Pumpkin Bread for Breakfast

PUMPKIN BREAD FOR BREAKFAST

I had pumpkin bread for breakfast this morning. It was a gift hurriedly accepted yesterday from my co-teacher as we prepared for our Monday class of Seniors. By chance I had taken in a small bag of Clementines for her, which I almost forgot to give her. I notice that one of the marks of true friendship it this business of giving small things you know the other will enjoy, with no occasion needed, no thought of who owes what to whom, and rather casual thanks, because the deeper pleasure and gratitude are understood without talk. I didn't pack the Clementines with any pondering - there were more in the little crate than I could eat before they spoiled and I knew she would enjoy them. We don't waste any time on "oh, you shouldn't have bothered."

When I opened the bag I was delighted to see that she had printed a perfect label, well designed, centered, and all that, for the top of the loaf. This meant more than you would think to glance at it. I met E. when she appeared in one of my Complete Beginners Classes. She took to the computer like that proverbial duck, and soon borrowed one of the Senior Center's old, old machines for practice. It wasn't long until she returned that and bought an elegant new machine. All of our star pupils are invited to come back and coach with an experienced teacher, and then take a class of their own. E. started coaching with me and we soon became a pair. We have so much fun teaching together that we are not interested in breaking up and getting her a separate class.

We are both retired public school teachers, so we could trade war stories forever and not run out. We try not to use energy getting excited when we read about the same administrators' and theoreticians' obtuseness that we lived with. We know exactly how to cure the nation's school problems - just hire intelligent teachers who love kids and have some liberal arts background, open preschool havens for every child who does not have a caring parent or two at home, put half the administrators and special services people back in the classroom, pass legislation to protect teachers so they can be honest about children's problems without being prosecuted…. That will do for a start.

Teaching half a dozen Seniors who can't find the space bar, or 25 kids who would rather be outdoors, is about the same - fascinating, rewarding and exhausting. So E and I drop in on various nearby restaurants to hash over the day's class and revive ourselves with a little something.

Yesterday we shared an enormous Tachino on focaccia sandwich. This is not a family recipe. It was all new to both of us. Marcella Hazen says focaccia is a descendant of the earliest bread. Its name comes from Latin focus meaning hearth, the place where it was baked, flattened on a tile. (More Classic Italian Cooking, Knopf, 1978. I bought this book to read between rounds of a jousting tournament in Maryland, for which web site designer daughter was playing trombone in a small band, but that's another story.) For our sandwich the bread was almost an inch thick, toasted perfectly to be comfortingly warm, but easy to eat. Marcella Hagen of course gives you the full details for the classic version, which I suspect is what we were eating. Another book suggests using frozen bread dough, pressed flat, poked many times, drizzled with tomato sauce, Romano cheese, and olive oil. An even quicker version uses 3 cups of biscuit mix with 1 cup of milk, sage, olive oil, and garlic salt. They bake at 400 and 450, but Marcella Hagen lines the oven with tiles to do it right. I have never had a Bisquick recipe that didn't taste like Bisquick, which is O K sometimes, but not here. Tachino is turkey, not a common dish in Italy. Our sandwich also had perfectly melted cheese.

Back to pumpkin bread. E's is moist and dark and sweet, full of raisins and nuts, sort of what fruit cake ought to be, and never quite is. The Pumpkin Bread at our house is different. When my brother and his wife and I were sad and weary clearing out my father's house in St. Petersburg, Florida, the lady next door brought over a loaf of warm bread, which made a wonderful reason to stop sorting papers and have a little something. Later I wrote to ask her for the recipe, and used it on our Christmas card that year. The bread was also expected at each Credit Union annual meeting for many years, along with Blueberry Bread.