My Battle Song and Lemon "Doughnuts"

If you check the play count on my iTunes playlist, you’d find that Switchfoot’s “Dare you to move” has been played 1200 times.  And that’s an underestimate, since I tend to hit replay before the song ends.  I am one of those people who obsesses over one song at a time, and keeps it on repeat until I can mentally follow every drum beat and guitar rift.  I do this with every song until I am utterly disgusted with the melody and move onto the next catchy tune.  This is why I need my own room, because I would drive my roommate nuts.

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But “Dare You to Move” holds a special place in my heart.  It is THE song I revisit, time and time again.  I’ve played it the day when I sat down on the steps of some stranger’s house and cried.  Over lost loves, dashed hopes, and deep-seated fears.  This is the song that inspires me at every twist and turn, reminding me that life is so much bigger than my circumstances.  It is the song I turn to when I need to find myself through anger and sadness.  In disappointment and confusion.  From resignation and indifference. 

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This song is about moving forward regardless of whatever humiliating, shameful, hurtful, and devastating event took place.  It touches the very core of what I believe in.  That we have a choice at the brink of defeat and surrender—“between who you are and who you could be”—to choose how we want to make our lives.  It is timeless precisely for that reason.  Because failures come and go, because we will never know what adversity will hit us next, because we can never predict where we will find ourselves, we will always need to remember how to move forward. 

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This past weekend, I tried to make doughnuts with lemon ricotta cheese filling.  I love the lemon zest and sugar topping, but the bread itself tastes nothing like soft, fluffy donuts.  Even though they make for some tasty breakfast buns, I consider this a flop.  I suspect I must have overworked the dough while rolling it out to cut out circles, because it was extremely difficult to re-roll the scraps.  Note: let it rest after each round of rolling so that it can build up some air.  Moreover, I could barely fit more than a small dollop of cheese filling into the buns without it spilling out.  In the end, I had so much leftover cheese filling that I had to figure out some way to use it up.  I’ll post what I did with that later. 

One thing I did learn from this is how to let dough rise in an icy cold apartment.  I turned on my electric oven to 200F for a minute and 15 seconds.  Turned it off and shut my doughnuts inside to rise.  It’s great because it’s well insulated and protected from drafts.  Now, if I could only figure out how to “fluff” my buns, then I’ll be happy. 

Baked Lemon Doughnuts from Gourmet Traveler