You Can’t Fax a Fig

We have all sorts of electronic substitutes these days. We push a button and things happen, things appear. We can bank on-line. We can borrow a book through the Kindle service. We can send an e-mail.

But it’s not real money, not a real book, and not a real letter. We’ve trained ourselves to accept the electronic substitute and taught ourselves to believe it costs us less, although usually it does not. Not if we think about all the real costs.

Anyway, I’ve been picking figs, lately, and the only, ONLY, ONLY way to get a fig that is still warm from hanging in the sunshine is to get up out of a chair, go outdoors, walk over to the tree, reach up, grab ahold, and pull a fig off the branch.

And it is worth all that incredible effort. A warm, ripe fig is a soft and squishy confection, what some might call “deliciously juicy”. Softer than a banana, sweeter than a strawberry, not sticky like caramel, yet reminiscent of all three, a fig can only truly be compared to another fig.

Oh yes — worth it.

And the people who like a fig enough to plant the tree, or to get off that chair and go on out there, or to cut the stems off the fruit and get out some canning jars, or to stir some canned fig into a cake batter — they’re worth it, too.

These are the kitchen people. The real butter people. The whole wheat flour, olive oil, honey, and home-grown eggs people. If offered store-bought, um, we really don’t mind fasting that much.

Got figs? Get these recipes!

MYO Fig Bars

2 c. chopped figs, stems removed
3/4 c. water
1/4 c. honey
2 tbsp. whole wheat flour
Boil until clear. Cool.
Dough:
1/2 c. butter
2 small eggs
1 tsp. vanilla
1/2 c. honey
1/2 tsp. soda
2 1/2 c. whole wheat flour
Cream butter and honey. Add eggs and vanilla. Beat until fluffy. Add flour and soda (sifted together).

Press half of dough into 9×13 pan. Spread fig filling evenly over dough. Roll remaining dough on wax paper and flip onto top of filling. Press gently. Mark bars by cutting through top, slightly. Bake at 375 degrees until lightly browned. Cool. Cut bars. Better than you-know-what.

Fig Bread

3 eggs
2 1/2 c. sugar
2 c. mashed, ripe figs
3/4 c. very fine olive oil
3 c. flour
2 tsp. baking soda
1 tsp. salt
1/2 tsp cinnamon
1/2 c. buttermilk
1 c. chopped pecans
Beat sugar into eggs. Add figs and oil. Sift together dry ingredients.  Add to figs, alternately, with buttermilk. Beat well. Fold in pecans. Bake at 350 degrees for 1 hour in greased and floured loaf pans. Yields 3 loaves.

Have fun!