With a pandemic raging about the land the ability to get certain provisions is limited. Either the store is running out of things or I'm running out of the store. Yesterday I went to Hy-Vee and it was like being in the wilds of Borneo. There were dangerous animals at every turn. Namely, other shoppers who were probably virus shedders. It was futile trying to maintain a six foot berth inside those narrow aisles. I wanted to shout, "Stand back, you savages! I'm here to pick up groceries, not viruses!" I couldn't get out of there fast enough.
The shelves were absent of many things, some of them curious. Carrots, for example. Vegetable stock. Plenty of chicken stock, but no vegetable stock. Ricotta cheese was in short supply. As was Ben and Jerry's ice cream.
The threat of impending shortages makes one see things differently. In the past, if a recipe called for a tablespoon of tomato paste, I'd measure out what I needed from the 6 oz. can and throw away the rest. It was too small a blob to bother with and if I saved it I'd inevitably find it months later covered in mold. But nowadays it's a precious blob, with me thinking, "I could build a whole meal around that."
I find myself rethinking certain niceties. Like flavor. "Does this recipe really need an onion?" I'll ask. "I'm sure we can get by without it." I feel a need to hold onto my onions.
I seek new ways to source things, eyeing my suburban yard with new interest. "There must be something growing out there I can make tea from", I think.
I lie awake wondering, "Should I get a goat?" It could be a way to get milk and cream. Which I don't believe I can live without.
When I lapse into the abandon of more carefree days I scold myself for taking my eye off the ball. "Why did I use butter just now when I could have used oil?" I lament.
And suddenly, I find myself baking. It just seems like the thing to do. It's as if some ancient cellular memory from my prairie forebears has been awakened, giving me the urge to make dough with my own two hands and fill the house with the scent of browning crust---be it scones, bierocks or pot pie. As if I instinctively know that these are the skills that will be needed for the apocalypse. I'm not alone in this. The baking aisles of grocery stores everywhere are decimated, a back-to-basics scratch approach being the new national Zeitgeist as we Stay At Home.
I contemplate the nearly full container of Crisco left in the cupboard from that one pie I made last Christmas. It's like gold! Think how many pie crusts I can get out of that! I cheer myself with this, hugging myself quietly.
But I haven't been able to score any yeast for bread-baking. I was touched when someone on Twitter addressed this, sharing a way to jerry-rig yeast from dried up fruit.
@shoelaces3, who describes himself as a biologist, scraper of knuckles and orchid killer, tweeted:
"Friends, I learned last night over Zoom drinks that ya'll're baking so much that there's a shortage of yeast?! I, your local frumpy yeast geneticist have come here to tell you this: THERE IS NEVER A SHORTAGE OF YEAST. Here's where I'm a viking. Instructions below."
The Tweeter went on to describe how to make yeast from dried fruit. Good to know, but then I wonder, what if I run out of flour? Hmmm....if it comes to it, maybe I could grind up that jar of Planter's roasted peanuts in the coffee grinder.....
If I start making my own yeast, why stop there? Why not MacGyver my own wine? God knows I have plenty of old foodstuffs fermenting around the house. I'm looking into it...
My Google searches of late all amount to the same question: Can I still eat this? ("If blueberries are wrinkled have they gone bad or are they just less attractive?" "How much mold can I get away with on cheese?" "Can I freeze heavy cream just before it turns?" "Do I have to take expiration dates seriously?")
I find myself harking back to those forebears, thinking of how they would have pooh-pooed things like expiration dates or even refrigeration. Why they probably wouldn't have blinked an eye at wrinkled berries. They would have gobbled them right up with a little dollop of curdled cream. And if there were any left --they'd have made yeast out of them! But throw them out? Never! Waste not, want not!
Perhaps the most frightful shortage looming is that of toilet paper. A substitute will be harder to improvise. Are we to go back to my mother's day, when she said they used to keep a big Sears Roebuck catalog in the bathroom? I'm a good sport up to a point, but forebears or no, I have certain sensibilities. We'll be okay for awhile. We've only just begun to crack the mega 24-roll pack I bought a month ago, but since then I haven't been able to lay in any more. I'm afraid it's only a matter of time before we're down to our final roll. So it is with a great uneasiness that I've started looking at my L.L. Bean catalog in a new way. I'll say nothing more.
