Stir (24 page)

You'll end up with more vanilla sugar than you need for this recipe. Save what's left in a lidded jar for sprinkling on cinnamon toast, whipping into cream, or stirring into anything that might benefit from a hint of vanilla flavor. If you'd rather not splurge on the vanilla bean, ½ teaspoon of vanilla extract will do. As for the white wine, use whatever you have on hand. I've tried everything from Moscato d'Asti to sauvignon blanc with splendid results. I don't think you can go wrong.

Serve these warm, with a pour of cold sweet cream or a scoop of vanilla ice cream if you'd like, though they don't need it. I store the leftovers in a jar in the fridge and eat them chilled over yogurt or oatmeal. My friend Carrie puts them on a sandwich with melted cheese. That sounds like a plan to me.

½ cup white wine

1 cup (200 grams) granulated sugar

1 vanilla bean

8 apricots, halved and pitted

⅓ cup (45 grams) shelled, roasted, and salted pistachios

1–2 pinches ground cardamom

Heat the oven to 425 degrees.

Pour the wine into a 2½-quart baking dish. (Swirl in the vanilla extract, if using.) Put the sugar into a bowl, split the vanilla bean with a sharp knife, scrape out the seeds, and rub them into the sugar with your fingertips. Measure 3 to 4 tablespoons of the sugar into a shallow bowl or pie plate. Transfer the remaining sugar to an airtight jar, bury the scraped-out vanilla pod inside, and reserve for another time.

Press the apricot halves into the sugar to coat them on both sides, then place them, skin side down, in the wine bath. Bake for 35 to 40 minutes, until the apricots have deepened in color, puckered around the edges, and barely resist when you poke them with a fork. Meanwhile, coarsely chop the pistachios and toss them with the cardamom.

To serve, spoon a few warm apricots and a bit of the winey syrup into each bowl, and scatter with a spoonful of nuts.

Serves 4.

P
rune plums were back in the market. September is their time. I spotted them in the far bin and stepped carefully through the crowd. We'd been home from Berlin for a year. That spring, we'd moved from our one-bedroom apartment into the larger unit next door. We had a proper dining room now, with space for a proper table. Our small red one was now my writing desk. From our living room and bedroom windows, I could see the park. There was our picnic spot, the playground, the field.

I picked up a plum and ran my thumb across its cloudy purple skin. Prune plums are more oval than round, egglike, only smaller. When you hold one in the palm of your hand and close your fingers around it, it all but disappears.

“Taste one,” the farmer said. “I'd say taste two, but I assume you guys can share.” He winked, gesturing at my belly. I smiled and bit into the fruit's flesh, sweet-tart and firm. “When are you due?” he asked.

“Any day,” I said and felt a ripple beneath my ribs, as though on cue. The sugar from the plum had reached her fast. I walked home, my tote bulging with plums, bumping gently against my hip.

Prune plums are nice enough straight from the tree, but really, they're for cooking. Heat emboldens them. They hold their form beautifully in the oven and emerge plump with juices, deep purple and sweet. I'd never thought of plum as a flavor, distinct and retrievable from my memory like green apple, banana, or peach. Then I tasted a prune plum, cooked—baked, actually, into a buttery cake—and thought,
I know what a plum tastes like now
.

I put a cut-up stick of butter into a pot and swirled it over a low flame. Then in went the sugar, the vanilla and almond extracts, the flour, and the salt. I popped one hip, steering my belly to the side so that I could move in closer, stirred the mixture into a soft dough, and pressed it into a fluted pan.

As the crust baked, I tipped the plums onto the counter, washed and dried them, cut them lengthwise down their center seams, and pulled them apart. I had a plum half in one hand, the pit I'd just pried loose in the other, when I felt a now-familiar ache in my back, an insistent tightening around my middle. Still holding the fruit, I leaned over the counter on folded arms and breathed deeply until the tension released. These contractions were just practice. I'd been feeling them for weeks.

The crust in the oven darkened a shade. The scent of almond and butter hit. Of cakes, of cookies, of macaroons, of gratitude for where I'd been and where I was going. I felt the desire to nourish and be nourished, to make something, to
be
something. The desire to begin.

 • • • 

On September 9, 2011, our daughter came screaming out into the world. Nine days later, in a living room full of our family and closest friends, we named her: Mia Louise, after my grandmothers. Julia and Eitan brought cupcakes; my sister Kasey brought bagels. There was lox and champagne and fruit. I didn't cook a thing.

Megan had flown in from Los Angeles for the gathering and after everyone had left she pulled out a gift.

“For Mia,” she said. “I hope you like it.”

