Dorm Room Apple Cobbler

As a student living on campus, there isn't much room for creativity when it comes to cooking, unless you live in the apartment style dorms and have your own kitchen. I do not have my own kitchen, a means for getting to and from the grocery store, or even much storage room. This is fine, because I have a meal plan and can eat all the mediocre food I want with a swipe of my ID card. Unfortunately, even those of us with meal plans still occasionally have a need for cooking/baking. My need happens to come in the form of my boyfriend and his imminent birthday. How will I overcome the undesirable circumstances of dorm life in order to make him the most delicious birthday treat of his young life? By creating the recipe for Dorm Room Apple Cobbler, of course!

Note: This recipe is based off of what I personally have in my dorm room. Some of these ingredients will need to be bought if you, unlike me, do not own them already.

Dorm Room Apple Cobbler  
Equipment-

•  one deep baking dish, preferably 9 in.
•  a sharp knife 
•  one medium bowl for mixing; ask the nice people at the front desk
•  one wooden spoon, for mixing, ladling and licking when you are finished. Again, see front desk.
• measuring cups, teaspoons and tablespoons. As a college student living in a dorm, I'm sure you don't have these. Either eyeball it (let's be honest, it's cobbler. You're basically just throwing a bunch of delicious ingredients together and calling it baking) or ask the people at the front desk and pray you get lucky.
• one oven mitt or heavy towel for taking the pan out of the oven.
• friends to share the finished product with. If you don't have friends, you can substitute with the gym after you have eaten the whole cobbler by yourself.

Ingredients-    

    Apple Filling:

• about 5-7 apples, which you can steal from Suwannee/Fresh. Try to get the green ones.
• 3/4 cup sugar. If you don't have enough sugar to accommodate both the filling and the topping, try substituting with brown sugar. It pears nicely with the apples. (See what I did there?)
• 2 tablespoons flour
• 1/2 teaspoon cinnamon
• dash of nutmeg
• 1/4 teaspoon salt
• 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
• 1/4 cup water (Use bottled if you can, but if you use tap, filter it first. Tallahassee water is some nasty sh*t)
• 1 tablespoon butter. Don't have room in your fridge or your wallet to buy four whole sticks of butter at Publix? Use Suwannee/Fresh for that, too.

        Topping:

• 1/2 cup flour
• 1/2 cup sugar (real sugar for this one)
• 1/2 teaspoon baking powder. Do NOT use baking soda. For both our sakes.
• 1/4 teaspoon salt
• 2 tablespoons butter
• 1 egg

            OR (if you don't have eggs and don't feel like buying a whole carton for one recipe)

• 1 1/2 tablespoon water
• 1 1/2 tablespoon oil
• 1 teaspoon baking powder

Apparently this mixture mimics the texture that the egg was going to give the batter. Plus, you don't have 11 unused eggs in your tiny little dorm fridge now.

Directions-

      Prep:

• Walk down to the kitchen on your floor of the dorm. If it is in use, proceed to closest floor and try to use their kitchen. If the people occupying the kitchen are using it as a study room, use the oven and counter space anyways while giving them pointed, dirty looks. 
• Preheat the oven to 375 degrees. 
• While the oven is preheating, wash, peel and slice the apples. Don't worry about getting all the peel off, nobody cares about that. 
• Lightly butter your 9in. dish. If your hands are clean, which they are since you just washed those apples, your fingers will work fine for the buttering process. 
• In medium bowl, combine the thinly sliced apples, sugar, flour, cinnamon, salt, vanilla, and water in the quantities given. Put this mixture into your buttered dish.
• Dot the apples with the remaining 1 tablespoon of butter and set aside for the moment.
• Using the medium bowl once again, combine all of the ingredients for the topping and beat until smooth using that wooden spoon. 
• Drop the batter over the filling, evenly spacing it. The batter will spread as it bakes, so don't worry if it doesn't seem like there's enough. 

      Baking:

• The oven should be heated by now, so open it, making sure to blast those studiers with searingly hot air (seriously, there are plenty of study rooms that aren't kitchens, get out!), and put your little dish of appley goodness inside. 
• Bake for 30-40 minutes or until the apples are tender and the crust is golden brown. 
• Using the heavy towel or oven mitt, remove the cobbler from the oven, let cool for a moment and then serve.

Serves 6-8 (or one very lonely, hungry college student)

I have a feeling that I am going to be adapting many recipes like this for next semester. Anyways, have fun and enjoy!

Don't Blink

Sometimes, I feel like Lucy from Fifty First Dates. Not because I have short-term memory loss or because I relive the same day over and over, but because like Lucy at the end of the movie, sometimes I wake up and have no idea where I am.

