Sometimes a Cookie is Just a Cookie.

Dear Boo,

I have nothing profound to say about these cookies. A fact which has kept me from writing to you about them for some time, despite the fact that they are delicious, a cinch to make, and are both dairy free and flourless, which makes them perfect for those of us on restrictive diets/those of us celebrating the upcoming Jewish holiday. I just couldn't come up with anything poignant, moving, touching, funny, or otherwise worth saying about them, and so they've languished for weeks without a mention.

I thought about using these as a way to discuss why I’ve decided once and for all, that I am against diets of the sacrificial, weight-loss type, the kind that inevitably lend moral weight to inanimate, edible food items, and through their inevitable consumption (because we will, at some point, cave and give in and eat eat eat, feeling horrible and disgusted/disgusting the whole time), give us the false sense of BEING Good or Bad, as if these morsels have the ability to taint or cleanse our very souls. But I mean, really? Do you want to hear more about this? I'm annoying myself here.

Then I thought about something more light hearted, like the fact that when you mix up these ingredients, they somehow turn in an instant, into a thick glue-like consistency that caused my forearm muscles to ripple with the effort of moving the whisk through, despite the fact that I pick up and put down an 18 pound solid (and very cute) weight about a hundred thousand times a day. It reminded me of making ‘ooblech’ as a kid, a potent mix of corn starch, water and food coloring which turned solid when enclosed in a fist, and liquid when you opened your fingers. The best was hurling it at a wall while in the liquid state, a little puddle in your palm, which would then burst forth as spattering droplets which shattered upon impact with the surface.

The 18 lb weight enjoys some avocado

Then I thought I'd talk about how legend has it our grandmother used to bake every. single. day during our mother's childhood, and that homemade dessert would be served at every. single. meal. And that she did this while raising three kids and before the advent of seamless.com. And how I have one tiny person, a one bedroom apartment, and can barely manage to boil a pot of pasta, let alone make a pie crust on a tuesday afternoon. AND my husband does the laundry. But that these cookies are so simple and so fast to make that even I can do a fairly good impersonation of grandma and have a fresh-baked batch ready by dinner time. I was going to go on talking about how I still, six months in to motherhood, can't seem to get much done and how quickly each day seems to go by and how my standards for productivity have been lowered to the point where responding in a semi-timely fashion (read: three days late) to one email and finishing the dishes in the sink deserves a pat on the back. And then of course I remembered raising and growing and keeping alive another human being is pretty freaking productive and then I fell asleep from BOREDOM because complaining about being tired and busy is like the most boring thing in the world and I refuse to do any more of it.

And then I stopped thinking about these cookies and started thinking about how many other things I am not doing because I'm waiting for something outside of myself to happen--inspiration to strike, a sign to be sent my way, someone to swoop in and rescue me from doing it myself, fear to be miraculously removed from my path, indecision to be wiped away once and for all. And the list was loooong, lemme tell you. Its tremendously easy for me, I've found, to think about doing something without actually doing it. To focus on all the reasons not to do it, or not to do it NOW, or why someone else should really be the one to do it, or to get up and eat another pretzel--just ONE more--before I do.

And really, what is all of that nonsense anyway.

So I'm taking a stance, here and now, to stop waiting. Sometimes inspiration comes. Sometimes it doesn't. Sometimes it shows up when you're busy slogging away. Sometimes it arrives at precisely the moment you sit down to do your work, with hours of uninterrupted quiet stretched ahead of you and the chair that's perfectly soft and shaped to your butt with extra lumbar support. But usually not. Sometimes things you (I) write will suck. Sometimes they won't. Sometimes other people will do it better. (And they'll definitely do it better if you don't do it at all.) Sometimes cookies are profound. And sometimes a cookie is just a cookie. And you write about it anyway. Because its better to write than not to write. Because they're yummy and your sister should have the recipe.

You're welcome.

Love,

The Mouse

P.S. Speaking of inspiration, I will forever love this interview on the subject.

