Zigmund Fertig Quotes

There was something in her eyes that made me trust her. Maybe it was because they held the same cynicism, the same world-weariness I saw in my own every morning when I looked at myself in the mirror. ~ Melika Dannese Lux

Death stalked toward us on padded feet.
And it was not alone. ~ Melika Dannese Lux

Don't listen to the ramblings of fools," he said, smiling grimly. "When it comes down to it, if they knew the truth, no one would want to live on this earth forever. ~ Melika Dannese Lux

Whenever there is some trouble in any area of the economy, the simplest solution to many people is "Let the government fix it." Yet ... every time the government uses its money or its power to favor this group or that ... the net result is such a web of supports, subsidies, interventions and controls that it is almost impossible for a nation to find its way back into a dynamic system of really free enterprise. ~ Lawrence Fertig

At Rainbow Cake, January's special flavors would be dark chocolate and coffee, those pick-me-ups we all needed to start the day- or a new year. To me, their toasty-toasty flavors said that even if you only had a mere handful of beans and your life went up in flames, you could still create something wonderful.
A little trial by fire could do you good. After all, if it worked so well with raw cacao and coffee beans, it could work for others, including me. ~ Judith Fertig

Could a flavor be pleased with itself and its position in the world? That was plum. Not the sharp-flavored skin and the sweet flesh of a fresh plum, but more the concentrated flavor when the fruit was cooked down for a tart filling. Like the taste of port. In fact, I liked to pair plum and port together. ~ Judith Fertig

A virtue of the free enterprise system is that it offers every individual the greatest opportunity for self expression. ~ Lawrence Fertig

I was starting to think of her as the "Goth Van Gogh" on a good day or "Vampira" on a bad one. She took a little getting used to. ~ Judith Fertig

I knew that sunny citrus helped put things in focus, sharpened the memory, just like a squeeze of lemon juice could sharpen and clarify the taste of sweet fruit. I was also well aware that too much citrus could indicate a corrosive anger. My first wedding at Rainbow Cake had taught me that. But this was a gentle, subdued citrus, like the taste of a Meyer lemon.
Spice usually indicated grief, a loss that lingered for a long time, just like the pungent flavor of the spice itself, whether it was nutmeg or allspice or star anise. The more pronounced the flavor, the more recent the loss and the stronger the emotion. So there was some kind of loss or remembrance involved here. Yet there was also a comfort in the remembering, knowing that people had gone before you. That they waited for you on the other side. ~ Judith Fertig

A bit reluctantly, trying to leave my bruised ego behind, I was warming to the Appalachian idea.
Bourbon and branch water. Dulcimer music. Wildflowers in jelly jars. Biscuits and country ham. That did have a certain charm. ~ Judith Fertig

I looked up to see the sun struggling behind a gray mass of snow clouds.
I could relate.
And then a beam of sunlight found a way through. A sign? Maybe.
But what was this? I gasped. The bakery esters had refracted into visible bands of flavor.
Red raspberry, orange, and the yellow of lemon and butter.
Pistachio, lime, and mint green.
The deepest indigo of a fresh blueberry
The violet that blooms when crushed blackberries blend into buttercream.
The Roy G. Biv that a baker loves.
And then the darkness: chocolate, spice, coffee, and burnt-sugar caramel. ~ Judith Fertig

He knew me so well. He was the only one who could make me feel as if the world were right again, and I was loved and cherished and known and he would never, ever leave...even at a distance, he could read me. He could find that vulnerable spot and say the right words, do the right things, that brought me back time after time. ~ Judith Fertig

Let's not freak out here," Jett said, ever the diplomat in venom green nail polish and little skull earrings. "People aren't going to come until they've had their dinner. Pie is for dessert."
Maggie and I stood behind the counter, arms folded, and stared out the display window.
Jett shook her head. Leave it to her to be remarkably upbeat while the rest of us were uncharacteristically morose. "Maybe we should open up so that this wonderful pie aroma brings them in," she said brightly. She opened the door and used it to fan the pie air out onto the street.
And it worked.
Somebody walked in. ~ Judith Fertig

It wasn't often that I had difficulty tasting something. Flavor was the way people like me made sense of the world.
We knew that there was a flavor that explained you-even to yourself. A flavor whose truth you recognized when you tasted it. A flavor that answered the question you didn't know you had.
Perhaps it was a voluptuous vanilla that your sharp-edged self could sink into like a pillow. Or a homesick pomegranate, each seed like a ruby slipper that would take you back to the place where you were loved and where people had missed you. ~ Judith Fertig

At the far end of the bakery, our canvas curtain heralded April's lime and coconut theme. Little bags of coconut meringue polka dots with lime buttercream filling were there for the taking. I was proud of our little cakes shaped like a cracked-open coconut- white coconut cake interior with a dark chocolate "shell," complete with a lime cookie straw inserted in the center for imaginary sipping. Lime bars with a coconut crust and lime curd filling sat on a snowy white cake stand. ~ Judith Fertig

I walked back to the front of the bakery to see a knot of people stalking our display for June. Apricot and lavender might seem like an unusual pairing, but it made perfect sense to me. Luscious, sweet apricots taste best when they're baked and the flavor is concentrated. On the other hand, lavender likes it cool; the buds have a floral, almost astringent flavor. Lavender was a line drawing that I filled in with brushstrokes of lush apricot. ~ Judith Fertig

