I believe in making fudge, or more precisely, I believe in making decadent, old fashioned, hard fudge that is frustratingly difficult to produce. The fudge I'm talking about sparkles under bright lights, crumbles when you break it apart, and melts on your tongue if you have the self-restraint not to chew it. This is the best kind. The kind my grandmother always makes for Christmas. The kind that reminds me of my childhood. The kind that brings out the best and the worst in me.
I'm a perfectionist you see. My family think I'm OCD, which, if I'm honest, wouldn't surprise me at all. While this particular idiosyncrasy may help with schoolwork and baking, it does not bode so well for any activity involving boiling sugar. Boiling sugar, a temperamental substance at best, tends to do exactly the opposite of what you'd expect as my first attempt at fudge making more than adequately demonstrates.
I followed the Good Housekeeping recipe to a T. I measured every ounce of sugar, every cup of milk, every teaspoon of vanilla essence to precisely the prescribed amount. The mixture looked textbook as I continued to stir. A notoriously time consuming undertaking, I was prepared to spend rather a long time perfecting the fudge, however, to my dismay it began to thicken and congeal in a sudden burst of zealous action. I scraped the mixture out of the pan into a tin and watched with glum horror as my beautiful fudge set into a crumbly heap of failure. My father and grandmother tried to console me to no avail, claiming it was salvageable although it most obviously was not.
After a few minutes, I pulled myself together and decided to make one last attempt at creating this elusive delicacy before I went to bed. With steely determination, I set about recreating the fudge and eliminating any minor errors I thought I'd made. After nearly two hours, by sheer luck and a little guidance from my all-knowing mother, I did it. I made that relic of Christmases gone by. I had defeated the perfectionist's ultimate adversary: hot sugar.
The next time I made fudge, it turned into another hot mess.
I have made many fudge batches since and I think I've missed almost as many times as I've hit my goal. At first, accepting failure or anything less than my ideal was extremely difficult. Just as in all other aspects of my life, I like things to go as planned and am usually highly irritated when they don't. However, I began to learn how to enjoy failure as much as success because no matter what, the product tasted good.
I still feel pangs of annoyance when the sugar seizes or my fudge sets as toffee but these events have ceased to be as apocalyptic as they were. Like life, fudge is unpredictable and doesn't always go as planned. Especially during a time like senior year, the process helps to remind me that whatever the outcome, I'll find a way to make it work. Although I sometimes find the capriciousness of life incredibly difficult to accept, I've become more flexible to change and less easily rattled by what I cannot control. These subtle differences in my attitude towards life have helped me control my stress and find joy where I didn't before. Who knew making fudge could be so enlightening?
I'm a perfectionist you see. My family think I'm OCD, which, if I'm honest, wouldn't surprise me at all. While this particular idiosyncrasy may help with schoolwork and baking, it does not bode so well for any activity involving boiling sugar. Boiling sugar, a temperamental substance at best, tends to do exactly the opposite of what you'd expect as my first attempt at fudge making more than adequately demonstrates.
I followed the Good Housekeeping recipe to a T. I measured every ounce of sugar, every cup of milk, every teaspoon of vanilla essence to precisely the prescribed amount. The mixture looked textbook as I continued to stir. A notoriously time consuming undertaking, I was prepared to spend rather a long time perfecting the fudge, however, to my dismay it began to thicken and congeal in a sudden burst of zealous action. I scraped the mixture out of the pan into a tin and watched with glum horror as my beautiful fudge set into a crumbly heap of failure. My father and grandmother tried to console me to no avail, claiming it was salvageable although it most obviously was not.
After a few minutes, I pulled myself together and decided to make one last attempt at creating this elusive delicacy before I went to bed. With steely determination, I set about recreating the fudge and eliminating any minor errors I thought I'd made. After nearly two hours, by sheer luck and a little guidance from my all-knowing mother, I did it. I made that relic of Christmases gone by. I had defeated the perfectionist's ultimate adversary: hot sugar.
The next time I made fudge, it turned into another hot mess.
I have made many fudge batches since and I think I've missed almost as many times as I've hit my goal. At first, accepting failure or anything less than my ideal was extremely difficult. Just as in all other aspects of my life, I like things to go as planned and am usually highly irritated when they don't. However, I began to learn how to enjoy failure as much as success because no matter what, the product tasted good.
I still feel pangs of annoyance when the sugar seizes or my fudge sets as toffee but these events have ceased to be as apocalyptic as they were. Like life, fudge is unpredictable and doesn't always go as planned. Especially during a time like senior year, the process helps to remind me that whatever the outcome, I'll find a way to make it work. Although I sometimes find the capriciousness of life incredibly difficult to accept, I've become more flexible to change and less easily rattled by what I cannot control. These subtle differences in my attitude towards life have helped me control my stress and find joy where I didn't before. Who knew making fudge could be so enlightening?
Do You Need