I've logged in a few times now to blog, but then something pulled me away. So stay tuned...
I just pulled a pan of shortbread out of the oven. While it's not necessarily my favorite baked thing, shortbread never ceases to amaze me and I love making it. How much more simple and spectacular can you get than a cookie made with just 3 ingredients? Who made the first shortbread and why? Were they looking around the old underground pantry and ended up using "oh, you know--whatever I happen to have on hand"? I imagine people have been combining fats and grains for most of history, but it took the mortar and pestle*, and later the mill, to truly transform grains into something that would bake up softer than a hockey puck. Sugar is a whole other issue. Who discovered that those reedy stalks were sweet inside? Was he a starving troubadour making his way across the south who decided he would risk the alligators to take a bite out of that thick woody grass over there?
Food history should have been my 7th major.
*mentioned exclusively for Meredith's benefit, per our scintillating conversation in TJMaxx the other day.
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