Cupcakes and Easter Treats

Introduction

Ah, spring. Isn’t it just wonderful? I don’t know about you, but I feel like an entirely new person, like I’ve been let out of jail. Like all the early evenings I sat in the house wishing I could take a walk but it was dark out and cold and lonely and I was trapped inside have just dissolved into the background noise that washes underneath all the melting-water bridges of every winter I’ve ever slogged my way through.


Now, here in the my town, anyway, there are all these white and pink fruit blossoms, yellow tulips and daffodils, the tiny purple fairies of grape hyacinth that make you stop to bend over and speak to them without moving your lips (lest the neighbors think/realize you’re nuts). And the ducks are doing odd things. And there is a dove on a nest in my dining room window. And my peas are in the ground! And it’s raining! And baseball season starts on Sunday. And my heart has awakened. And it’s a whole new world.


They tell me that SoCal and Texas and Florida have seasons, too, and that once you’ve lived there a while and paid attention, you begin to see them change. Of course this is true. Wouldn’t it be divine if, included with our Spring recipes, we wrote a sentence or two about our experiences of spring in our respective parts of the world? Or, if there is a memory of a place, a spring somewhere far away you’d like to muse upon, here we are – the audience and the opportunity.


For those of you who are still feeling daunted by this whole thing, here’s an idea:


What if you got the kids/grandkids involved? What better way to get them into observing these magical changes in the natural world around them? How lovely to encourage the sharing with the extended family? And writing (sorry, former writing teacher here)? How fun to have them help you compose a word or two about the change of seasons, and then concretize those by helping cook the dish you’re submitting with their writing of those observations?


Anyway, I know we’re all looking forward to the lovely spring recipes. Cupcakes? Candies? Easter treats? Lamb roast? A salad with mint and sorrel? What else? Two years ago I made some cupcakes with vanilla bean icing. Maybe I’ll see if I can modify that lovely white cake with lemon curd between the layers into a cupcake. How would that work? Could I inject the curd into the cupcakes, so they’d by like a springy Hostess Cupcake? Hmmm. How hard can that be?

All My Love,
Margaret