Jesus likes chocolate
December food magazine covers usually feature artfully arranged cookies, guilting everyone into some type of baking production not seen during the remainder of the year.
Except in my mother’s kitchen, where the cookie production never ceases.
The holiday batches, produced and delivered on the same day, seem somewhat unremarkable as they are normal kitchen output (although the cookies themselves remain rightfully famous and anticipated by recipients).
I’m fond of one of their neighbor’s holiday gifts, a fresh salsa heavy on the spring onions that we incorporate into our traditional Christmas Eve fajitas.
Atlanta is traditionally a city of important hair, serious shopping, and, during the holiday season, a Pink Pig. On Saturday, Katrina, Kassandra, and I went shopping at Lenox, which announces its presence streetside with a line of international flags—this is a mall—
and has absorbed two Atlanta traditions: the Great Tree, which used to top the downtown Rich’s,
and, on the topmost parking deck, the Pink Pig.
In 1953, Priscilla (the original Pig) circled the toy department inside Rich’s before movin’ on up with her new porcine friend Percival to ring the Great Tree on the department store’s roof a few years later. In my childhood, the Pig came out of retirement for the Festival of Trees, where my dance company performed each year, and this past weekend, the line of parents and young children stretched almost into the store.
Kassandra and I debated whether or not to even venture inside the mall, where it was less crowded than usual; still, we made quick work of our chain store errands, and left for Little 5 Points (L5P) and the Biscuit.
Locals worry that the Flying Biscuit’s changed ownership will alter the food and that the restaurant’s extended weekend lines will no longer be worth the wait; happily, we found the Biscuit still true to the Candler Park area and its best dishes, organic oatmeal pancakes with peaches and love cakes (black bean cakes with tomatillo salsa and feta).
Katrina and I always split sides of love, fried green tomatoes, and oatmeal pancakes (one or the other of us will place the order for all three dishes and we both laugh as the server’s eyebrow raises); Kassandra’s favorite order: french toast with raspberry sauce and crème anglaise. [Note: The biscuits are fine, but not transcendent, and can be bought next door at the bakery.]
After I took the above interior shot at the Biscuit with my SLR, I experimented with the camera on my new phone. The below image encourages me in my campaign toward stealthier food photography.
Leaving the Biscuit, we went into L5P proper, a more diverse area than the images show.
My favorite outside vendor sold mistletoe and smiled:
Following bikers back toward the highway, we returned to the house, venturing out the next day to scout unfinished construction as backgrounds for Kassandra’s new portfolio images.
I took the far shot, Katrina the closer one.
For me, the wonder and magic of Christmas
mixes with my mother’s caffeine of choice (long before it was a revamped energy drink),
Toby’s gerbilicious favorite toy,
the bizarre branding of vegetarian organic,
the neighbor’s afternoon shooting of ducks in the lake from his balcony,
my mother’s perplexing spice cabinet,
and stupid pet tricks.
Poor dog. At least Toby has a name, which is more than can be said for Kassandra’s friend Michael’s fish that she petsat over the weekend. The fish survived the weekend, but I can’t help but wonder how you might mourn an anonymous pet. (Wrapping him or her in your trench in the pouring rain and admitting that there is some inherent sense of belonging, I suppose.)
On Christmas Day, glamazon that she is, Kassandra stole Charlie Brown’s shirt while I wore Heidi’s dress;
according to my mother, Katrina is wearing a kaftan—I hold this is a mu’umu’u.
Kassandra worked on the salad
while Katrina threatened to take away my new camera bag if I blogged this picture of her dotting the macaroni pie with butter.
We celebrate with a casual Christmas brunch, and this year I decided on a comfortably southern meal of the meat & 3 variety, which demands a multiplicity of vegetable sides. My father’s mother hailed from Charleston, so her macaroni pie fit our theme, as did cranberry beans that Katrina and Nana shelled. (We simmered the beans in broth for half an hour over medium heat and stirred in leeks sweated in butter.)
