Toast and Tea
Away from hOMe
It was not long before dawn would break that I awoke to a growling stomach. I laid awake, face down, staked out in the middle of a friend’s living room in a makeshift ‘bed’ made up for me countless times in the past from a remnant piece of sound proofing foam, a contour sheet over that and a sleeping bag as a comforter since the zippers’ broken.
It was a Monday morning. The day’s schedule was being sorted out in hushed whispers that drifted through the house from the kitchen, which in time grew loud enough to be regular conversation was definitely my signal to concede and arise. I emerged from my warm cocoon to get my marching orders since I would be the keeper of the keys. I learned how to lock up and alarm the house faster than nobody’s business because I then had to get driving directions to the office. “Got it, 6:30 at the office.” Briefcases and book bags were being lunged for as I walked like a sun soaked hermit crab back to my safe haven in the living room.
I was completely exhausted. I had just completed work on the first WOMAD, North American tour. Organized and supported by Peter Gabriel’s Real World, The World of Music Art and Dance was the first festival of its kind to tour North America featuring multi-cultural music acts, and workshops. To date it might still be the largest group of people assembled on the road for a happening of this kind. It was this morning in San Francisco that I had a mighty and significant realization. Little did I know than the impact the simple breakfast of toast and tea I whipped up in a hOMe away from hOMe would have on my life, oh two or three years down the road. I had a momentous realization that morning. When you’re on the road you’re every whim is catered to ‘round the clock. Catering being the operative word. What struck me this morning as I savored two scavenged slices of whole-wheat toast and a steamy cup of tea on my friend’s sun deck on a crystal clear fall morning was that the energy or life force one brings to or transfers to ‘self prepared’ food is so vital to ones holistic makeup on any given day. The energy, direction and focus are missing when you don’t prepare food for yourself. You become sloth like eating prepared food.
Once the coast was clear, (my friends had gone off to work) and my hunger pangs had finally gotten the better of me I made a B line to the kitchen. It was a glistening fall morning in the Oakland hills. Numerous small crystal objects that hang in the huge picture window ricocheted tiny rainbows onto surfaces you would never expect to find a rainbow on. Sure I could get into making an eggs and potato something but it was the furthest thing from my mind. A bowl of cereal is a nice and simple ‘excuse’ for sustenance when you’re as burnt out and starving as I am, but no way. As I was coming to, so to speak, I remembered the special treat that awaited me here, MY San Francisco treat. I wanted one thing and one thing only; toast with organic spun honey coupled with a steaming cup of English Breakfast tea.
It’s funny, toast is the first thing I think of having when I sleep over a friends house, but never once did it cross my mind to make it when I was on the road faced with a row of steaming chaffing dishes of eggs, potatoes, & hot cereals. I’ve always ignored breakfast meats.
I noticed a pattern, more often than not, when I’m away from my hOMe I find mornings at a friend’s place are as though I’ve woken into the middle of a maelstrom. Children run hither and thither unhappy with their soggy cereal. My friends are grabbing at food as they run off to meetings and appointments. Then a cleaning lady or nanny comes along who is also looking to suffice a break-fast appetite. When caught up in this whirlpool of activity I become like an apparition, gliding and drifting about with very few words, imposing little on the space I’m in. So, it’s toast for me. As a matter of fact, I boldly go for two slices of toast. No matter what I may choose to top my toast with it’s got to be cheaper than a bowl of cereal these days. Another great thing about toast is that it requires very little ‘hardware’, if any, except of course a butter knife and that’s probably lying around because someone else used one earlier that morning, and, clean up, it’s nothing. Often times I don’t even dirty a plate because I wrap the toast in paper towel or a napkin, sweep the crumbs into my palm and bolt from the kitchen mix. Between my own two hands and the paper towel, I’ve got an eating surface and utensil all at hand, humm, there may be a pun intended here. Talk about the perfect utilitarian, dish.