Don't worry. This isn't an entry about how I drink too much and then black out and wake up in some stranger's house. I just feel like the story of my life unfolds so quickly that I forget where I left my bookmark the night before when I went to sleep.

Of course, when I open my eyes in the morning, I am happy with where I am. This place that I find myself in, this momentary blip on my lifeline, is a good place. But still, it is unsettling to know that life passes by so quickly.

I feel like the last time I blinked, I was a little girl playing outside with my sister, and the next time I blink, I will be in my thirties watching two of my own children play outside.

The only protection against the raging current of life, which seeks to sweep us off our feet and carry us away at breakneck speed is to find an anchor. That anchor is living in the moment. This moment that we have right now, we can never have it again. We can visit it, in memory, but we cannot swim back upstream to that exact spot once we have left it behind. Cherish the moment and the people who inhabit it with you.

A Dream is a Wish Your Heart Makes

So, let me preface this with a little anecdote about my morning. Yesterday, my laptop decided that it basically hated me and every time I turned it on, it sounded like a low-powered lawnmower. Unfortunately, it didn't cut grass, so this new feature was useless and pretty annoying. After listening to it for a while, I surmised that the sound was coming from the fan, so even though the computer itself was still functioning, if the fan wasn't working properly, it would quickly overheat and that leads to even more exciting problems.

When I discovered all of this, it was already 4:45 and the IT Service people were about to close up shop for the day, so I had to wait until this morning to bring my little baby down to their building. When I brought it in, they gave me a bunch of papers with a lot of words on them that basically say "We maintain the right to charge you lots of money for this repair and to take our own sweet time doing it." What was I supposed to do? I handed over the laptop and said a tearful goodbye, knowing that we would not be reunited for "at least five business days". As today is Friday, that meant an entire week of regular days.

After leaving my laptop in the capable hands of those more computer-savvy than I, I walked back to my dorm and decided I needed a nap. About thirty minutes after I had fallen asleep, the IT guy called me and said that the laptop was ready for me to pickup, it turns out there was just a little bit of dust in the fan so they cleaned it up for me free of charge. I never knew that a few specks of dust could sound like a handful of sizable pebbles. Anyways, I was thrilled, because I didn't have to pay any money and now my computer runs smoothly and quietly. If I close my eyes, it's as if I am sitting at a Mac.

So that story had a happy ending, but what I really want to talk about though, is the dream I had after I got of the phone with IT (because yes, I wanted to finish my nap).

In the dream, my mom and my stepdad were sending my little brother to college. Now, my baby brother is bright, but mind you, he's only thirteen. Besides, he already gets into enough trouble just in middle school, so why would they send him off to college where they can't keep an eye on him? Ah, that's where I come in. Instead of sending Jakob to UC Davis so that he could still live at home, under their noses for the majority of his day, they decided to send him to FSU. It's logical, because they could just set him up in the same dorm as his big sister and bam! built in babysitter.

Of course, none of this makes any sense, but it was a dream, so bear with me. Jakob is pretty upset by the whole situation. He's just a kid and he doesn't want to live so far away from his family and friends. In an effort to cheer him up, I tell him that I will help him unpack and settle in. While I am helping him carry his bags up the stairs, I tell him that whenever he feels lonely or homesick, he can always come see me, because I will be right down the hall. He said, "But Meghan, boys aren't allowed in the girls rooms, are they?" I thought for a moment. "That's not really true. There are some foggy, 'cohabitation' rules that no one really follows, but don't worry. You're my brother, so it won't even be a problem. If you're feeling sad or just want to hang out with someone other than your room mate, just come over and we'll lay out some sleeping bags and pillows and blankets on the floor and have a sleepover."

Maybe I shouldn't have used the word cohabitation in front of my little brother, but this was just a dream. Anyways, we finally get to his room and there's a little white board hung on the door that has his name and his room mate's name on it, but Jakob's name is spelled wrong, so I let him rewrite it before opening the door. This is the best part of the dream: the room was all the way at the end of the hall, kind of in a corner, and it was huge! It looked like someone had converted a three or four person suite into a double. Not only was there a bunch of space, but there was also two bathroom sinks and a long counter in front of a wall of mirrors, there was a kitchen sink, complete with garbage disposal, a bunch of cupboards and storage space, a stove, an oven, a private bathroom with a tub and this weird machine set into the wall that peeled, diced, or shaped  fruit into fancy shapes (I want that machine to be real).

Clearly this room was being wasted on boys. Why didn't this magical room exist for girls? It looked like a studio apartment, except nicer. I ran out into the hallway and looked at the room number. "Okay, I told myself. I am going to remember this room number so that I can change my room assignment for next semester."

