OMG A SQUIRREL OMG DID YOU SEE THE SQUIRREL OMG OMG OMG DIDJA!?

My dog is a fu**ing rockstar. Seriously. We can hardly get to the end of the block without people unable to contain themselves with oohs and aahs and copious amounts of petting. I have to admit- I’m very proud; I always beam and say “thank you” when she gets a compliment and it’s especially touching when others (including trainers) comment on how well-trained she is, or at least how well I’m doing when she’s out of control and I’m calm (my dog is helping me work on my own frustration tolerance!). Basically, my dog is the epitome of marvelous 90% of the time on 90% of our walks. That other 10% of the 10%, however, is pretty disastrous. But I’m not here to talk about her extreme prey and play drives (she doesn’t take “no” for an answer when dogs or squirrels are near, or basically anytime we’re in Central Park).

That’s how she sits, cuz she be rockin.

So my dog is a rockstar, which is pretty cool. Everyone loves her. I wonder if it’s the same sort of thing that makes people love three-legged dogs so much. That adorable quirkiness- the mishap that the dog so obviously doesn’t even notice is a “wrong” about her or him. With Fig, it’s her insane proportions. She has a big shepherd head and large paws, but from above she is pure wiener, giving her this incredibly wrong-looking floppiness. There’s also, of course, the issue that if you approach her she immediately wags her entire body and, often, rolls over for a belly rub. I can’t complain with this one, and I know she’ll eventually figure herself out in the park and around other dogs. Someday. Oh, and maybe, someday, I’ll be able to leave the apartment for more than 1-minute intervals every five minutes (yes, she’s still got that thing going on. Fluoxetine, anyone?)

I’m sure she punished me for not rubbing her belly while I was taking this photo.

My dog is such a rockstar, so well-behaved and mellow, that my mother actually thought I was drugging her. Well I’m sorry if my dog doesn’t want to jump all over you and play tug on your schedule. She is her own lady, and she is easily worn out by romps and tugs (see above for description of stretchy wobbliness).

Mom & Fig.

So where does that leave me? Am I, like, her agent? Manager? Pimp? Not at all. I am just the woman who walks behind her on the street, picks up her shit, and on rare occasion pulls a goddamn crab leg out of her mouth. I hate the person who left the crab legs on the sidewalk way less than the man who actually looked at me with a “yo whatevz bro” face as he left the dog park today with both gates open, as if he was deliberately trying to get everyone’s best friend KILLED. But that’s another story and if I see him again I will do everything I can to get the police up his ass. For those of you without dogs – dog parks have a double-gate system similar to a submarine or space shuttle so that you can safely make sure all dogs remain inside the run while your dog is leaving (and he left both open, clearly on purpose).

She’s an amazing dog, but she would definitely die if she got out of the dog park at this point in her training, and that is scary as f**k.

I can’t believe how much I just wrote about my dog. But, like, she is a serious full-time job! Luckily she sleeps a lot so I can still bake up a storm. I’m here today to tell you not just about my very own personal in-house rock star but also the most amazing multigrain bread. I eat this bread everyday with my homemade raspberry jam or some melted butter. It comes from Martha Stewart’s Baking Handbook, as do many of my beloved yummies. This bread does everything right. It relies more on whole wheat than all-purpose flour, it has whole grains (oats), things I’d never heard of (oat bran), and even omega-3’s (flax seed). It’s sweetened with honey, not refined sugar, and there’s an entire cup of milk which I can only assume adds some sort of richness above and beyond water, which is used in most breads.

You can see the healthy emanating from this bread like sunlight. Healthy, filling sunlight.

I’ve been walking for multiple hours everyday because of Fig and her insatiable desire to be outside. Sometimes I let her into the hallway and all she does is calmly walk to the elevator and lie down, giving me insane puppy-dog eyes. How can I not take her outside 400 times a day? You can’t walk forever on lemon bars and blueberry pancakes, even if they are whole wheat, let alone tire your (and many others’) dog out by running back and forth with a drool-and-mud-covered tennis ball in Manhattan’s best dog park. Why am I the one always chasing after the ball, anyway?

These are lemon bars. They are actually that color in person (no, I did not use any dyes, just a million lemons). They’re delicious, but not very interesting. Just curd on top of almond shortbread. Recipe found here.

