The moment I started making banana bread, a sense of calm began to wash over my jittery, anxious self.
Moving through those familiar rituals _ measuring flour and sugar, cracking eggs, greasing a pan _ turned out to be the kitchen equivalent of a deep cleansing breath.
Once the house began to fill with the tantalizing scent of this childhood favorite, I was certain that I'd made the right decision to pull out the mixer and preheat the oven.
I've always been aware of the concept of stress baking, but only as an intellectual abstraction. But in this time of ongoing crisis, baking has become a new meditation of choice, an emotional salve.
I highly recommend it.
Start with these time-tested crowd-pleasers, reliable for their uncomplicated nature. No ingredients that stretch beyond pantry staples, no challenging techniques, no out-of-the-ordinary equipment. Also, they're delicious.
One peek into a refrigerator drawer filled with Braeburns and McIntoshes and my imagination immediately dashed to fragrant, cinnamon-scented baked apples, and to "Comfort Me With Apples," the second (and best, in my opinion) of food writer Ruth Reichl's series of memoirs; I think I'll download it on Kindle and reread. And because it's fruit, it's good for you, right?
I'm baking coffee cake because it's not just for breakfast, and because I happened to have sour cream on hand, and blueberries in the freezer. And cinnamon, always; my spice rack is never without it. Coffee cake also has a long shelf life, a key selling feature for the housebound.
Cookbook giant Dorie Greenspan's World Peace Cookies have been a fixture in my baking repertoire ever since 2006, when Mary Eckmeier entered them in the Star Tribune's annual holiday cookie contest, and won. They exude a deep chocolate aura, one that's accentuated by sea salt (even more so with the addition of espresso powder). They follow a basic cut-and-bake formula, yet taste as if you fussed.
There are almost always a few ripe bananas in our freezer, waiting to be converted into smoothies. Or, better yet, banana bread. This recipe is adapted from the one that my late mother-in-law used to feed her family.
As for the pudding, yes, technically, it's not baking. But it is dessert, and who doesn't like butterscotch pudding? This recipe requires just a few steps beyond the instant boxed mix variety, and the results are far more impressive.
The recipe hails from a foolproof collection of comfort foods that New York Times food writer Marian Burros published in response to an earlier tragedy, the Sept. 11 attacks, and I've been cooking and baking from it ever since. Now I realize that I reflexively reach for it during times of stress.
