I’m in a strange kind of limbo right now. Waiting for edits and stalled on my current book, the writing muse is hiding right now (probably because I don’t really believe in her and she’s pissed off).
When I’m in limbo, I tend to cook. In this case, since my family is getting together for Thanksgiving this year and not Christmas, I wanted to make up some holiday goodies to take down with me on Thursday. One that I talk a lot about, but haven’t made in years, is home made marshmallows.
You did not misread that. Yes, I said marshmallows. I LOVE home made marshmallows! But today I remembered why it had been awhile since I’ve made them.
They’re sticky. And prior to that, boiling sugar. WTF? Okay, I got past that part, and did the whole pouring into the medium speed kitchenAid part – but still. I wanted to make peppermint marshmallows (YUM!), but I didn’t have any food coloring – that’s my way of letting everyone know exactly what they’re getting – so I had to stick with regular vanilla.
I digress. Okay. I poured the hot stuff into the bowl and beat for 15 minutes at high speed – until it turned the color and consistency of marshmallow fluff, the stuff in the jar, you know? – then holy moly… I pried the beater out of the bowl; then I needed the spatula that never sticks (IS there such a thing?) in order to spread it out on the foil and oil-sprayed cookie sheet. Except – the darn stuff doesn’t want to come out of the bowl. And when it did come out of the bowl, it didn’t want to spread – it just lumped there all sticky first on the spatula, then on the foil. The stick factor was amazing, and it went everywhere – the spatula, my hands, the counter – anywhere it could stick, it did and while I shouted for help, I also turned help away. No one else needed to get sticky sweet marshmallow fluff on them! I had forgotten that you get about half a second from the end of the 15 minutes of beating to get it onto the already prepped pan, or it turns sticky. Boy, had I forgotten!
I had marshmallow everywhere. On the counter, on my face, my fingers, my jeans – I could have made a perfect Santa beard out of the stuff, only my hands would have been stuck to my face.
Finally I sprayed the heck out of the stuff already on the pan (gave up on the stuff still in the bowl, and don’t even ask about the beater…) and spread it out with my hands, also sprayed. The veg oil disappeared in the flocking of powdered sugar it got next. Now it sits overnight to “cure” before I go through the trauma of actually cutting it.
Gee…after wrestling in the kitchen with marshmallows, I’m thinking writing is a lot easier…oh muse….here, muse muse muse…