Tied up in knots

It was an 18 hour drive from where we lived outside Chicago to the small Long Island town where my mom had grown up. Once or twice a year we would leave after school and my dad would drive all night. (I know, I can’t imagine how he did that.) It was quite an adventure, I remember waking in the night to see a sign on the Pennsylvania Turnpike for Valley Forge. I would imagine the winter encampment, wonder what it looked like now. (And now I live a short distance away from that exit. Also funny to realized I have no memories at all of the 18 hour drives back to Illinois, which we surely must have done at night as well to minimize the kid boredom and resultant chaos.)  

The bakery on Long Island was close enough to walk to from my grandparent’s house. There were sidewalks! For a girl from rural Illinois (no sidewalks, no shops within walking or biking distance) it was exciting to have such independence. My dad loved the poppy seeded hard rolls from the bakery with his coffee in the morning, fetched fresh each day. When we moved to California, too far for even such infrequent visits, my dad began to try to duplicate the rolls at home. My grandfather would taste test when he came to visit (easier to transfer one elderly parent by plane from East Coast to West than six kids and a dog in Volkswagen van.) He finally settled on a recipe that matched his memories (and got my grandfather’s seal of approval as well). 

When I would visit he would make a batch, timed so they’d just be coming out of the oven when I walked in the door. To be eaten hot, with butter. My dad died in 2019, but the rolls live on. The third generation (both Crash and Math Guy) learned from my dad how to tell when the dough was just right, how to tie the dough into knots and how much egg wash to use to get the right color and those poppy seeds to stick.

A few weeks ago, during the snow storm that left us snow covered and encased in ice (it’s been 3 weeks and the back yard is still under several inches of snow) I made a batch of braised short ribs and my dad’s hard rolls, It was the first time I had tried them since Parkinson’s symptoms had become evident. My head remembers how to tie the knots, but my hands had a hard time complying. A subtle reminder that Parkinson’s always lurks under the surface, the medications only (mostly) mask the symptoms. I eventually got a dozen rolls onto the sheet, and baked. They were not perfect, but they were wonderful, hot from the oven, redolent of yeast and memory.