I unwound the tissue paper from around something hard, narrow, and flat, about the length of a shoe box: a wooden ramp. And an elephant, painted blue, that rocked its way down,
ke-donk, ke-donk, ke-donk.
We stood there watching it go, Megan, Eli, and I, with a snoozing Mia in my arms.

“Megan!” I was delighted. “Where did you find this?”

“Prague,” she said.

It took me a second to understand what she was saying, for the trip she had made without us to come to mind.

“That was more than a year ago.”

“Yeah,” Megan said. “I've been holding on to it for her.”

“But . . . How . . . ?” I didn't know what to say.

Megan smiled. “I knew she'd come.”

Once-upon-a-times have a way of sneaking up on you. Stories never begin where they begin. Mia was stirring. With her eyes still closed she moved her head side to side, nuzzling into my chest. “Hi, sweetheart,” I whispered into her ear. I sat down on the sofa, laid her on my lap with her head up by my knees, and stroked her tiny fists. She smacked her lips and poked her tongue out, searching, hungry. I drew her to my breast, and she ate.

Italian prune plums arrive in the final weeks of summer and don't stick around for long, so when you see them, grab them and make this tart. The press-in crust keeps things simple and bakes up beautifully into a sweet and salty shortbread-like shell. Then all that's left to do is fill it with fruit, whisk together a custard, pour it over top, and bake. While I'm waiting for prune plums to come around, I make this with apricots, instead. Delicious.

For the pastry:

1¼ cups plus 1 tablespoon (180 grams) all-purpose flour

½ teaspoon sea salt flakes, like Maldon

½ cup (1 stick; 113 grams) unsalted butter, melted and cooled

½ cup (100 grams) granulated sugar

¼ teaspoon pure almond extract

¼ teaspoon pure vanilla extract

For the filling:

½ cup heavy whipping cream

1 large egg, lightly beaten

½ teaspoon pure vanilla extract

3 tablespoons granulated sugar

1 tablespoon flour

10–13 Italian prune plums, pitted and halved

Heat the oven to 350 degrees and generously butter the bottom and sides of a 9-inch fluted tart pan with a removable bottom. 

Make the pastry:

Whisk together the flour and salt in a medium bowl, and set aside. Put the sugar and melted butter into a large bowl and mix well with a spoon. Add the extracts, flour, and salt to the sugar and butter mixture, and stir to form a soft dough. Transfer the dough to the center of the buttered pan and press it evenly into the bottom and sides of the pan. Bake for 13 to 15 minutes, until the dough puffs slightly and takes on a bit of color. Set aside to cool. (It doesn't need to cool all the way to room temperature, just enough so that you won't cook the egg in the custard on contact.)

While the pastry is baking, make the custard:

Whisk together the flour and sugar in a small bowl. Combine the heavy cream, egg, and vanilla in a medium bowl, and whisk well. Add the flour and sugar, and whisk again until smooth.

Place the prune plums cut-side down into the cooled pastry in two concentric circles, with one in the center. Pour the custard into the tart around the fruit. Bake for 40 to 45 minutes, until the custard is just set and the top blushes with spots of golden brown. Cool before serving.

Serves 8 to 10.

This book would not exist had I not been around to write it. To all of my doctors in Burlington and Boston who diagnosed me, took me apart, fixed what was broken, and put me back together again: Thank you for saving my life.

I am especially grateful to Dr. Bruce Tranmer for his intelligence and warmth, for never losing sight of the person in the patient, and for assembling and mentoring a team of brilliant residents who practice medicine with great courage, compassion, and humility.

At Fletcher Allen, I was fortunate to be in the hands of extraordinary nurses and aides, generous, unflinching souls who kept me feeling human in my darkest hours. They were my world. In flipping through an old notebook from my hospital stay, I found a list in my father's handwriting with the heading “Nurses We Love.” Susan Amidon, Carolina Baldwin, Greg Brooks, Erin Charles, Peter Clark, Patty Crease, Amela Dulma, Aimee Eaton, Darlene Fraize, Mike Higgins, Pete Kassel, M. J. McMahon, and Michelle Norse: Thank you for your care.

One terrifying night in the emergency department back in Boston, I met a young doctor named Kristopher Kahle. He acted as my advocate and ally, above the call of duty. Thank you, Dr. Kahle, for making me feel less alone, and for helping a girl get some Tylenol.

