De Baking Psychopath

It's been difficult to make any significant headway into the plethora of baked goods in my freezer during the shelter-at-home.  We're not natural bread-eaters; although we love it in all its forms, we just don't have that bread-eating habit that Americans of European descent have of eating sandwiches oftentimes as much as once or twice a day, or eating bread as a side dish to dinner, and therefore making short work of plowing through loaves of bread and other baked goods.   At some point, though, it became difficult to repress my usual stress-/procrasti-baking tendencies, and also baking projects provide fun activities to keep the kiddo occupied for a little while.  Furthermore, with all the sourdough love on the Internet these days, I felt like I need to keep Gus in peak condition to flex some sourdough muscles and show everyone he's still got his skillz.  (Spoiler: Yes, he still does!)  A nd so despite good intentions to preserve my flour reserves fo...

My New Year's resolution this year had been to cut down on my hoarding and commit to try to buy smaller amounts of ingredients (particularly baking ingredients), and only when I had a specific application in mind.  I had done a mini-purge of expired ingredients from the pantry, and the guilt over the wasted food/ingredients drove me to strive to do better this year That being said, I knew that there were many ingredients that we did in fact go through consistently, and therefore I felt less guilty continuing to buying in bulk quantities, such as flour, my beloved Ahmed Mango black tea , instant espresso , and oats of various sorts from Bob's Red Mill.   Furthermore, at the beginning of shelter-in-home, I had a realization that we were already pretty well stocked to hunker down for a good long while, with exception of fresh produce and dairy items.  I had still a decent amount of flour left over from holiday time, when I stocked up on a couple extra bags o...

Greetings from the coronapocalypse of 2020.  Right now, I am at home for an indefinite amount of time.  Our county and city have declared a stay-at-home order for all non-essential work and services.  The university has mandated for research labs to reduce to "essential" staffing only, which I am not as a postdoc researcher.  However, I may get pulled to help with clinical service at some point; since pathologists aren't front line care providers, it would likely be if the regular pathologists get sick and need to self-isolate and need backup support.  While we wait for the storm of infections to hit us, I figured now would be a good time to reboot the blog and post some recent baking exploits, if only to distract myself from the vortex that is the news.  So, welcome to the new and fancy redesigned blog! First, an update on life.  Since my last post, I have finished residency.  I went on to complete a clinical fellowship in Liver/GI path...

Wow, I somehow let 2015 go by without a single post. I guess I have some excuses, like a baby, moving, first year of residency, etc. And I suppose in the whole Internet world, I've seen many well-loved blogs peter out due to changing priorities and modes of communication with the intended audience. But, despite the life changes, I do want to keep this space open and return to it one day. Probably when my core clinical training is finished and I return back to the research world more full time, I will be able to see whether I can fit this back into my lifestyle. For now, greetings from a new home and a new phase in life. Shrimpy is now almost 17 months old, and she is as feisty as we could have expected from her in utero exploits. She's got a full-time daddy to take care of her for the time being, and for that I am eternally grateful. I am 8 months into my first year in pathology residency, and it's been fun but challenging. Gus is still alive too, and if nothing else co...

What to do when you're sitting around waiting for your full-term baby to come out? As far as "nesting" goes, we've already done everything we can possibly do for the baby's arrival. A full complement of baby clothing/linens/blankets/etc. is all washed, folded, and in their proper places. The "go-bag" has been packed and repacked and is ready-to-go in the car. The car seat is installed. We have all the baby gear (stroller, carrier, bottles/pumps, etc). We've celebrated with friends and co-workers the incoming bundle of joy (thank you all!). My mother has arrived from far away and is settled in. I've finished all my academic obligations, including all my required medical school rotations, residency applications, and licensing exams needed for graduation.  So last week, at the beginning of my vacation/maternity leave month, I decided to stock the freezer with baked goods see if I could make myself busy enough to kick the baby out of dorman...