Bread and Wine: Goat Cheese Biscuits

For whatever reason, it has taken me roughly forever and a day to get this blog post written.

This recipe comes at the end of the chapter "Hummingbird" about Niequist's first pregnancy, and I think ironically it has been my children that have kept me from writing about it.

Isn't that they way it is-- "life is what happens to you while you're making other plans." Never more true than when babies are patting your touch screen with peanut butter hands and yelling, "Look at me, Mom!" every five seconds.

I am blessed. Truly I am.

My kids were able to be a litte more officially involved than usual with mom's cooking fettish this time around. My daughter turns three this month (though the warning signs have been flashing since May) and I've been struck, if not completely overwhelmed by the fact of how big she's getting and her abilities to follow instructions and learn stuff is on the exponential uprise. I can't think of many better preschool activities for her than cooking, so when Mom's cooking she is too. It's been a good experience for both of us, and particularly meaningful even as we cooked through this recipe in this particular chapter-- a reminder about how we love and care for these gifts in little children's bodies.

As usual, here's a bit about how we made the recipe and then I'll talk about the chapter.

Let's eat.

Goat Cheese Biscuits
Ingredients: All-purpose flour, baking powder, salt, plain yogurt, cold butter, crumbled goat cheese, Parmesan cheese

I noted in my last blog about my weird relationship to goat cheese. I have tried it so many ways and yet we never seem to connect (in short: I do.not.like.it). BUT. There it is-- I must make this recipe. And be a good example of an open mind and palate to my little girl. 

What a great practice in openheartedness I hope I can return to again and again. My little baker demanded to know what kind of mysterious cheese was in the unusual container I brought out. She'd met Feta and liked it, and so was intrigued to try what looked so similar. 

Everybody, I had to take the carton AWAY from her as she would have sat down with the entire THANG to eat it all. She now loves goat cheese. 

Curious that her normally "munch as she goes" mother wasn't sticking my fingers in the bowl, she asked me why.

"Um, well, it's not mommy's favorite, but I'm so excited to make these biscuits. And I'M SO GLAD you like it," I assured her. 

She sifted and mixed the flour (something we've been working on for some time) and was happy for mom to takeover when the batter got a little thick. (Sidenote, Niequist writes how friendly the recipe is to substitutes. It really is. I had to use sour cream instead of yogurt...and Niequist uses yogurt instead of buttermilk as it calls for in the original recipes...so yeah, it all works).

I'm used to drop biscuits or cut outs, but these worked up as a lovely in-between, dropping them onto the melted butter in the cast iron pan before baking, and coming out light in crumb and deeply savory. The goat cheese is evident, but thanks to the company of sour cream and parmesan cheese, its full influence is softened. My daughter and her daddy gobbled them up. I served them with the Green Well Salad (previous blog) and dipped them in balsamic vinaigrette. 

Maybe it's not my preferred cup of tea, but it turned out to be a new favorite to two people in my family, plus my daughter discovered a new taste, and that was enough for me.

"Hummingbird"
I've really really needed to write about my kids lately, they're changing so fast from infants to little people and some hours it's more than this mom's heart (and head) can accept. I feel frightened and elated by turns, wondering if I can possibly keep up with all that they need me to be to them in this season, wondering and afraid whether I'll ever be able to take care of them they way they deeply need.

Fear. It seems to come inherent to mothers.

In this chapter Niequist writes about fear while being pregnant with her oldest son Henry. After a miscarriage with twins, the fear over this new life, this new possibility, was suffocating:

"When I found out I was pregnant with Henry, I felt delight. But this time, one split second after the deep happiness, what I felt was fear. I basically wanted to be put into a bubble with a twenty-four hour ultrasound so that I could always know if the baby was OK. I was so happy, and I was so scared. I prayed, but mostly in a manic way, almost chanting out loud, please, please, please."

Miscarriage is not part of my story, but fear is. 

With both of my children I was immediately introduced to the anxiety that seems to walk with most moms. I woke a lot of times at night, remembering the miscarriages of friends, worried and frightened it could happen to me.

And yet that anxiety was nothing to what I felt once my daughter was placed safely in my arms at birth. Could I love her enough? Would she know she is loved? Can I give  her what she needs? What if I'm stupid and forget something? What if...? What if...?

My anxiety landed me in postpartum depression and deep exhaustion, and though counseling and wonderful family helped me through that season, I was worried when my son was born if I would have a relapse, or if something else would knock me down.

As my tension grew leading up to my son's arrival, I felt darkly afraid, not so much for his physical safety--my OB seemed to think Aaron and I were completely, almost boringly, healthy--rather I was afraid that this new life would pull me under, scramble my identity and upset my daughter's and my relationship, as well as my husband's and mine. 

It's what I've since learned many new moms of two feel, but at the time, it felt overwhelming.

The morning I was to be induced with Aaron I went to my usual devotional website to find it was about committing children to God--that they are not fully our own.. Not appropriate, or anything.

The woman writing it was a mother of five--five-- who had endured a year--a year-- of mandatory bedrest in which she could no longer be the sole caretaker of her children. She of course came to lean on community and family in a new way, which was great, but it was a completely different spiritual attitude that she had to adopt--one of completely trusting God with her babies, for she could not be there totally for them.

Not that she really could any way. Not that any of us really can.

I needed, and need, that reminder. 

Niequist writes about celebrating Valentine's Day when she is pregnant with Henrry--she and her husband Aaron go to Art Smith's restaurant Table Fifty-Two and eat Goat Cheese Biscuits and homemade ginger soda-- a symbol of celebration, of life.

She meditates on the little life "life, life,life, smaller than a hummingbird" in her belly. 

When the next morning she discovers a hemorrhage, thrusting her into a whirlwind of appointments and her own bed rest to protect the life of her baby, the picture of the hummingbird is not merely one for life, but hope. 

In the end, Henry becomes Henry. She is well. Hope is fulfilled, life is sustained.

Life. Hope. So inherent to mothers. We feed it, we breathe it, we give it, we live it. And yet, we feel the fear. I know I do. 

But I'm starting to think that the fear is  not so much a weakness or a failing as much as a call to recommit both my babies and my self to the One Who gave me life and hope to begin with. As a mother, I may be a conduit of those things, but I am not the source, and my children daily remind me to return to the One Who is.

So I'll walk with the fear, the hope, and the life. I'm a mom, after all. 

And I'll celebrate.