When I lived in New York and went to Chinatown, I learned that these flavors and their meanings were actually a foundation of ancient Chinese medicine.
Salty translated to fear and the frantic energy that tries to compensate for or hide it.
Sweet was the first flavor we recognized from our mother's milk, and to which we turned when we were worried and unsure or depressed.
Sour usually meant anger and frustration.
Bitter signified matters of the heart, from simply feeling unloved to the almost overwhelming loss of a great love. Most spices, along with coffee and chocolate, had some bitterness in their flavor profile. Even sugar, when it cooked too long, turned bitter. But to me, spice was for grief, because it lingered longest. ~ Judith Fertig

In simply thinking his name, an iceberg of frozen emotions loomed on my horizon. Everything I knew about icebergs I learned from the Titanic.: You saw the tip of the iceberg floating in the water but what you didn't see was all that lurked beneath the surface. I didn't want - and I couldn't afford - another shipwreck in my life. ~ Judith Fertig

The flavor that came to me was a luscious Suncrest peach that I once had in California. This heirloom variety needed time to ripen on the tree to achieve its peak flavor. Unlike other peaches that were picked unripe so they would ship more easily. Suncrest peaches had to be eaten right away. But they were worth it- fragrant, luscious, juice-dripping-down-your-chin perfection.
The problem was that I didn't have any peach mousse or filling. But I quickly improvised.
"You're getting married in August, when peaches are in season," I said. "Taste our browned butter yellow cake with a little apricot and some vanilla-almond buttercream, and see what you think."
As they each took a small bite of what I hoped would be their signature cake flavors, I was drawn back into the taste of the peach. It was juicy and sweet, but as I got close to the center of the peach, their was an off flavor of rot. In my mind's eye, I could see a darkened area close to the center that would soon cause the peach to wither. I knew what that meant.
I didn't know whose life would be blighted, but these golden days were few. They wouldn't have much time together. ~ Judith M. Fertig

Sister Boom Boom - a half-Catholic, half-Jewish drag queen named Jack Fertig, who wore a whore's makeup and a nun's habit and vamped it up with the other political pranksters in the Sisters of Perpetual Indulgence - was an especially aggravating thorn in Feinstein's side. Boom Boom ran a remarkably aggressive campaign against Feinstein during her 1983 reelection bid, under the slogan "Nun of the Above," eventually winning twenty-three thousand votes. ~ David Talbot

She couldn't see the homemade colored sprinkles, the tender yellow cake, or the pale pink frosting made with strawberry syrup enhanced with a little rosewater. Although our local strawberries weren't in season yet, I had conjured the aroma and taste of juicy berries warmed by the sun. I hoped this flavor would help the two old people return once more to their youth and the carefree feeling of a summer day. ~ Judith Fertig

Jett's artistic talent was as weighty and emphatic as the heavy black makeup she applied to her lips and eyelids. ~ Judith Fertig

I was beginning to taste it. Something bitter, but warm.
A flavor that woke me up and let me see things clearly. A flavor that made me feel safe, so I could let those things go. A flavor that held my hand and walked me across to the other side of loss, and assured me that one day, I would be just fine. A flavor for a change of heart- part grief, part hope.
Suddenly, I knew what that flavor would be. I padded down to the kitchen and cut a slice of sour cream coffee cake with a spicy underground river coursing through its center, left over from an order that had not been picked up today.
One bite and I was sure. A familiar flavor that now seemed utterly fresh and custom-made for me.
Cinnamon.
The comfort of sweet cinnamon. It always worked. I felt better. Lighter. Not quite "everything is going to be all right," but getting there. One step at a time. ~ Judith Fertig

He opened the box and saw a tiny cake shaped like a bird's nest in three small round layers of tender, browned-butter vanilla cake with an apricot filling. A "nest" border of piped rum and mocha buttercream enclosed a clutch of pale blue marzipan eggs and a sugar-paste feather. The complicated yin and yang of rum and mocha, the "everybody loves" vanilla, Mr. Social white chocolate, tart and witty apricot, and artistic marzipan- all said "Gavin" to me. ~ Judith Fertig

The tantalizing scent transported me to a white, sandy beach lapped by a turquoise sea under a tropical sun. Lime and coconut were the getaway flavors my bakery customers needed in April, tax time. ~ Judith Fertig

There was something about feeding a man who appreciated your efforts and ate every bite. ~ Judith Fertig

I didn't know until I licked the mocha buttercream from my third devil's food cupcake that this was the flavor of starting over- dark chocolate with that take-charge undercurrent of coffee.
I could actually taste it, feel it. And now I craved it. ~ Judith Fertig

Maggie and I were delighted. It was now Jett's turn to go to the dark side. "I've never seen such a bunch of doom cookies," she said, wiping down the tables.
"What?"
"Doom cookies. You know, people who pretend to be something they're not, like girls in my class who pretend to be bad-ass but go home and read The Little House on the Prairie in their Disney princess bedrooms."
"Who were the Pie Night people pretending to be? I don't quite follow."
"They're pretending to be bad-ass pie bakers," Jett trilled in a church-lady falsetto, " 'Oh, leaf lard is the best.' 'No, I swear by a mixture of Crisco and butter.' When was the last time they actually baked a pie? If they did, they wouldn't be gorging themselves here on Pie Night. They probably don't even own a rolling pin." Jett sniffed. And then she added, diplomatically, "But your pie was good. ~ Judith Fertig

The flavor the came to me was a luscious Sincerest peach that I once had in California. This heirloom variety needed time to ripen on the tree to achieve its peak flavor. Unlike other peaches that were picked unripe so they would ship more easily, Sincerest peaches had to be eaten right away. But they were worth it- fragrant, luscious, juice-dripping-down-your-chin perfection. ~ Judith Fertig