About

My mom had a standing arrangement with my sister, brother, and me:  pick a pie’s worth of blackberries, and I’ll make you a pie.  Fortunately, a burgeoning blackberry bramble sprawled out of the creek down the street from our house.  We spent many a summer afternoon filling coffee cans to the brim with berries and returning home with purple hands and faces.  More often than not, I stood on a chair at the counter helping my mom make crust for her amazing pies.

My mom likes to tell the story about the day my kindergarten class made pies.  Apparently my teacher didn’t know what she was doing, so I started giving her suggestions about cutting the butter into the flour so she’d get the right consistency before adding water–”ice water, Mrs. Robinson”–to the mixture.

So I guess I’ve always been a baker at heart.  I teach at a small alternative high school (you could call it a one-office-schoolhouse), but in my spare time, I dabble in baking breads, decorating cakes, and experimenting with other foods that time usually dictates people to buy rather than make.  I don’t pretend to know what I’m doing, but I’m having a good time.  And these days, I have to watch my toes as three-year-old Tessa drags a chair to the counter when I’m working in the kitchen.  She tells people proudly that she will be a chef some day.

 I can be reached at suzanne {at} flourarrangements {dot} org.