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About Olive Kitteridge Elizabeth Strout's Guest Author Blog
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FEATURED AUTHOR RECIPE Elizabeth Strout:
This “food” is often something sweet, and frequently a doughnut. She goes out for doughnuts with her husband, she swipes an extra brownie at Marlene Bonney’s house, she makes applesauce from the last of the season’s apples, she happily eats an ice cream sundae while visiting her son. These things comfort her, and for any of us that have a sweet tooth, we can understand that. For much of the book, Olive is at the point in her life where she is no longer cooking. And, as she suffers one loss after another, it seems that for awhile she is sustained mainly by a diet of Dunkin’ Donuts. The reason that I included this doughnut recipe is because I imagined Olive’s collection of recipes that would have been compiled over the years, and I thought – as with many women and their recipes – there are certain things that would be passed down from generations before. Where did Olive’s love for doughnuts come from? Her grandmother, I decided, would have made doughnuts. My own aunt sometimes made doughnuts, and they were unbelievably good. These days we are all (and rightly so, big sigh) concerned with healthy food, and doughnuts don’t make the top of the list. But Olive, until the very end of the book, is not too concerned with her health. The pleasure she received from her grandmother’s doughnuts, doughnuts she no longer makes by scratch, but buys at Dunkin’ Donuts instead, are presented to you here for that occasional “day-off” treat.
Note: To make sour milk, add one tablespoon of lemon juice or vinegar to one cup of milk, and allow to stand for ten minutes. Or, you may substitute buttermilk for sour milk. To shape the doughnuts, use a doughnut cutter, which can be purchased for a few dollars at a kitchen store. If you don't have a doughnut cutter, use a 2 to 3-inch round cookie cutter. Cut out the smaller inner circle using a smaller cutter. 3-1/2 to 4 cups flour
Optional: For sugar and/or cinnamon doughnuts, place dry doughnuts in a paper bag, add 1 teaspoon cinnamon and/or ¼ cup sugar and shake well. Yield: About 2 dozen 3-1/2 inch doughnuts
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During most of the book Olive Kitteridge, the reader sees Olive in her later years. We have glimpses of her earlier life when she is cooking and cleaning (and often pretty fed up with doing so), and we see beans and hot dogs served, and understand that the culinary life of her family is straightforward, with few frills. In her fierce and imperfect way, Olive loves her son and husband, and tries to take care of them while also tending to her students that she taught for somany years. Life frequently tires her out, which means – often – grabbing something to eat that gives a quick boost. By the time we see her at her son’s wedding, in her nice new dress that she made, she admits to herself that she is larger than she wants to be, but she “is not about to give up the pleasures of food at this stage in the game.”