Aebelskiver... say what?

I normally don't eat food with names that I cannot pronounce, so it's a good thing that Trader Joe's calls these little tiny balls of doughy tastiness "Danish Pancakes;" otherwise I would have skipped right over them while looking for something delicious (and premade) to serve at Marieke's shower. These aebelskiver were the hit of the whole spread at the shower (well, maybe other than the mimosas), and they deserved their place in the spotlight. They were delicious. Slightly crispy on the outside, warm and spongy on the inside, and not sweet at all. Not fried in a vat of grease like fried dough, and not rubbery like a traditional pancake (maybe I'm the only one who makes rubbery pancakes?). I sprinkled some powdered sugar on the top, but also served them with some raspberry jam, and either topping was a fine accompaniment.

Well, Marieke's now mother-in-law was at the shower, and she noticed these little Danish pancakes right off the bat. She wanted to know if I made these aebelskiver myself, and I kindly handed all the credit over to Trader Joe's, after asking her if that's what they were actually called (what do I know?). This got us to discussing the ways you can make them, and that she has a special aebelskiver pan at home that she hadn't used in ages, and that they're pretty easy to make. And then, when we were at Marieke and Curt's wedding - in the receiving line, actually - and we saw Marge again, she remarked to her husband about the aebelskiver I served. Craig was pleased that I served such food out East (is this regional fare?), and he and Marge decided to send me Marge's aebelskiver recipe. I told her that I'd love to have it, and thanked her, but I admit to not expecting anything out of it. I'm cynical, I suppose. I'm a New Englander. We say things that we don't deliver on, but with the best intentions, of course, so I suppose I expected the same from Craig and Marge. I was happy enough to have had such a nice conversation with them; they truly are such pleasant people.


But wait - what's that? It's my new aebelskiver pan! I found it in a box on my doorstep on Thursday, and it was a complete and total surprise. Doug thought it was one of the pedals he had ordered, but when he saw that it was an Amazon box and addressed to me, his curiosity was piqued, as was mine. Once I got through all the bubble packaging and saw the little holes in the pan, my mind instantly went back to Marieke's wedding, the receiving line, and Marge and Craig's comments about sending me the recipe. But they said nothing about a pan - and where was the recipe? That came in the mail the next day, complete with Marge's alterations to make it come out just a little bit better. I have to say that I am so impressed - and pleased and excited. Marge and Craig's kindness has touched me. A big thank you to them! Are all people as nice as them out in the West?

I do New Englanders some injustice, though, when accusing all of us of being unfriendly and a bit cantankerous. We do have our own kind of niceness here, a quiet, unspoken neighborly niceness, and Doug and I experienced it earlier this week. This was the scene on our street on Wednesday, during the big winter storm (was it a blizzard? Maybe just a Nor'easter? I watched the news virtually all day on Wednesday and am still not sure about what this storm was, exactly. In Connecticut it had a name - Benedict. Here in Massachusetts, it seemed to be just a storm.). Doug and I spent a good two and a half hours shoveling out our driveway, steps, and walkway, and uncovering the cars, in the mid-morning while it was still snowing pretty hard. We witnessed one of our trees falling down, but thankfully were not under it when it fell: Our street didn't really get plowed that day, and even by the time I left for work the next morning the street sat under a good six or more inches of snow. I knew that by the time we would come home that night the street would likely have been plowed, and that would mean that the opening to our driveway (that we had spent so much time shoveling!) would be plowed in. And then we wouldn't be able to get into our driveway. So all day on Thursday I had a vision of Doug and I driving onto our street that night, trying to ram the car into our driveway, and getting stuck. And me getting out and shoveling around the car while Doug rocked it back and forth, burning out the clutch, to get it unstuck.

But we didn't have to do that. Anxious visions be gone! Because our neighbor, the one who I don't think I've ever said even one word to in all the time that I have lived here (he's not a talker, and really neither am I) snowblowed our driveway after the snowplow came by while we were at work. And he widened the path that the plow made on our street, too, giving all of us more room to put our garbage cans. That was another touching moment, knowing that our neighbor had done something so kind and thoughtful, even though he probably doesn't even know our names. So maybe we New Englanders aren't so unkind and unpleasant after all. Maybe we just express ourselves differently. Regardless, this week was definitely the week for kindness, the kindness of virtual strangers, and that made it a really good week.