Baking is Poetry 401

What is Baking mean to You? Here is a poem I just jotted down in an effort to get back to food blogging again.  I want to hear from my readers --- is baking a smell, a sight or sound? A memory?

Baking

It is patience

It is understanding 

the
ebb
and
flow 

 Of ingredients
Of Environmental factors 

It is flirting

with formulations

to achieve

the ultimate

in taste combination -

Whether 

that result achieved

is

simplistic

or 

quite complicated.

Baking is 

the warmth of a stack oven
Of the freshly
de-panned product.

Baking is

 the satisfaction
Of creation.
 Of the tears 

which 

well in their eyes

when a taste, a smell

invokes 

memories
of home,

Of a loved one

that 

has
passed on.

Baking is
the alcoholic fumes

permeating

from a container

that
housed 

your starter -

your poolish -

your biga -

or 

your mix.

Baking is intoxication.

 Amber ©2010. All Rights Reserved

I also experimented with a new add-on  for GIMP called "Polar Inversion" - so I used it on the pic below. I think it encapsulates production quite well, you know, the total process seems full circle.

Saterday Soul Search : Food Poetry 21

In my hopes to re-ignite my poetry writing, I try to find food pictures that will inspire me - then in a creative burst, I try to write out the thoughts that come to mind and type them out immediately. Here are some of my plated desserts shots and the words that became of them...

Sugar fired ---
extreme degrees render your cube like structure molten.

How you boil into a yellow frenzy ---
Scorching, throwing your strand like tentacles
grasping and attaching

your hot intensity
slips quietly into a more permanent existence ---
Hardening , your exterior smooth,
yet fragile in
your mock
glass sheen.

Related Posts:

• Soul Search : Saturday Food Poetry
• Poetry of Baking
• Poetry : The Long Ferment

Soul Search : Saturday Food Poetry 15

In an effort to reawaken my poetry writing, I will be featuring a food photo that inspires me, then let the words that stem from that image fall onto the page. Enjoy! Comments welcomed and appreciated.

Thanks ericmcgregor for use of this photo.

Muscular and artistic hands -
weaving the magic we call presentation.

I see the art,
fashioned of edible sculpture.

Your formulations
are
the
holy scripture.

you are profit of the palate,
to
your
unwavering congregation.

cutouts of cake, bases;
the pulpit
from
which
you preach
your decadent wisdom.

Dripping, oozing
thinning sauces.

Prepping, squeezing;
till heavenly visions
are realized.

Tuiles, chocolate decorations;
An offering
of snap,
of crispy symmetry;
Oh lovely visual revelations.

Is it enough to paint those lines,
to chase perfection
to gain
culinary
holy ground?

© All Rights Reserved. 2008

Poetry of Baking 1

Baking

At night, I wake up sweating
And feel poems baking in my heart
Like my grandmother's biscuits.
As I toss and turn, they brown and rise.
I test each one and add a pat of butter here,
Some honey there, a bit of jam.
I will savor them with my morning coffee.

-- Published in Writer's Journal 2004 . Raynette Eitel

Poetry : The Long Ferment 0

My thoughts are a cloudy mess
gluten like epiphanies,
that meld into a thick opaqueness.

A forever state of
complex biochemical changes
slowly dampen my sweetness.

A rough life
my emotions inflate
leaching into alcoholic fumes.

I am stretched
into delicate webbing,
threatening to break.

A formula of years
tears moist yet salty
friction makes for uniformity.

Lay me down
let the realizations
multiply and engulf me.

Stowed internally
eventually I peak,
overflowing.

Constant reshaping
proofing the layers
which precede me.

I am thick skinned
yet vulnerable to
each harsh action.

Watch my color
fade,

the sheen ---
the splendor---

a dull reflection.


Amber © May 05, 2005. All Rights Reserved.