Live from The Brooklyn Swamp

Day number infinity of the heat wave

Jul 15, 2024

As someone who left the sweltering Florida heat for seasons and smooth hair, I feel it’s my right to complain every day of the summer that this is NOT what I signed up for, and that it is way too hot to be out there summering in the city. I’m spending an inordinate amount of time searching for clothes that are “office-appropriate” but won’t show sweat, especially after a cramped rush hour commute (on heavy rotation: this and this). Like, say, a 92°F commute where a man shoves his way in after the doors are closing, yells “HUSTLE IN TEAM” and pushes myself and my fellow commuters into one another and we all reach for the same spot on the handlebar and gasp in repulsion and regret after accidentally touching each other’s sweaty, sticky hands. Clothes for if something like that happened.

Let’s get into this week’s Silly Little Things: Hiding Inside, Ignoring ConEd’s “Energy Conservation Request” Edition.

Stress Baking

My favorite indoor activity is baking. Specifically, the Stress Bake™. Born not from a craving for something sweet or an imminent dinner party, but rather the immediate, inexplicable need to create something with my hands and distract myself from whatever anxiety is brewing that day. Typically labor intensive and done during atypical baking hours, a Stress Bake™ should always: take much longer than you think it possibly could, be made completely from scratch, and include a moment where you realize you’re missing a key ingredient because you didn’t mise en place like you always tell yourself you’re going to.

This week, I made a stunningly silly little gluten-free blueberry treat. The dough recipe is by the Loopy Whisk, who always has THE BEST gluten-free recipes that actually taste like real pastries, instead of the crumbling cement I usually have the pleasure of enjoying. Like everyone else in 2021, I developed a gluten intolerance, and now I try really hard not to glute myself unless it’s really worth it. Plus, gluten-free baking is incredibly difficult to get right and so much harder to work with—the perfect makings of a Stress Bake™.

Pierce Abernathy made a blueberry + pistachio galette, so I made a blueberry + pistachio galette

A note on ingredients: Don’t ask for measurements. I do not know them. I’m always too impatient to use my scale and instead, prefer to feel my way through the process. How many blueberries? Not sure! Enough until it looks right. Sugar? Eyeball it! Everything else? Taste along the way and see what happens. It usually just…works.

Farmer’s market wild blueberries hit different

Roll out the dough on parchment paper and resist the urge to abandon your silly little project when it starts ripping and sticking to the rolling pin
Mix blueberries in a bowl with sugar, vanilla, salt, potato starch and lemon zest and let sit for as long as it takes to go the the bodega and pick up your missing ingredient—in this case, eggs
Pour blueberry mixture in the center of the dough and fold edges towards the center, repeat
Lightly egg wash the edges to give it some extra crisp and gloss (you can see how I’d forget the eggs, right?)
Finish with sugar and coarse salt and bake at 375°F for ~30 min
Top with crushed pistachios, a drizzle of olive oil and more blueberries, because you know you’re not going to eat them this week and they’re going to go moldy in the back of the fridge with the arugula you got to make “salads for the week”
Stare at your creation in all of its glory and eat a bite to confirm it’s as good as you know it is, then spend the rest of the afternoon agonizing over what to do with the rest of a large format dessert because the goal here was to make the pastry, not necessarily eat the pastry
Text friends asking if they want a galette, knowing this will inspire confusion
Explain to confused friends (all) what a galette is (kind of like a rustic, but chic! free-form pie) and slowly eat the entire dessert at decidedly non-dessert times throughout the week in lieu of consuming nutrients

Realizing this would have been so much better topped with ice cream, but it definitely would have melted before I made it home

Fleurs of the week

Flowers are definitely silly little things. Affordable luxuries I rotate every single week, that are either A: representative of the mood I’m in or B: representative of the mood I’d like to be in. These stems represent both. Spiderhead (A - prickly, moody) and Pink Astilbe (B - bright, soft). I think documenting my weekly stems will be one of the most beautiful parts of my life to look back on, especially since flowers will forever remind me of my pal Kate, the best florist there ever was <3.