A Mother's Guilt

These days, we've been eating a lot of vegetables and pulses chez Fractured Amy. More so than in the gluten-filled days of yesteryear, that's for sure, and I've been trying to figure out why. So has the Kid Squid, who is not at all pleased by this turn of events. He let me know this in no uncertain terms after I proffered for his approval yesterday a forkful of Down-with-the-Tyrant Butternut Squash, my new favorite dish of all time.

Now, the Kid Squid is quite the gourmet and an adventurous wrangler of new flavours - bolder than many of his friends and contemporaries, in fact. Foie gras? Crocodile ribs? Exotic curries? Raw fish? These he will eat with a relish and enthusiasm that does his foodie parents proud.

This was not always the case, however. For years he subsisted, somehow, almost entirely on hot dogs and buttered noodles. Conventional wisdom freely offered up by Others was that he would be a damnably picky eater all his life unless we took drastic action. We chose (wisely, it turned out) not to battle with him over food and he will now try anything at least once - and often surprises us with the things for which he declares a liking.

To his credit, he's been generally supportive of my gluten freedom-fighting, gamely taking a crack at corn spaghetti, quinoa, and brown rice. He's proved a zealous (if often disappointed, and who's to blame him?) judge of gluten-free baking experiments and a good sport where new recipes have been concerned - even when this has meant monkeying around with his trusted favorites.

But he is a scrupulously honest sort of lad and does not dissemble all that well. The plaintive look he gave me as he sampled his squash and chickpeas was almost more than my maternal heart could bear. Clearly, in his estimation, with this dish I had Gone Too Far. I could tell as soon as he started chewing. A mother knows these things.

So I decided to make him a treat to show him that I still love him.

One of his favorites - fudge.

The recipe is simplicity itself, as all fudge recipes tend to be. It's pretty much the one that appears in the Joy of Cooking. The Squid likes it because it most closely mirrors the confection that, in his opinion, is the zenith of the species: the plain chocolate variety to be had thirty miles away at Cabela's in Hamburg, PA - and which he is therefore able to acquire rather less frequently than he might if his world were a more perfect place.

Since this was a spur-of-the-moment project and - wishing to regain my son's good will ASAP - time was of the essence, I had to make do with the ingredients I had in the pantry. This was no hardship, except where the chocolate was concerned. I don't normally keep chocolate in the house because, since it always gets eaten by persons unknown when I'm not looking (thus necessitating a special trip to the shops anyway), what's the point? This way, chocolate is purchased more efficiently on a just-in-time basis and everybody stays fit and slim - or that's the theory, anyway.

However, on this happy occasion I happened to have a bar of chocolate squirreled secretly away, in anticipation of just such a culinary whim: a bar of Zolotaya Marka 70% kakao, smuggled back by DMR from her early winter adventure in St. Petersburg. Dark, complex, and special enough to show the Squid I care.

The perfect peace offering.

 

Russian Fudge for the Kid Squid

• 2 cups sugar
• one quarter cup corn syrup
• 1 cup whipping cream
• pinch of salt
• 6 oz Russian dark chocolate, chopped into tiny bits. You could use American chocolate, I suppose, but then it wouldn't be Russian fudge, would it?
• 2 tablespoons room temperature butter
• 1 teaspoon vanilla
• additional bits for adornment (we like ours utterly nude, as the good Lord intended)

Butter a nine-inch square cake pan and set it aside. Combine the sugar, corn syrup, cream, and salt in a large saucepan. Bring to a boil over medium heat, stirring all the while.

Remove the pan from the heat and stir in the chocolate. Keep stirring until it's all melted and smooth and amalgamated.

Return the pan to the heat and continue cooking until you reach 240 deg F. Do not stir during this stage of cooking!

When you reach the desired temperature, remove the pan from the heat and add the butter and vanilla. Do not stir it in!

Decant the still unstirred mixture into a cool mixing bowl. I send mine straight to the bowl of my standmixer, onto which I've fitted the paddle attachment.

When the fudge is no longer hot, start beating it until it loses its sheen and is very thick. This is actually one of the few occasions where I prefer my standmixer over all other possible tools: I turn it on low and walk away for about 15 minutes, during which there is ample time to wash all the dishes or check how everybody on Facebook is doing.

When the fudge is ready, you can stir in your bits or spread the naked mixture straight into your prepared pan. You can score the surface now for slicing later on, if you so desire. Refrigerate overnight.

The next day, dip the pan in very hot water and turn out the fudge. Slice it into pieces but do not refrigerate them hereafter or they will lose their creaminess. I keep the pieces in a cake tin on the kitchen counter, where they hold beautifully for at least a week.

Next up: unable to contain my own new found enthusiasm for butternut squash, I consider a new risotto recipe to have for lunch in the Kid Squid's absence