Chocolate Brownie Cookies (Courtesy of Bon Appetit)

3 cups gluten-free powdered sugar
3/4 cup unsweetened cocoa powder
1 teaspoon kosher salt
2 large egg whites
1 large egg
4 ounces bittersweet chocolate, chopped
3 tablespoons cacao nibs preparation

Place racks in lower and upper thirds of oven; preheat to 350°F. Whisk powdered sugar, cocoa powder, and salt in a large bowl, then whisk in egg whites and egg; fold in chocolate and cacao nibs. Spoon batter by the tablespoonful onto 2 parchment-lined baking sheets, spacing 2" apart. Bake, rotating sheets once, until cookies are puffed, cracked, and set just around the edges, 14–16 minutes. Transfer baking sheets to wire racks and let cookies cool on pan (they'll firm up). DO AHEAD: Cookies can be baked 3 days ahead. Store airtight at room temperature.

I Would have Posted this Sooner, but...

Dear Boo,

So you know I have this deadline by which I'm supposed to be done with at least a rough draft of this play I'm writing. I basically had all summer to write it--3 whole months--which isn't that much when it comes to writing a play, but is certainly more than the 6 days I now find myself with. Now, I don't like to brag but I'm kind of a prodigy when it comes to procrastination. Not too many can hold a candle to the commitment, skill, and ingenuity I bring to the table. Basically, I'm kind of a big deal. Just as a sample, here's a few of the things I've done to avoid work in the past couple of weeks:

1) Watched a ton of Olympic events
2) Reenacted exciting moments from the Olympics that the Boyfriend may have missed.
3) Put on and taken off gym clothes multiple times (I've also actually gone to the gym a couple of times, but that's a whole other procrastination story.)
4) Cut my hair.
5) Sat on a rooftop drinking a bottle of Cristal borrowed from the home of a fugitive on the run from the FBI. Not joking. (Unless you work for the FBI, in which case I am.)
5) Read the following blogs:
Orangette
Amateur Gourmet
The Wednesday Chef
The Girl Who Ate Everything
6) Checked and rechecked said blogs to see if they'd posted anything new.
7) Explored the Chamber of Commerce website for every small cute beach town within 200 miles of NYC.
8) Called a million hotels/motels/inns/b&bs to see if they'd consider offering a special asylum rate for one poor little girl being unfairly persecuted by a deadline.
9) Watched a marathon of Degrassi the Next Generation. SO good.
10) Thrown at least two fits.
11) Thought about vacuuming the carpet.
12) Read every word of a blog written by a girl I haven't seen since high school who writes exclusively about her new baby for the sake of her family members.
13) Watched Meet the Press, Face the Nation, and an infomercial hosted by erik estrada about a utopian community in Arkansas where I MAY or may not have bought a home at a cut-rate price.
14) Facebook. Nuff said.
15) Wrote a blog entry.

**At this point I'd like to draw attention to the fact that I started this post 5 days ago and can't seem to finish it.**

I wanted to end this post with a recipe since one of the best ways to procrastinate is to cook something elaborate and time consuming, or something like risotto which requires constant attention so while your Boyfriend (insert appropriate nomenclature here) says, "shouldn't you be working on that application/dissertation/expense report/new design for ass-less chaps" you can be all, "I would, if this risotto didn't require me to stand right here stirring constantly". HOWEVER, I have been too busy procrastinating to actually get to the whole cooking aspect of this blog.

Instead I offer you this handy procrastination tip, in place of a recipe: MENUPAGES. The ultimate time eater for the...eater.

One of my favorite ways to waste time is to play the find-a-restaurant Game. Ask me for a not-too-expensive-but-still-sharp-and-appropriate-for-dinner-with-parents-Mediterranean-restaurant-on-the-upper-west-side and I'll happily jump on this site for initial research supplemented by NY Magazine and NY Times and Chowhound reviews for hours of wasted pleasure. By the way, the answer is Kefi.

(Just yesterday, I played this game when our Uncle (the first foodie I ever knew) and our family friends (of the tomato revelation fame) were looking for a place on the Lower East Side near Rockwood where they could eat before your gig. I settled on Little Giant, a fantastic restaurant tucked away on Orchard Street where A.Mac. and I went for one of our secret don't-tell-anyone-we're-splurging-on-this-meal dinners. I plan to treat myself to a dinner here when I finally meet this deadline. Or finish this blog post--whichever comes first.)

Love,
The Mouse

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