hsb's low-carb pb cookies

I recently had to pass up the opportunity to attend at tasting at the Harvard Sweet Boutique in Hudson, MA, both due to being ridiculously busy, and the fact that I am constrained to visiting bakeries that are easily accessible by public transit. It was maybe a good thing, because I think there are certain items I might have eaten until I got sick.

Luckily, Sue George (the founder) really wanted to make sure my tummy didn't get too comfortable, so she shared her recipe for low-carb peanut butter chocolate chunk cookies with me.

Um, I might have had four in one day. Maybe five.

And now I've happily unfortunately discovered that HSB's sweet treats can be ordered online, and they are currently selling Boston Strong cookies with all profits going to the Boston One Fund. The next time Joe and I head out of town for a special trip, this is a business I'd like to go support...their store location serves breakfast, lunch, dinner, and dessert, and I can only imagine how delicious they are.

I followed the recipe as shared with me (below), except that I used palm sugar for the white sugar, didn't pack the brown sugar, and used whole wheat pastry flour for the white flour. (If you do the same, be sure to use a little less flour than what's called for.) The cookies are so delicious. These aren't of the chewy variety...they're just sort of soft, and almost melt in your mouth a little. Delicious.

Harvard Sweet Boutique's Low-Carb PB Chocolate Chunk Cookies

Ingredients:

4 oz. (1 stick) unsalted butter

1/2 cup peanut butter (creamy)

1/2 cup light brown sugar, packed

1/2 cup sugar

1 egg

1/2 teaspoon vanilla extract

1 1/4 cup flour

1 teaspoon baking soda

1/4 teaspoon salt

1 cup semisweet chocolate chunks

1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees.

2. Prepare baking sheets with parchment paper.

3. Cream butter, peanut butter, light brown sugar, and sugar with mixer.

4. Add egg and vanilla and mix well.

5. Sift together flour, baking soda, and salt, and whisk to mix.

6. Add flour mixture to peanut butter mixture and stir until just blended.

7. Add chocolate chunks and mix well.

8. Bake 12-14 minutes until golden brown.

yarn along - the new jim crow

My yarn and books are all over the place lately. Reading and crocheting were both major stress relievers for me during my crazy last month of the semester. But with all the hopping from job to job, place to place, I was hopping all around my projects and books too. I currently have three crochet projects going and have finally gotten my reading list down to two books.

And for the record, I am the sort of person who likes to finish one thing before moving on to the next. I have been embracing the diversity.

One of the projects has been to clothe our second hot water bottle in its own cozy, continuing on my quest to use up the miscellaneous yarn in my basket. I tried to make this one match Joe's personality a little more. He rarely uses a hot water bottle, but I figured it would be a nice gesture, since the first cover has my name written all over it.

The book I'm sharing this week is a very sobering read, but it's so important and incredible that I had to share. The New Jim Crow basically presents the argument that our present criminal justice system is inherently racist and results in the systematic oppression of men of color. It's a serious argument, and I've tried to approach it with skepticism. But every time a doubt arises in my mind, Michelle Alexander's next paragraph explains it.

I highly recommend it for everyone. It's a heavy read, but I can promise you will be stunned.

There are so many jaw-dropping statistics...

The US has the highest rate of incarceration in the world.

Three out of every four black men in Washington, DC are in prison.

White people are equally likely to be involved in drug activity, but black men are more likely to be arrested for it.

In Chicago, young black men are statistically more likely to go to prison than to college.

And Alexander's very convincing argument is that these things reflect a broken system.

I promise I'll be back soon with something a little more lighthearted. But I think these tough issues deserve our attention too, right?

Linking up with Ginny. Happy Wednesday!

a saturday for listening to the birds

I think, as we grow older, we have to make a choice...

We can become stubbornly rooted in the people we've always imagined ourselves to be, falling back again and again on, "It's just the way I am."

Or, we can continuously redefine ourselves, holding on to the things that we've come to know and love, and letting go of the ones that we eventually recognize as hurtful to ourselves or others.

I hope to be the second kind of person.

And I am happy to have found a life partner who thinks the same way I do. We share a long history of perfectionism, an over-appreciation for structure, a resistance to relaxation. And we both know that those are not pieces of ourselves that we want to hold onto.

So on Saturday morning, we ignored the voices of work and dirty dishes and sensible meals at home, hopped on a train, and instead listened to the voices of Fenway birds on a little hike to the Isabella Stewart Gardner museum.

We finally exercised our free pass privileges (yes, you heard right) to the ISG, and spent a couple of hours breathing in the beauty of that old house...its lush courtyard, dark wood rooms, and canvasses from lifetimes ago. It is absolutely the place that everyone has told us it is, and now that we know we can go as often as we'd like for nothing, we might just adopt it as our second home. We spent this first trip just being in all the rooms, but we'll likely grab the audio tour next time so we can actually know what we're looking at.

Saturday was truly the most perfect day for spontaneous adventuring. I can't tell you how happy I was to don boat shoes and my cropped pink pants again, and get a little sun on my whiter-than-porcelain skin.

Our adventures took us past the Harvard med campus and then along Boylston to one of the tastiest places in Boston...

Tasty Burger veggie burgers are my favorite (don't worry, meat lovers...most of the menu is for you). Sometimes I am actually a little disappointed with healthy veggie burgers...they seem to miss the point. But I can assure you, Tasty Burger veggie burgers are decidedly not healthy. Infused with a barbecue flavor and sporting the crackliest grilled edges, they are a vegetarian sinner's delight.

Eaten in the sparkling sun on a bright red picnic table? Even better. So good, it might make you pull a Gollum...

You can bet I'm holding on tight to those sunny memories (my precious) as clouds are now sneaking their way across our sky, enveloping us in a week's worth of rain.

Hope your weekend was as beautiful and spontaneous as ours! This weekend, we let go of our inner voices so we could listen to the birds instead. As you've grown up, what parts of yourself have you let go of for happier things?

brothers

One of my favorite parts about visiting J's family is watching him with his brothers.

Three boys.

They pretend they're only mildly pleased to see each other...pats on the back, handshakes...

But then they gather in the yard with a wiffle ball and a lawn chair to mark the strike zone. I sit on the sidewalk, resolutely unhelpful in catching and returning stray balls. And while I take pictures of flowers and soak up all the sun I can get, I listen to them joking and teasing each other.

Greg is the youngest. It feels like everything out of his mouth is a joke (and he is funny), but at heart he is the sweetest...the least likely to argue and the happiest to see everyone gathering at home again.

Michael is the middle child. We can relate about that, I think. He is a profound intellectual, an artist, and the most likely to argue...but always in defense of truth and rightness.

And Joe is the oldest. He is the big bear, comforting and quiet. Like many oldest children, he appears to let nothing bother him and is always ready with advice for his brothers. I know that the feeling of responsibility has never left him.

If any of them read this, they will laugh at how sentimental it sounds. Because the truth is, they spend most of their time together reminiscing about when Michael pooped in Joe's bedroom (he was 2) and seeing how many times they can get their mother to roll her eyes.

At the wedding we attended last weekend, Joe and Greg shared a total of five entrees between them. This is their quality time.

When we're visiting, I get to talk philosophy with Michael while I poke Greg in the ribs, trying to find that ticklish spot. I have to admit, it feels like a little honor that I'll be able to call myself their sister soon.

When it's time to say good bye, they maybe hug, and I tease them for loving each other more than they'd care to admit.