On the Eve of the Super Blue Blood Moon

Which year starts tomorrow?

Witch year starts tomorrow!

I think the second full moon of the year (and the month, thus the blue moon) with a morning lunar eclipse is the right time to start Witch Year.

Pie year continue until the lunar new year (Feb. 16), but I'll be starting my exploration of witches wearing black and petting a white cat as I watch the closest moon of the year (super moon) go behind the shadow of the earth.

Sweet Potato Pie and I'll Shut My Mouth

Back in October I baked two fabulous sweet potato pies and took them to a dinner as part of a Race, Religion, and BBQ series of conversations coordinated by our pastor.  The pies were excellent, perhaps the best I have ever baked.  (Our pastor walked outside to where I was eating that night to inform me that he didn't like pumpkin pie, and that was the best pumpkin pie he'd ever eaten, someone else raved about the on Facebook the next day, and the Mister liked them better than all of the [very tasty] pecan and chocolate pies baked with students a few weeks later).

The whole time I was baking them, I had a line from Alabama Song of the South stuck in my head: "Song, song, of the South, sweet potato pie and I'll shut my mouth" and all fall I thought I was going to eloquently write about race and racism; and about sweet potato pie, misplaced pride, and shutting up. 

Today I met with some of the same people from the discussions to march in the Martin Luther King Jr. Day parade in Oklahoma City.  We intended to march with the Black Lives Matter organization, but ended up with representatives of several churches with Black Lives Matters signs.  It was bitterly cold with a north wind and the too-long parade route was not lined with people waving at the floats and the bands-- mostly just participants who had already marched the distance and were returning to the start.  I still don't have the right words to say about racism.  I hope that being there, that taking Aster and Dianthus and talking about the legacy of King, in itself says something, and that something is hopeful.

I will tell my students, all my students, from families from all over the world, that they are valued in my classroom tomorrow.

I will let you know that not all are being silent-- from the expected (you can listen to David Wheeler's pre-MLK Day sermon here, and more from "badass preacher lady" Elizabeth Hagan here), to the less so (my friend J, a returned Peace Corps volunteer, in the midst of chemo-induced anemia, posting how about the great people she's worked with-- abroad and as immigrants: my friend D has had to speak up in support of her students learning and teaching each other ecology in Haiti [some older blog posts here]).

Let us not be silent in the face of oppression. Yet if our words might further injustice, why, perhaps we should just take that pie and shut our mouths.

I'm Still Counting

Pie year continues through the Lunar New Year or such time that I decide the new theme begins, so, have no fear, there are still chances for more pie.

I baked three pies over the weekend, the two Epiphany pies shown below, plus a ham, leek, ricotta pie the next day, and surprised myself by not being able to give an accurate count when asked how many I've baked during Year of Pie. Obviously, what I need to do on the first night of class is sit down and count some more.

When I last counted in early September, I had baked (or directed the baking of) 47 pies to date.

Since then

September (1 in addition to the 7 listed earlier)
S'Mores Pie for the Mister's birthday

October (5)
 2 sweet potato for Race, Religion and BBQ discussions (more on both the pies and the issues sometime in the future) which are the best pies I have baked.
3 variations on chocolate chess for the Fall Festival at Church

November (10)

Nov. Student Baking: Sometimes One Forgets to Style the Pies

Lemon tart, Chocolate Chess, Chocolate Pecan, and Chocolate, Cinnamon, Coffee, Pecan with students (all good, but as the Mister declared, none as good as the sweet potato).
Pumpkin and sweet potato for the harvest breakfast
Mincemeat, cranberry mince, pumpkin and sweet potato for Thanksgiving

December (3)
Cranberry rhubarb, mincemeat and Shaker orange for Christmas

January (3 so far)
Sausage and apple, Epiphany Pie, and Ham, Leek and Ricotta

68 pies to date!

Variations of chocolate and pecan.  All good.  None better than
straight pecan or straight chocolate.

Pies Parading On

Thanksgiving

I chipped a small piece of my wrist in November, while talking.  Yes, the longest blog post hiatus of the ten year I have been doing this can be attributed needing to wear a brace from talking too enthusiastically.
Anyway, all is not fully healed, but I am now four days without a brace and soon I will be typing at full speed again.  In the meantime, Thanksgiving, Christmas and Epiphany Pies.

For Thanksgiving, The Mister cooked most of the meal at the Mister's parents' house.  I baked pumpkin, sweet potato, and mincement pies and a cranberry mince tart, while my parents drove from Colorado to Kansas to join us, bringing pecan pie, a cranberry walnut tart and my niece.

In my mind, Thanksgiving has a set pie tradition, and adding chocolate to those mentioned above would be about as far as I deviate from it.  Christmas, on the other hand, is not normally pie time in my household, and while the Christmas Eve meal and desserts are set, Christmas Day is fairly open.  I baked three pies, intentionally making them not predominately sweet.  I attempted to improve upon the homemade mincemeat from Thanksgiving and ended up with a very dense mincemeat, heavy on the allspice, ginger and cloves.  Cranberry rhubarb was tart and bright and the shaker orange with teh snowflake top crust included the peel, so it has bitter notes along with the tart and sweet.

We had friends over for dinner last night and decided to make it an Epiphany/Three Kings Day/Twelfth Night celebration.  We had a sausage apple pie in a cheddar crust and almond frangipane in puff pastry, which I am insisting on calling an Epiphany Pie rather than a Galette des Rois or a Kings' Cake.  Aster was very involved with the baking of both Epiphany pies and is planning what next year's kings' cake will be.  I explained to him the tradition of the "lucky" recipient of the charm being required to bake the next cake, and that he can do it any time until Mardi Gras, he doesn't need to wait until next year.  The Mister suggested that he bake a Martin Luther King Cake next week for after the march.

Joining Families at Thanksgiving on the Ranch

Mincemeat and Cranberry Rhubarb: Christmas

Shaker Orange: Christmas

Sausage and Apple in a Cheddar Crust: Ephiphany

Epiphany Pie-- or Galette des Rois