Home Hunting: Ginger-Maple Scones

Me Blogging Before Beginning the House Hunting Process:

Aaaaaaand Now:

THE END.

Or not. But really, this is insane.

According to Lyon Realty, the average American only stays in the home they bought for eight years before selling and starting the whole process again. I don't actually get this. I grew up in only two homes my entire life. The first one I was in until the age of six, but my parents had been there for 15 years, and my mother is still in her second house.

How does the process not mentally and emotionally scar people to the point where they never leave their new homes? I imagine myself at the end of this process sustaining on the unfortunate squirrels who happen into my backyards in order to avoid society. I would have to restrain myself around loan officers and realtors for fear that I might bludgeon them to death with mortgage insurance paperwork?

At least the loan part is done. We have one and awaiting a letter of approval so we can start making offers.

Assuming we can, that is. Allow me to break down the market here in Sacramento.

1. Most homes stay on the market an average of 20 days. This is because there are a lot of buyers and not a lot of homes. This is lame and I hate it.
2. The market is slowly beginning to rise in Sacramento so everyone who was waiting to buy is now out in force. I am trying to move quickly before the hibernators come out with the winter thaw and every open house begins to look like a salmon spawning ground of eager buyers pushing approval letters with sweaty hands and pulsing through the tours of guest bedrooms.
3. Many investment corporations are buying up to 30 homes a week in Sacramento with cash. Some of these corporations aren't even local. Some are in China, because apparently they're running out of highrises to stuff their populous in. My guess is that we will soon begin outsourcing jobs to overseas workers who actually live down the street. One investment corporation in particular purchased over 500 homes in Sacramento last month. This means the little people wanting a first home (e.g., me and husband) are screwed.
4. The first home we found that was just right we didn't get to tour. Within 24 hours of it being up for sale the home had 20 offers and 4 counter offers. I fell into a Virginia Woolf-style depression for days and kept filling my pockets with small stones.

I am coping by falling back one of the oldest traditions in my family: drinking. Not like in an, "Oh my God, Garrett, we love you and you have a problem," way, but I find having a rather large glass of wine when I attempt to decipher mortgage loan offers or understand APR financing seems to help. The last one is still rather hazy and not due to the wine (or so I tell myself as I sit there, alone, full glass in hand).

What sustains me through this three bedroom, two bath nightmare? The desire to have hardwood floors, a guest room, and a yard of my own. Most of all, though, a proper kitchen. Something with cabinets so deep I could go hunting for my springform pan and end up in Narnia. Something with enough space for my table with all three leaves and where I don't have to turn it at an angle to make it fit. Something where I can keep cookbooks in the kitchen and not in the living room and where I have to trek back and forth like a Mongolian nomad. 

I want a yard where Brian and I can build that wood burning pizza oven we've dreamed of, regardless of the fact that neither of us know how to make pizza dough (yet). A yard where Jack the Corgi can pee on our lemon tree, variegated apple tree, orange tree, and pomegranate tree. A yard where I can build proper and permanent garden boxes and perhaps have a proper compost heap that the neighbors don't complain about. 

These are reasons to pursue this mission, or so I hear. There's also the fact that it'll be a good investment and the fact that owning would be cheaper then renting right now. 

But let's be honest... it is all about where I can cook.

Assuming the stress and stress-eating and stress-martini downing don't do me in first. We're being fiscally smart and ensuring we have the money, time, and willingness to do some projects ourselves to take any kitchen with electric ranges and pink tile counters and transform them. Between Brian and I we can easily transform anything that needs a bit of TLC. Bring on the fixer-uppers!

We refuse to be house poor and I refuse to have to hire help for every project. We'll knock down walls, install a gas range and two ovens so that Thanksgiving won't be so stressful, and buy a fridge with a vegetable drawer big enough to host a farmer's market. I also have a dream of concrete counter tops and glass tile backsplashes.

It will be the kitchen any food blogger could ever want.

Until then, I will continue cramming out food in my tiny 1982-built kitchen. It's not all bad and I certainly know how to make do until the right kitchen comes along. I was able to prepare these scones, after all. A bit of flour, sugar, cream, candied ginger, and maple syrup. Delightful and they make my charming rental smell like home. Or, at least, a home I rent.

Not that the food is bad. In this case I offer you scones jammed full of candied ginger and brushed with a maple syrup cream glaze.

Ginger-Maple Scones

6 oz all-purpose flour
2 oz sugar
2 teaspoons baking powder
1/2 teaspoon salt
1 1/2 teaspoons ground ginger
3/4 cup candied ginger, chopped
6 oz cream, plus 2 tablespoons for brushing
2 tablespoons maple syrup, preferably Grade B but use what you got

1. Whisk together the flour, salt, sugar, ground ginger and baking powder. Next, whisk in the candied ginger. In a small bowl mix together the maple syrup and the two reserved tablespoons of cream.

2. Add the cream and use your hands to gently bring together the ingredients. If you need to add a bit more cream or flour then do so judiciously. It will be sticky and clumpy. Turn the dough out onto a lightly floured surface and knead twice (push-squish, push-squish, done).

3. Form the dough into a disc and cut into 6-8 pieces. Brush the tops with the cream-maple syrup mixture. 4. Bake at 425F for 10-15 minutes or until golden.