Finishing our menu prep, we pulled the spoon bread (the southern equivalent of baked polenta) out of the oven just before we ate; nevertheless, it fell more than an inch by the time we had finished dishing the pea soup.
Staying casual, we went green first (pea soup and a salad with pomegranate seeds, berries, and a warm pecan dressing) before ham with Christmas chutney, cranberry beans, macaroni pie, maple-glazed carrots, spoon bread, baked coleslaw (Mom’s recipe), and cream drop biscuits.
Katrina called me last week as I was pulling cake pans out of the oven for my friend Chris’s birthday and her voice fell; “You’re making the chocolate cake? With the coffee in the batter and icing?” Reminding her that our traditional family Christmas dessert is a birthday cake (for Jesus), she said slyly, “Jesus likes chocolate…”
I’m still unclear why it was necessary to light a single birthday candle with a butane grill lighter, but then again, birthday cakes normally appear the year after a birth…
Cooking in a southern style ensures leftover Pyrex casserole dishes full of breadcrumbiness; in this case, wrapped in industrial plastic wrap before The Filming of the Presents began.
Dad took up his post on Camera 1 as Nana and Grampa opened a few curiosities,
including a psychic device with ESP pretensions (Kassandra tells me she outwitted the thing).
Then Mom revealed that she had deprived some overprivileged child of a TMX Elmo (the hothott toy of 2006)
TMX Elmo dances, asks for more, then gurgles “Too much!” and pitches himself prone, which seems problematic for mice, men, and a children’s toy.
Opening our stockings, we women of the world raisedextended our right hands to display vegetable peelers and scrubbers that slip on the finger,
attempted more stupid pet tricks,
and donned new hats that retained so much of Kassandra’s ear warmth she briefly fell asleep.
Kassandra’s friend Amber rallied from illness later that evening to visit, and Kassandra convinced us that the title song from “The Wedding Singer” musical was the perfect beginning to our Christmas dance medley video.
Amber agreed on the condition that Beyonce’s “Irreplaceable” was the second track (I strenuously supported this idea),
and we journeyed to the basement, where all the costuming begins, finding fabulous peacocks that we twisted onto sequin headbands, among other fluorescent gear.
Here you see Katrina’s outfit in full (clearly, this is a mu’umu’u) as, once again, she films the video.
For the closing song, Kassandra and I practiced overzealous backup dancer moves to distract from Amber’s inspired diva incarnation of “All I Want For Christmas.”
Amber was not amused. Since I was already working a delicate Blind Melon armband allusion, I gave her my peacock to add to her headdress.
Setting up the fireplace shot, we all felt a strong sense of déjà vu,
which continued the next day, as I went shopping for, omg, shoes—it’s too early for New Year’s resolutions.
The full image gallery is on Flickr.
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Posted Thursday, December 28th, 2006, 7:37 pm | Filed in Food, Travel. Follow responses through the RSS 2.0 feed. Leave a response, or trackback from your own site.
December 29th, 2006 at 2:21 pm
Densely allusive and frolickingly fun, this post rules! My family’s singing should really give way to more costuming. I’m impressed by the camera phone shot, and I always encourage stealth.
December 31st, 2006 at 2:28 am
The pictures of TMX Elmo made my day, as did the Blind Melon wristband. Speaking of “Shoes,” Harrison and I spent a good part of dinner tonight quoting the two lines we remembered. I guess it kind of rubbed off…kind of…
[pitches onto the floor à la TMX Elmo]
January 16th, 2007 at 7:35 pm
I’m so glad to have made my way into the honorific realm of kthread.com. And damn, that chocolate cake was good.
November 6th, 2007 at 7:00 pm
That story was cool! My name is kassandra too! My best freind’s name is Amber and it’s kinda cool hearing the same names! Just as i thought my name was never going 2 appear……….bam you were there! That was verry cool hearing stories like that!
April 1st, 2008 at 3:00 pm
Haha ! My Name is Kassandra as well as the other on who as aleady left a reply . i Typed in Kassandra in Google & then this turned up . Most of the stuf in the fotos look like stuff i would do which is actually kinda weird =)