Of course, on waking up I realized that no such room exists at FSU, or anywhere. A dream is a wish your heart makes, a horrible, unresolvable wish that will only lead to heartbreak.

That fruit machine was the sh*t. Seriously. I want one.

Favorite Food

          So, there is something you should know about me if you are going to read my blog: I have an obsession with delicious food. In the past I have promised that this is not a food blog and I still swear by that. In fact, I'm not really sure what kind of blog this is anymore, it's something of a grab bag. I ought to change the description of the blog, since it doesn't really hold true anymore. Anyways, my obsession with delicious food encompasses dishes from nearly every culture. If I were to ask you what my favorite food is, you might answer with baklava, butter mochi, Vietnamese vermicelli noodles, or bibimbop. This are all fairly good guesses, because I do indeed love these foods. But my true favorite food, the one thing that I could eat every day and of which I would never grow tired, is not a fancy foreign dish or even something that you have to prepare at all. No, the food that I love the most is best in the pure, unadulterated form in which God gave it to us, and that food is the strawberry.

          I love strawberries so darn much. In fact, I recently bought three baskets at Publix because they were on sale, three for $5. I didn't need three boxes of strawberries, but when you live in the world of apples and bananas that is the FSU meal plan, the lure of having fresh strawberries for an entire week is too strong to resist. Besides, it was five dollars. Of course,this cannot compare to the huge flats of strawberries that I remember buying in my hometown of Merced. These delicious strawberries were as big as my tiny, seven year old fist, and they were sold by the Hmong families that tended enormous fields of strawberries and watermelons, selling their produce out of plywood fruit stands set up near the roads. These stands easily sold strawberries that boasted ten times the flavor of their anemic grocery store cousins at a quarter of their price.

         It was these strawberries, so abundant and delicious, overflowing their green plastic baskets, nestled side by side in the huge cardboard flat, that sparked my original love for the fruit. Strawberries symbolized summer and childhood and the simple joy that relied solely on the pleasure of the moment that your teeth cut through the firm flesh of the strawberry so that juice floods your mouth.

         Publix cannot rival these strawberries, particularly because they are romanticized by the generous veil of memory. However, as I am no longer in Merced, I have to make do with strawberries from Publix, and as far as grocery store fruit goes, these strawberries are pretty damn good. I am fastidious in choosing my fruit, so I picked three near perfect baskets, all full of ripe but not overripe, fruit, no spots of mold, no tiny green strawberries hiding amid their larger, redder brothers. In order to put things into perspective for you, I bought these baskets on Sunday, two days ago. With the help of one Chris Mougey (friend, boyfriend and all-around great guy), I now only have one and a half baskets of strawberries in my fridge.


         What I really need here at college is a good, easily accessible farmer's market. With a farmer's market, I can get my strawberry fix for cheap as well as find a variety of different locally grown, healthful foods. Sigh. All of the plans...

Cousins

I've been thinking recently and I have come to the conclusion that I miss my cousins.

At the risk of stepping on several toes, I must clarify that I am referring to my two older cousins in this instance. Of course, I do love my multitude of younger cousins, but I have a different kind of relationship with Sam and Alex.

In addition to my sister, they were my first friends when I was little. During the earliest years of my life, I spent more time with my sister and my cousins than I did with nearly anyone else. We have countless hours of blackmail worthy footage of our childhood and even though we've all seen it more times that we could say, there's nothing more fun than sitting down together and rediscovering what weird kids we were. It's a reminder of how simple life used to be.

We used to split off into little pairs: Kali and Alex would trundle off, speaking their own made up language that comprised mostly of words slurred around the pacifiers hanging from their mouths, while Sammy and I would play with the dolls or dress-up or whatever other girly things took our fancy. I cannot even tell you all of the inside jokes and hilarious stories I have, mostly because revealing those things on the internet would bring down on my head the murderous anger of those wonderful persons mentioned previously.

The simple fact is this: my cousins are my friends but they are also my family, which means they understand exactly how crazy everything is. When I make new friends, I have to explain, "My mom lives in California, but I live here in Florida because blahblahblah." My cousins don't need an explanation, they know.

We were so close when we were little, and even as we grew older, whenever we got together, things were just great. At every family gathering, they were the ones my sister and I would gravitate to because we wanted to escape from the adults and the little kids.

But now we all have our own lives and we're spread out across the globe. I miss the days when things were simple and easy and we could sit on our grandmother's couch eating red vines and watching movies until two in the morning. Laughing at old family videos just isn't the same when everyone isn't there. How can we laugh at that video of Alex falling on his face when he is miles and miles away with the Marines?

