Substitution Dilemmas

The Chocolate Cake Dilemma

Because folks, including us, do not venture into grocery stores as often as usual during coronavirus confinement, they sometimes have to substitute one ingredient for another in recipes. We’ve had fun experimenting with new options. Our newspaper is full of substitution ideas. Try pizza seasoning on spaghetti. Use spinach instead of escarole.
 
This is not our problem. Our problem is a fixation on chocolate cake. A fly on our wall would hear Monday night after dinner: “I’m in the mood for chocolate cake.” A grasshopper on our wall Tuesday would hear the longing in our voices: “Wouldn’t a piece of chocolate cake be wonderful?” An ant on our wall Wednesday would hear us whine: “We want chocolate cake!”

I have a gluten-free chocolate cake mix in the pantry. If I bake it, the two of us will eat every chocolatey crumb in short order. If we had dinner guests to help us eat this cake, I would bake it. We cannot have guests now. Neither of us wants that much sugar at any time, but especially now when we are super-conscious of keeping our immune systems strong.

A recipe for Trail Mix Cookies catches my eye as a high-fiber, high-protein, low-sugar treat containing chocolate. I baked these cookies tonight. My, they’re tasty. Alas, they cannot substitute for chocolate cake.

Who wants to be our first dinner guests when this confinement is finished? There’ll be chocolate cake!


The Library Book Dilemma

I’ll just come right out and say it: An e-book is no substitute for a paper book. Call me old-fashioned, I don’t care. I am really having trouble with our libraries being closed.

When sheltering-at-home began in early March, I was slow to realize libraries would close. My rude awakening came when I went to return an Edwidge Danticat at the drive-up slot, only to find it duct-taped shut. I felt shocked and sad. But I knew that the book I wanted to read next would be available online, so I downloaded it. After working on the computer four or five hours a day, my eyes are tired, but I adjust my schedule to fit in a little casual e-reading some afternoons.

Evening relaxation, for me, however, needs to be a non-screen activity. I began pulling paper reading out of my magazine basket. How fun to re-read articles. I even found a few crossword puzzles I had somehow overlooked when the magazines were new. What I really craved though was a novel. With libraries closed, I turned to my own bookshelves. Lo and behold, I found a large paperback volume of Short Novels of the Masters, so I read a few. Henry James, Gustave Flaubert, Leo Tolstoy—great to read the masters. When I got to one novella that turned out to be in a time of plague, I put that volume back on the shelf and pulled out The Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society, which was just as delightful this time around. Now I’m loving rereading Jan Karon’s first Mitford novel. Perfect for curling up in bed.

Happy as I am to be part of an interesting book club, and glad as I was that my library had an e-license for our recent book, it came with frustrations. How do you go back and bookmark what you want to discuss with your friends? Apparently, as I e-read our next book, I’ll have to take paper notes as I go along. Our group has also chosen its next-next book, and one of our members had two copies, so she lent me one. She put it in a plastic bag on her front stoop. I rang the bell. She in her living room and I on her front sidewalk got to chat through our masks. So that in-person visit was a balm for these lonely times. I let her book sit for the recommended five days. And now, I have an actual book to hold in my hands and treasure like a … well, treasure.