So Martha Stewart has this amazing multigrain rolls recipe. The first time I made them I made about 24 dinner-roll-sized rolls. They were great, but they were rolls. I mean, what do you do with rolls? Are they like some sort of side dish? Do I serve them with meals? It just wasn’t working for me. I wanted sammiches and slices. I needed innards much more than crust. So the second time, I made two 9-inch loaves. I thought I had screwed up the rising process somehow and that’s why they were so short (subconsciously making them look like my dog?). However, upon further investigation, I discovered that this recipe is really only enough for one overflowing 9-inch loaf plus one mini loaf. Third time’s a charm, I guess. Now that I actually understand the science of this recipe (i.e. the yield and rising), I can work on fulfilling the two orders. This bread is so good I actually got two, yes two (!), requests- my sister (the health freak) and my boyfriend (wishes he was a health freak; thinks liking goat’s milk qualifies him), who wants these in hot-dog bun form. No problem, brah. I got dis.

These look really sad; an upgrade was necessary- an upgrade to real bread.

This recipe is practically fool-proof and incredibly easy (so why’d it take me three tries to perfect it!?) I’ve found that using my oven (set to 170 then turned off upon preheat ding) to help the dough rise is magic, and “warm milk” actually feels hot to my touch. I’ve also decided that egg washes are a waste of an egg and don’t add anything to this recipe, and I already have 8 extra egg whites in my fridge from the ice cream I made yesterday. I just cannot make another four batches of meringue cookies; they are too sweet for me (I never thought I’d hear myself say that. OH GOD AM I OLD!?).

This is exactly how you want it too look. Extra crispy in some spots, dark brown in most others.

Multigrain Rolls [adapted from Martha Stewart’s Baking Handbook]
Makes approx. 1 overflowing 9-inch loaf + 1 mini-loaf

Ingredients
.5c oat bran
.25c. flaxseeds
.5c boiling water
1 envelope active dry yeast
.25c honey (oil your measuring cup first so the honey slides right out, or don’t and use a spatula, you’ll be fine).
2 eggs, lightly beaten (I forgot to pre-beat my eggs and it made absolutely no difference so if you don’t want to dirty yet another bowl, just add the eggs in as they are)
2/3c. oats (the old-fashioned kind, not the quick-cooking kind, but feel free to try whatever you have)
7 ounces whole wheat flour
1tbsp salt (I used Trader Joe’s fine sea salt and it’s great- go with what you like)
Approx. 2.5-3c all-purpose flour
Oil (olive or anything) for bowls, plastic wrap, and loaf pans
Optional: 3 tbsp mixed seeds and more salt (coarse) for sprinkling. I wouldn’t recommend buying this stuff just for the bread – it’s more for aesthetics.

You can easily make one regular loaf and one mini loaf, like the one above. It’s great for mini snacks or even as a gift with your homemade jam.

To Make Bread: (the directions call for a stand mixer. If you don’t have one, it’s okay. Flour your hands and prepare to knead for ten+ minutes on a floured work surface)
1. Combine oat bran and flaxseeds; cover with boiling water; let cool/gooify while you work on other stuff. Preheat oven to lowest temperature (mine is 170).
2. In the bowl of your stand mixer whisk together the warm milk, yeast, and honey. Let stand 5 minutes until slightly foamy. Attach your dough hook.
3. Put mixer on low speed, attach the splatter guard, and add in the eggs, oats, WW flour, salt, and oat-bran/flaxseeds mixture. Slowly add AP flour, 1/2c at a time, until you have a soft, sticky dough. Sticky = delicious. It should stick to you if you grab it, but not if you poke it.
4. Knead on med-low speed until it’s springy to the touch, approximately 3 minutes. It should depress and then pop back up when you poke at it.
5. Put dough in an oiled bowl covered with oiled plastic wrap. Make sure to oil your plastic wrap, since this is a sticky dough! Put the bowl in the oven, turn off the oven, and walk your dog for 1.5-2 hours while the dough doubles in size. Don’t worry- the oven won’t melt your plastic wrap. If you forget to cover your dough it will dry out and get semi-gross in spots, so please cover it (have you been counting my mistakes?).
6. Generously oil your loaf pan(s). Plop dough into pans, cover once again, and put in warm spot for 20-25 minutes, until it doubles in size (again). Preheat oven to 375F. While the oven is preheating, the back of your stove should get warm – this is a great spot to let your dough rise.
7. If using seeds – brush egg yolk over dough and sprinkle seeds/salt.
8. Remove the plastic wrap and bake bread for 22-26 minutes, until dark brown on top. Cool on a rack in the pan for 10-15 minutes before eating.
9. Spread with butter or jam or speculoos or really anything. This bread is good with anything. After the first day or two it can be kept in the fridge (in a large baggie) and then reheated in the toaster. Best eaten immediately, while it’s still hot enough to burn your fingers and melt your butter.

This is not a beautiful picture, but it is a good visual representation of happiness on a plate, in the healthiest of ways.