Yes, we're all separated now. When I go to family gatherings, I have no one, because even my sister is 3,000 miles away from me. It's lonely; I'm too old to hang out with my younger siblings and cousins, but apparently not old enough to join in adult conversation. So this being said, I miss my cousins (and my sister, but that's a different story).

The River

Editor's Note: I know I haven't written any real blog material, but I have been busy slash bored with my life, so here, read this instead. 

Come stand in the river,

Let it wash over your feet, your calves; you're thinking

Is the water rising, or are you sinking?

Does it matter?

Let it wash over you, rushing in a direction unknown,

Pulling at you, your feet slipping over the smooth stones.

The river is clean; the river is kind.

It doesn't ask for you to please wipe your feet

Before you come in, because the river doesn't mind

A little dirt; that's how it stays clean.

The river is older than you can imagine

But it doesn't feel old.

It feels young and vibrant, refreshing and cold

As the last snow before the spring.

The river is deep; it is full of hidden things.

The river will keep your secrets. It is

Wise enough to know that a secret should be kept.

It will gather your tears and hold you while they're swept

Downstream, to be forgotten, just another drop

Of water in the river.

So why shouldn't you come stand in the river?

It is kinder than the land

Which reminds you with a footprint where you stand

And approximately how much you weigh.

The river doesn't judge you. It doesn't say

With a groan that you're heavier than you used to be

Because the river is made of water, weightless and free.

And the river has been places. It knows

About the salty ocean shore and the mountains where it snows.

The river always remembers a name.

It has seen many people, and it remembers all of them,

Not one of them the same.

Did no one ever tell you how much the river loves you?

It only wants to hug your ankles on a summer day

And kiss your thighs and pull your cares away.

Although the river has many loves,

It doesn't love you any less.

It is just the river's nature, and you cannot think on it

Unkindly. If the river were to only caress

You and leave the rest of us baking on the shore

Then we wouldn't want to come stand in the river anymore

And when you left, the river would be lonely.

It would be selfish of you to ask that of the river.

The river doesn't love for itself, it is a giver

Of love.

The river is also a mirror, it cannot show you

Anything untrue.

If you do not like what you see in the river,

Don't be angry with the river, it still likes you.

The river loves your bare toes, and the spray

Of freckles on your nose; it loves the way

The tiny hairs on the top of your feet

Move with the water; it loves the quickened beat

Of your heart when you feel how cold the river is.

If you think that you might have made the river angry,

By throwing stones at it, or muddying the water

By scuffing up the bottom, don't worry.

The river is gentle and quick to forgive.

So just come stand in the river.

Stand there and live.

Mary Returns to My Blog

 Editor's Note: I don't think I'd very much like to continue with online installments of Mary's adventures, as it is a work in progress and I both adore and fear criticisms. If they are good criticisms, such as "Meghan, my god, how have you never been published before, you brilliant genius, you!" I am obviously a fan. If you say something along the lines of, "Well, if you used less commas and smaller words and perhaps didn't write like a stuffy old English professor, I might find it more enjoyable" then I'm liable to do one of two things: reject your criticism as bunk and possibly defriend you, or, and this is the more likely option, never post again because I realize that I am a failure. SO. As that stands, please do not be disappointed if I stop posting about Mary if I take long breaks in between. Also know that this is a blog for my life experiences, not for my writing experiments, so if I do end up continuing this little project, I'll probably set up a separate blog. Which would be a hassle. Anyways, read and enjoy!

When the bell signaled the end of class, Mary wondered how she was still standing. Her best guess was that it had something to do with her incredibly sensible shoes. Engaging these children was like pulling teeth of her own mouth.

"Tell me your name and three things about yourself" she'd asked of them, generously giving an example, in case the straightforward instructions had confused anyone. She was worried in particular about the sleepy-looking youth who sat near the door; he looked none too bright. "My name is Mary Bridges, feel free to call me Mrs. Bridges; either that or Your Majesty, Highness, Gloriousness or any variation thereof." A stifled sound which might have been a sympathetic snort had come from the quiet girl in the last row. Tough crowd. "As for the interesting facts, I have my degree in criminal psychology, I own two and a half cats and have a zero tolerance policy when it comes to four things: bullying, willful stupidity, faulty grammar and bad haircuts."

