Back Porch Bakery...

This morning we had the great pleasure of visiting the Berkeland family, and enjoying their absolutely incomparable home-baked goodies. Dan and Caroline, are incredible bakers and have generously opened up their kitchen to the community- aptly dubbing it the Back Porch Bakery. This was my first visit, but good gracious am I hooked! Their cute little home sits on a corner lot, in a quiet neighborhood (you're well-advised to look for the purple door), and entrance is literally through the back porch. A large tray full of bagels, scones and freshly baked bread greeted us first, followed closely by warm offerings of "Coffee, juice, water? What can I get you to drink?", and the curious pitter patter of 14 month old feet on the floor. The Berkeland home feels like the kind of place you could just curl up in and take a nap. It's cozy times infinity. It even SMELLS cozy... Whatever that means.

I think the baked goods absorb all of the cozy goodness of this house and this family too. To call them mere bagels, or bread, or scones would be falling flat. Dan gave us a sneak peek yesterday when he dropped off a couple of Pane Siciliano loaves. To give you an idea of how great these are, allow me to set a scene... Upon slicing into it, alone in my kitchen, knife in hand, I said a single word aloud... "Beautiful". And it is. In every sense. The crisp, fresh, hollow softness of that first break into it? Heaven. I stood over my sink eating slices with fresh tomato, salt, and nothing else. Beautiful, indeed. This morning's array was no different. Imagine the genius of chopped dates mingled with thick bacon pieces, and all snuggled up in creamy, crumbly, perfection. That's the Berkeland scone. But my favorite? The absolute highlight of my day? Can a bagel be a pièce de résistance? These are. These unassuming little treats are actually the bagels to end all bagels. I saved mine until I got home, sliced it in half, toasted it flat for about two minutes, and spread cream cheese thin across each one. My first thought aside from "Holy... Oh my gosh, are you kidding me?" was "biali". The flavor, the texture, the PLEASURE of this little food... amazing. It harkened childhood memories of bialis, fresh out of the oven, eaten warm, in an open-air courtyard. Nothing I've eaten since has come close to those until now.

Thank you Berkeland family, thank you Back Porch Bakery, thank you bagel Gods.

Amen.

An Mei and the faux Foodland cashier...

Amber is my oldest friend. My best friend. The one I made as a little kid and still genuinely enjoy with all my heart. We grew up in a tiny community on a little island in the middle of a big ocean and in hindsight, we were a little.... isolated. Buffered. Sheltered. And (both only children), somewhat immature. But it's ok, because we still had so much fun. Though we live a few thousand miles apart now, we still have so much fun.

Here's a little texting conversation we had this afternoon:

Me: I just found a note to you that says- "'You used to be cute, now you're just a flat-faced Jap!' Pffft! You WISH, hapa glama girl! <3, C"

Amber: UMMMMM. Circa WHEN?

Amber: The actual Jade C. quote was "fat, flat-faced nap"!

Amber: Can you believe the nerve of that COW???????!!!!!!!!!!!

Amber: Flat-faced NAP??? Oh my god, I'm going to throw this phone into the street!!!!!

Amber: Droid FAIL

Amber: Am I even making sense right now? I'm having a low blood sugar episode. Sorry. :-!

Me: I got locked out of my house when I took out the rubbish right after I sent you that text, so six messages waiting for me was super entertaining.

Amber: The sad part is all of those were sent in like a 10 sec time frame...nutsowat

Amber: And nutjob here found a birthday card for Evelyn while cleaning... that was for her birthday last year. Nice job, Aunty An Mei.

Me: No, I cannot believe what a gross cow Jade was. I've been ging through old photos (I have lots), and I'm so sad to see just HOW nerdy I was. People hear "nerd" now and they think 'Awww... nerdy-cute'. No. Nerdy NERD. It's not the same. It's high waisted pants with a button up shirt buttoned all the way up. It's hours spent playing "Foodland" cashier ALONE. It's wearing spandex pants to your 4-H delegates' meetings and eating way too much KFC mashed potatos. :,(

Amber: but Coral... you WEREN'T alone... That is the truly sad part. :O

Me: I know, An Mei... I know.

Amber: Papino Library, anyone?! "We treat our customers like we treat our books"?

Amber: Coral, you WERE nerdy-cute, stop being such a fork about it.

Amber: DORK!!!! I HATE THIS PHONEEEEEEEEEE

Me: I have pictures that say otherwise. But it's ok. At least we skipped the whole beach and smoking pot thing. And walking around in sports bras with shorts.

Amber: We did cuter and cleverer things precisely because of the non-wearing of sports bras.

Me: Agreed.

Post Script...

"Jade" was a relentless (and grossly overweight) bully who tormented us throughout elementary and intermediate school. I think in high school he just got lost in the crowd.

"Foodland" was our local grocery store and later, a favorite hangout and the setting for our umpteen pointless teenage-years home videos.

"Papino Library" was... yes, our imaginary library.

Also, there are exactly three references to The Joy Luck Club in this exchange. Notice none of them are acknowledged, but we both know they're there. This is why I love her so much. Well... that and she owns countless hours of blackmail footage on VHS, so I have to. :)