Anyway – back here now, BE HERE NOW
First things first, I filled the kettle with water and got that on to the back burner. Next I was headlong into the fridge looking for that leavened loaf. You’d think the toast I’d be driven to write about would be a good quality raisin nut loaf or a sourdough, but NO! The toast I’m on about here and have a perfect sense memory for happens to be two leftover heels of an overlooked Arnold’s, whole-wheat sandwich loaf. I found the bread squished and wound up in the plastic wrap that once sheltered the whole loaf crammed into the back corner of the bottom shelf atop the vegetable crispers along the interior wall of the refrigerator. I must have looked a bit like Charlie Bucket of Charlie & The Chocolate Factory when he peeled back the candy bar wrapping only to find a hidden golden ticket. Similarly I unraveled this neglected rolled up mess of plastic wrap to joyfully find two heels of a loaf left behind. My findings were a bit stale on the edges but I couldn’t have been happier to find them.
I plugged the toaster in and sponged away the crumbs left behind by my friends’ rushed and routine morning. Being somewhat more mindful than I would give myself credit for, I checked the adjustment for the toast’ness I desired. Irregardless of how exhausted I was that morning I noticed that once the water was boiling a clarity and sense of calmness came over me like I had never experience before. It’s in between the ochre and the sepia tone, not the chestnut color that I desire for my toast. My friend’s husband likes his toast on the darker side. I’ll have to remember to put the gauge back to where it was before my adjustment. I placed my precious find into the toaster. Lever down.
Now, with a bit more energy in my step I was ready to tackle the walk-in pantry closet to hunt down some tea. Fumbling through boxes of every imaginable kind of tea under the sun, they sit on a shelf piled on top of, next to and cantilevered off of one another not unlike a child’s tower of building blocks. Not a virgin box of tea in the place, every box has been opened. The thick wax paper that lines the majority of these boxes is crumpled so that the tops of these boxes will never close properly again. All these choices and all I wanted to get my hands on was that red box of English Breakfast tea.
The POP! My toast is done! Ahhh that warm comforting sweet smell, just this little waft filled my lungs with a hint of that overwhelmingly delightful smell when a hOMe made loaf of bread is lifted from an oven. I’m liv’n large this morning. I’m gonna have my toast on a plate and indulge in a variety of toppings. Since I had so many options with which to top my toast I cut the two heels in half. I dressed the first quarter slice with very soft organic butter, it had been left out all morning. On top of this comes the topping to top all toppings, my San Francisco treat, raw spun honey. The fact that I have access to as huge a jar of this as I do could get down right dangerous. For my second slice of toast I did not bastardize or deter from the swabbing of spun honey with anything. Dry toast and spun honey. The next slice I made up was with the room warmed organic butter and a dusting of cinnamon and a little squinch of raw sugar. Last but not least, the funkiest, curled up brown piece of naked toast I delicately slathered with a thin layer of the softened butter, some spun honey a sprinkling of cinnamon, then a streak of peanut butter right through that.
Picking out a mug is similar to what it takes to getting at a tea bag in this house. The mug cabinet is chock full of various drinking vessels in an array of materials, shapes and sizes. I’m extremely partial to a mug I’ve been drinking out of since these friends of mine lived in New York City. The mug or vessel if you will that I use when I’m here is your weighty hand thrown model, without a handle, glazed with brush strokes of speckled brown and blue.
Looking something like an abstract Rothko, I took my plate of toast slices out to the sundeck on that crystalline September morning. Wrapped in a blanket I settle into a big bamboo bowl shaped chair sitting cross-legged with my sunglasses on, nothing to read and only the clouds to capture my attention. My steaming mug of English Breakfast tea with just the right touch of milk sits arms distance away, just to my right on the sundeck. A bit of condensation has formed under the pieces of toast, but I couldn’t care less. This break fast tasted more delicious to me than anything I could remember. I savored each of these toast slices, biting first from slice one, and then three and then the second slice alone, a sip of tea. This went on for quite some time as you can well imagine.
Sure I could have had toast with honey and tea on the road, but no toast would ever taste like this toast. It’s that energy and life force you bring to the preparation of food that makes the food taste so completely differently from prepared food. From left over, neglected scraps, with a little love and attention I had myself a delightful delicacy. This is what RECIPE$ 4 $URVIAL is all about.
Cheers, there’s another toast for ya.
