Pumpkin, pumpkin everywhere!

1. Pumpkin bread as modern art

2. Molly fashions the pie crusts for pumpkin pies

Ever since I was a little girl, I've adored all things pumpkin, specifically pumpkin pie. So did my brother Andrew apparently, as any pie left unguarded was his to-go target. We served many a crustless pie, thanks to his pillaging, or ones dotted with fingerprint holes, in the style of a deranged modern artist. We quickly learned that the pies, the moment they emerged from the oven, needed to be squirreled away out of reach, for them to have any chance of making it to the dessert table unscathed. I became so paranoid of suffering casualties that I got in the habit of making three or four at once. Plus, I could have a whole pie to myself the day after. If you think eating a whole pie is a hard task, you haven't seen me with a pumpkin pie. I love it so the filling is nice and chilled, not too sweet but full of spices. I've tried it fancy but I'm happiest with the recipe off the Libby's pumpkin can. Simple, nostalgic, perfect.

SPICY MOLASSES PUMPKIN BREAD

My childhood Thanksgiving always had two breads, a orange cranberry loaf and a pumpkin bread.

This bread is easy to make, and a nice side for the Thanksgiving feast. I like the slightly darker taste the molasses imparts, and the crunch of the walnuts. The oil keeps things moist. But be careful not to overcook!

INGREDIENTS:

1 (15 ounce) can pumpkin puree 4 eggs 1 cup vegetable oil 2/3 cup water 1 3/4 cups white sugar 1 cup molasses 3 1/2 cups all-purpose flour

2 1/2  teaspoons baking soda 1 1/2 teaspoons salt 1 1/2 teaspoon ground cinnamon 1 teaspoon ground nutmeg 1/2 teaspoon ground cloves 1/2 teaspoon ground ginger 1 cup coarsely chopped walnuts

DIRECTIONS:

1.	Preheat oven to 350 degrees F (175 degrees C). Grease and flour three 7x3 inch loaf pans. Chop walnuts.
2.	In a large bowl, mix together pumpkin puree, eggs, oil, water, molasses and sugar until well blended. In a separate bowl, whisk together the flour, baking soda, salt, cinnamon, nutmeg, cloves and ginger. Stir the dry ingredients into the pumpkin mixture until just blended, including most of the walnut bits. Pour into the prepared pans. Top with remaining walnuts.
3.	Bake for about 50 minutes in the preheated oven. Loaves are done when toothpick inserted in center comes out clean.

Thankful for...

This unseasonably mild November day and vibrant yellows of the ginkgo leaves outside our windows.

Painter of the day: Aaron Birnbaum

"If you are durable, your resistance can overcome a lot of trouble... It is not the strength you got, it is the durable you got that [helps] you overcome all your troubles." - Aaron Birnbaum (1885 - 1998)

One day Molly and I would like to travel to the bi-annual Slotin Folk Art Auction in Buford, Georgia, but until that day we content ourselves with the thick magazine that they send in the mail. While flipping though this term's offerings, I was drawn to the work of an artist previously unknown to me, the Ukranian-American Aaron Birnbaum.

A fellow Brooklynite, he would sit on his couch (or the stool next to it) in his studio apartment, surrounded by buckets of paint, to work. (I smiled when I read that, thinking of the havoc it wreaks on our tiny apartment when I take out my art supplies.) His apartment was literally crammed with his paintings, which often were painted on top found objects -- fruit crate tops, old mirrors, pieces of plywood, serving trays.

Born in the Ukraine, Birnbaum carried with him the memory of the beautiful countryside of his homeland. But his childhood was far from idyllic. He was taunted for being a Jew (one memory is of buttons being ripped from his new suit), and at age thirteen was pulled out of school to apprentice with a tailor, where he put in 17 hour days, 6 days a week. At age seventeen, he went to NYC to meet up with his father, who had emigrated earlier, and became a tailor and dressmaker himself. He did this his entire adult life. At 70, retired, and grieving the death of his wife to cancer, he decided to take up painting. He approached it much like dress-making, even making cardboard templates for some of his reoccurring images, such as birds and ships. While his pieces were featured in group shows, he only really achieved greater recognition in the art world at the age of 100, when he was given a one man show at the Museum of American Folk Art.

Birnbaum was called a "memory painter" because he painted all the scenes of his childhood from memory. In addition, he painted the world around him, his life in Brooklyn. 

I love the playfulness of his work, the composition, the flatness of objects, and their strong graphic bent. I love the way he renders birds. And I'm drawn to his personal story -- reinvention at 70 after great loss, fame at 100, death at 103. I often feel restless and antsy with respect to career aspect of my life, impatient that I haven't yet achieved nearly what I want and yearn to. Impatience (coupled with a slightly pessimistic streak) is one of my hugest character flaws. Yet, knock on wood, my life is still much longer, and there's a lot of time left provided I don't waste it.

The artist, with his giraffes.