I am grateful to all who helped me settle back into my body once the gravest danger had passed. Jeffrey Fergerson got me moving again in the earliest days of my recovery and let me talk his ear off about food on our many laps around the rehab center. Aimee Klein picked up where Jeff left off, pushing me with humor and resolve to trust in my own strength. And where would I be without Holly Herman? Holly is a force who practices physical therapy with the utmost generosity and skill. She told me that pain is temporary—and proved it.

To all my dear friends mentioned in this book, and the many who are not: Thank you for your every kindness, for guiding me through, and keeping me sane. You made me whole again.

If the food in this book is delicious, it's because I had help from some first-rate bakers and cooks. Alana Chernila let me pick her brain about recipe writing (among many other things). Ashley Rodriguez helped me get my plum tart just right. René Becker entrusted me with his almond macaroon recipe and helped me adapt it for the home kitchen. Andrew Janjigian was endlessly generous with his knowledge of all things flour, yeast, and beyond. Molly Birnbaum edited my recipes with care and, together with Andrew, spent a dizzying amount of time discussing measurements, leaveners, pie crusts—anything and everything that kept me up at night about telling people what to do in their kitchens.

My neighbors Cansu Canca, Holger Spamann, April Paffrath, Matthew Krom, Esmé Krom, Sam and Elisha Gechter, Lisa Ceglia, Andrew Blom, and Cecilia Blom came through with spare eggs, sticks of butter, cups of milk, and more during recipe testing when my own kitchen came up short. Sam and Elisha let me stuff them silly with many rounds of cookies, cakes, breads, and pies. They gave me their honest reviews so that I could do better.

To my recipe testers, Marco Ajello, Katie Baxter, Talya Benoff, Molly Birnbaum, Andrew Blom, Carrie Bornstein, Alana Chernila, Stephanie Cornell, Amy Fechtor, Anna Fechtor, Kasey Fechtor, Rivka Friedman, Lynn Glickman, Sarit Kattan Gribetz, Janet Helgeson, Hannah Heller, Eitan Hersh, Julia Hoffman, Esmé Krom, Isabelle Levy, Becky Lurie, Laurie Mazur, Lisa Moussalli, Sandra Naddaff, April Paffrath, Adena Silberstein, Amy Thompson, Lukas Volger, and Kit Wannen: a from-the-rooftops thank-you for your many hours in the kitchen, your attention to detail, your very fine taste, your thoughtful, thorough feedback, and your enthusiasm for this project.

One million thanks and at least as many cookies are due to the people in my life who have helped me to write:

To the readers of Sweet Amandine, for your kindness and companionship, for believing in what the kitchen has to tell us, and in me. When I got stuck along the way, I'd think of all of you, remember for whom I was writing, and carry on.

To my sixth grade teacher Deb Delisle, who made a special place for me beneath the spider plant to sit and write.

To my high school English teachers Nancy Brunswick, Bob Hastings, and Jan Morgan, for teaching me how to think about words on a page. Of the many competing voices in my head when I write, yours are ones I listen to.

To Savine Weizman, for long talks on Saturday afternoons, for introducing me to Rilke, for your profound understanding of what it means to strive in writing and in life, and for broccoli with mayonnaise.

To my fellow students in Darcy Frey's creative nonfiction seminar, for helping me see that there was a story here, and encouraging me to tell it.

To the faculty, staff, and alumni of the Wexner Graduate Fellowship for standing by me, for caring about this project, and supporting me in every way.

To my new friends and colleagues at the Makeshift Society, and to Shannon Lehman, for softening the landing when I moved with my family to San Francisco in the final weeks of this project, and seeing me through to the finish.

To Professor Ruth Wisse, for your wise counsel over the years, for cheering me on at every turn, for reminding me that while life is short, it is also long, and for encouraging me to write.

To Eitan Kensky, a brilliant writer and friend, for your support and confidence in me.

To Steve Jacobson, for seeing me so clearly and believing in me.

To Mary Medlin, for caring about stories and how they're told, for your faith in me, and for your friendship.

To Molly Wizenberg and Luisa Weiss, for paving the way, for boosting me up, and for so much inspiration—plus plenty of nuts-and-bolts advice and even some saving the day.

To Eitan Hersh, Julia Hoffman, Sarit Kattan Gribetz, and Jonathan Gribetz, for your enduring friendship, for knowing me well and loving me anyway, for being so damn smart, and for your clear-eyed feedback on my proposal and manuscript.

To Molly Birnbaum, whom I've already mentioned twice, but it isn't enough: for your hands-on help with every single stage of this project, for your wisdom and your cheers, and what feels like a lifetime of friendship over the past five years.