The girl with that shock of thick blonde hair had looked at her curiously, as if wondering how on earth she could own half of a cat, or perhaps thinking it impossible for Mary to have an "no bad haircuts" policy when her own bangs were in such need of trimming, but she had not raised her hand, re-reading instead, for the third time, the lengthy and apparently self-addressed letter which she thought she was successfully hiding. Mary had self-consciously adjusted her bangs and, after a painful silence, admitted that her half a cat was actually a kitten. There had been a few appreciative smiles, but the air in the room still felt like lead. It was with a happy heart that she had called on a student to introduce themselves, thereby diverting the attention away from her own poorly received jokes.

As was the usual case, nearly everyone knew each other, making the getting-to-know you process something in which only she had any interest. Quiet-girl, with the pale skin and downcast eyes, was from out of state and had made no real eye contact or even a very audible assertion of anything, mumbling out a quick "I like strawberries, my favorite color is green and I like to sing" as her interesting facts. Mary had noticed that she used a purple pen, though, when signing the attendance roster. Of course, one of her classroom rules being black and blue ink only, she had corrected this out of habit. The poor child's face had gone completely pink, the tips of her ears burning visibly underneath her hair and Mary had immediately regretted bringing the mistake to the class's attention.

The only other thing of note that had happened between the beginning of the name game and the tiresome but necessary reviewing of the syllabus was that the boy with the bad dye-job had nearly gotten in a fist fight with the eccentrically dressed vegetarian girl in the row across from him (her interesting facts had been "I'm a vegetarian, I have died my hair twenty-two times, not counting the current color, and I believe that an animal's life is just as important as a human baby's."). Mary wasn't quite sure how the argument had started, but the blonde boy had mentioned something about a hunting trip and suddenly half of the room was howling like a pack of rabid wolves while the PETA advocate was shouting "why don't you just shoot a baby?!?".

It had been a little too much to take in, so Mary Bridges had taken the flare gun she kept for such occasions out of her trench coat and fired it at the ceiling. "That was a warning shot." she'd said calmly, the sturdy yet attractive heels of her fine leather boots clicking as she had paced between the rows of frightened faces.

A single pink slip had been laid on the desk of each offending student. "Really?" she'd asked, in a tired voice. "The first day of classes?" As she had returned to her podium, she'd noticed the dark-haired boy in the corner: he had not looked up, but his stern expression had been replaced by a slow smirk, an intensely satisfied look that bespoke no end of hatred for the perpetrators.

Thinking back on the events as she watched the students file out of class, Mary wondered if every day would be as exciting. She certainly hoped not. Perhaps this was why life continued to pass her by: because it knew, deep down, that she didn't really want to be dragged along for a bumpy ride. Her bones were older and more tired than they used to be and she didn't think they'd appreciate the constant jarring of such an excursion.

A little later to leave the classroom because of the awkward way in which he was obliged to carry his backpack, the boy who'd caused such a commotion at the door stopped by the podium on his way out.

"Have a good day, Mrs. Bridges." he said, not meeting her eye, his lisp making the s's in her name uncomfortable and wet.

I wonder what his name is, she thought, not unkindly but merely with the weariness of someone who's memory is no longer what it was. "Thank you."

Resolving to study the roster that night, Mary turned from the door to her desk and the hour of rest that awaited her before the true terror began: Sophomore English. The last straggling students were still shoving their books into their bags, and scurrying away as Mary tried to match their names to their faces without much success.

It seemed strange to Mary that she had chosen to finally settle down as a high school teacher. She had always hated high school; it had been the worst four years of her life. I suppose I'm here to help those students like me, she thought, the ones who really can't bear it here and need something encouraging in their day. Students like him. 

She watched the dark-haired silent boy who's name might have been Ian or maybe Ivan, she wasn't quite sure, as he dropped a well-worn, paper-back copy of The Great Gatsby in his haste to pack up his things. His skin was olive in tone, betraying his obvious Italian heritage, but his eyes were a light green and very, very sad. The fingernails he had been coloring with a fine-tipped Sharpie, although covered in scribbles, were long and fine with very deep beds; beautiful hands, like a musician's or a writer's. He joined the blonde girl who had been waiting by the door. They didn't say anything to each other, but he held out his hand and she, rolling her eyes, handed him the page she'd been mulling over, heavy with pink secrets.

An interesting pair of friends. The quiet girl followed at a safe distance, neither walking with Ian (or Ivan) and his blonde friend, nor walking with last of her classmates filing out.

Mary wondered about her students. She wondered about her fellow teachers and whether or not they wondered. She wondered if it were merely her degree which kept her wondering about people or if everyone did so on occasion. She wondered if there was enough cat food left for Lord Byron, Edgar and Mimsy and whether or not she ought to stop at the neighborhood Publix on the way home. She decided she ought and began writing a list for groceries, letting her thoughts leave her students behind, momentarily absorbed in the mundane but pleasant details of domestic life.