The Yarn Whisperer by Clara Parkes

else’s fabric. I like to think my life fits my fiber far better now. I’ve relaxed into an open stitch pattern that highlights the mohair instead of trying to squash it. But I still long to go back to France. Whenever I’m on deadline, I’ll have at least three different browser windows open, each featuring a charming rental cottage or apartment somewhere in France. The worse the deadline, the bigger the house and the longer-term the rental.
    Part of me fears that the Clara I’ve become will still be sideswiped, if given the chance, by her long-dormant French counterpart. I worry that my beautiful life may suddenly seem once-again insufficient in the face of that alluring, smooth, tightly twisted worsted world. Or maybe France has changed, too? Maybe its fabric has relaxed to accommodate more variety. Perhaps now it would accommodate my fuzzy halo, and the two Claras could finally become one.

CHANNELING JUNE CLEAVER

    THEY SAY THAT beauty is only skin deep, that it’s what’s
inside
that really counts. All this is fine, well, and good, but what about pie? You could have the most exquisite filling known to mankind, but if your dough is a flop, nobody’s going to want a slice.
    For years, piecrusts have eluded me. One New Year’s Eve, I wrote a bucket list of things I’d like to accomplish before I leave this earth. Somewhere between “write a book” and “take off a year and travel to India,” I added “master piecrust.”
    When I was growing up, nobody ever seemed excited about crust. They never hummed as they rolled it out; there was always a sense of obligation and dread as they waited for it to tear (it always did) or stick (it always did) or otherwise spontaneously combust somewhere between the rolling pin and pie plate.
    My health-conscious mother made her crusts out of whole wheat flour, experimenting with various oils and “heart smart” alternatives to butter and Crisco. The pies of my childhood were always a bit dry, crumbly, slightly bitter in taste. Their tops were made from a patchwork of torn pieces that had been glued back together. And they were always served with the unspoken message, “Eat this damned thing.”
    Living in Maine in a house overlooking acres of blueberry fields, blueberries figure prominently in my summer diet. I’ve mastered blueberry crumbles, blueberry pancakes, blueberry syrup … but every time someone visits—and many do—the first thing they ask for is pie.
    How I’ve longed to be one of those June Cleaver people who can happily whip up the perfect pie at a moment’s notice. What’s that you say? A busload of tourists is stranded at the town hall, and they need two dozen blueberry pies for sustenance? Not a problem, let me just don my apron. Can I knit them some mittens while I’m at it?
    But the ominous nature of pie dough has always taken the wind out of my sails. When you hear people groan about something enough times, it’s easy to groan about it yourself—even if you’ve yet to give it a fair shot. People do this with knitting all the time. “Thumb gussets are impossible,” they say. Only after we follow the instructions, step by step, do we realize how incredibly graceful, logical, and downright
easy
a thumb actually is.
    Funny enough, I managed to write a book—three, actually—before I felt ready to turn my attention to pie dough. After multiple failures, each adding a new layer to the compost pile,I stumbled upon the golden recipe: the 3-2-1 Pie Dough from Michael Ruhlman’s
Ratio.
This combination of ingredients (flour, fat, and liquid) and technique produces the dreamiest piecrust known to man.
    It goes against all common pie dough wisdom. While everybody blends some mix of butter and Crisco, this one calls for nothing but pure, unadulterated butter. And everybody warns, “Do not overwork!” Yet I roll, fold, slap, and tease this