I am fortunate to have landed at Penguin with this book-to-be three years ago. Caroline Sutton saw in this project everything I hoped it would be and granted me the time and space to get the job done. Lavina Lee patiently awaited the final manuscript and worked her magic to get everything just right. Thanks to Sheila Moody for her smart and thorough copyediting, to Liz Byer for her meticulous proofreading, and to Matthew Daddona for helping to shepherd this first-time author through the sometimes confusing publishing process.

To Lindsay Gordon, Casey Maloney, and Farin Schlussel, thank you for getting behind this book so fully, and for calming my nerves as we released it into the world. I also benefited greatly from the insights of Hillary Tisman and Nach Waxman on what happens to a book once the writing is done. Thanks to you both for sharing your considerable wisdom.

I was still several thousand words and many pages of revisions from the finish line when I first saw the cover design for this book. My energy was flagging, but Alison Forner's beautiful work inspired me to finish strong and create a final product that would deliver what her cover promises. I am also grateful to Eve Kirch for an interior design that reflects the spirit and tone of this book.

My editor, Becky Cole, can hold an entire book in her head at once and flip through it as though the pages were right in front of her. For editing so smart it felt like cheating, for dazzling me with her flare for structure and form, for her patience, her humor, and for taking such good care of me and this book, I am unspeakably grateful.

My agent, Rebecca Friedman, always knows just what to do. Thank you, friend, for being right about everything, for having my back, for your intelligence and intuition about what makes a story sing, for getting this book into Becky's hands, right where it belonged, and for not marrying Eli.

To my writing partner Katrina Goldsaito, who dove deep into the mud with me and stayed until every word was in place: What can I say? Without you, this book would not be this book. For your x-ray vision, for keeping me true, for the courage to find my voice and use it, for inspiring me with your own brilliant, sparkling prose, for our weekly meetings and countless e-mails, phone calls, and texts that kept me afloat, thank you. I can't wait for more.

To Megan Metcalf, for that luminous mind of yours and oversized heart, for seeing me, for lifting me up, for letting us claim you as family, for suggesting I start Sweet Amandine, and introducing me to Katrina; for the wooden bird from Prague you saved in secret for years because you had a feeling there would be two, and for presenting it to our Freddie when she came along. I'm so grateful for you, friend.

My cousin Katie Wannen knows what's what. She enriched this story with her insights on illness and recovery, and my life with her intelligence and grace. Thank you to my great-aunt Eileen Farkas, my grandfather Robert Fechtor, and Jill Brock for always asking about my writing, for being so smart and so good, and for their faith in me. I wrote many of these pages with my grandmother Louise Fechtor, of blessed memory, in mind. I hope she shines in them.

Yeseny Alvarez isn't family, but she might as well be. For your energy and smarts, for delighting my daughters, for loving them as if they were your own, and playing no small role making them the wonderful creatures they are; for teaching me by example how to be the parent I want to be, thank you. I would still be on chapter one, Yeseny, if it weren't for you.

Thank you to my sisters- and brothers-in-law, Jonathan Schleifer, Katie Connolly, Yitzchak Schleifer, Talya Benoff, and Atara Schleifer for their support and love throughout my recovery and the writing of this book. Special thanks to Katie for her insight and encouragement at the earliest stages of this project. And to Leslie Rosenberg, for being a kindred spirit.

To Sarah and Steve Schleifer, thank you for Eli, and for you, for welcoming me into your family from day one and showing me the kind of love parents usually reserve for their own flesh and blood. Thank you, Sarah, for teaching me more than you know about family and love. Thank you, Steve, for taking an interest in my work, and for our many important conversations throughout the creation of this book. I love the way you think.

I am grateful to my brother and sisters, Caleb Fechtor, Kasey Fechtor, and Anna Fechtor, for their discerning eyes, their excellent taste, and for inspiring me with their own writing, baking, and art. Your support means the world to me. Thank you, Caleb, for your patience with me when this book and new motherhood kept me from making it across the river as often as I would have liked; to Kasey, for hours upon hours of hanging out with your nieces so that I could sit and write; and to Anna, for three weeks of tremendous help with the girls as I found my way back to this project after Freddie was born.

My parents taught me that I could be anything, which was convenient when, at age thirty-one, I decided to try to write a book.

To my mother, Laurie Mazur: Thank you for understanding me completely, for your careful eye and intelligent notes that helped me tame and tighten this narrative, and for dropping everything time and again to fly in and save the day.

Thank you to my father, Stephen Fechtor, for knowing exactly how to be and what to say, and to my stepmother, Amy Thompson, for showing me how it's done.

To my daughters, Mia and Freddie: Thank you for being you.

And to Eli: Thank you for your love. We're just getting started.