Rollin' Along

It’s marathon roll-baking week here, as intoxicating smells envelop the house and visiting grandchildren observe the baking process and sample my goods.  So far I’ve made three kinds of rolls that are hiding safely in our freezer until the weekend when they’ll be thawed for a high school graduation party: challah knots, soft Kaiser rolls, and crescent rolls.  One more to go, probably a honey-wheat.

Today was earmarked as crescent roll day.  A five-year-old granddaughter helped me knead the double batch of dough.  “This is the way I do it with my daddy, Nana.  I fold it and I punch it with my fists, like this.” 

She labored to manipulate the big lump, but had good technique.  I told her so.  In fact I said, “Maybe you’ll be a baker someday.” 

“Maybe,” she answered softly.  I already know she wants to be an artist.  In truth, she already is one.

An hour later the dough had risen above the top of the bowl like a smooth, yeast-infested, pregnant belly, and I called her to come watch the next step. I punched down the swollen mass and rolled a portion of it into a thin, round circle.  “What are you going to do, Nana?” she asked, knowing I wasn't making cinnamon rolls - her dad's forte. 

“Just watch,” I answered.  “I cut it in half, like this, and then each half in half again, and then…”

She curiously wrinkled her nose as the circle before us was cut into long pie-slice shapes.  Then she giggled and exclaimed,  “It looks like pizza!”  Her sparkly-eyed laugh slashed clean through me, the purging tool of childlike pleasure.  And I knew, in a split second, how this baking project - and every project I share with her - is about a lot more than the obvious.  For those with eyes to see, it is all about delight.