stress baking

My flatmates were telling me last night about a woman at their work who had recently had a miscarriage and has taken some time off work and has taken up baking. Apparently this is a woman who previously had never even bought a bag of flour because she never baked but she has now worked her way through a whole Delia Smith cookbook. Sarah thought maybe the lady was nesting and was pregnant again but I just shook my head and said, "She's stress baking."

Stress baking is something I have only recently encountered- or more accurately only recently labeled. I've always baked, I love baking. I bake when I have to, when I'm bored, when I want to, any time really. But when I've got a lot on my mind and am feeling a bit stressed out, that's when things really get going. When I suggested that this aforementioned lady might be stress baking and that I do it too, Sean looked at me and said, "Oh my God! You DO!" I still laugh at the memory of them coming in one night and Sean taking one look at a kitchen table filled with biscuits and me standing over the oven and he just said, "Put down the gloves down and step away from the oven!"

I'm not sure exactly what it is about baking that calms me down but my stress baking differs from I'm-bored or I-wanted-to baking in one vital aspect: volume. There is a rhythm to baking for stress. Stress baking for me almost invariably means cookie or muffins- something relatively quick to make and bake because it means as one item is in the oven, you can be preparing the next one and the cycle can just go on until someone pulls you away or you run out of ingredients- I've had to stop before because I ran out of flour. I think baking soothes me for several reasons:
1- I'm doing something which keeps my brain otherwise occupied
2- the smell
3- I'm creating something which always makes me feel good
4- better yet, I'm creating something that will make other people happy because it tastes good so they will like me because I'm cool and make yummy stuff*

And I am not alone. My sister, pre-taking-off-on-adventures has apparently filled up my parents' freezer with baked delights as well as having items farmed out to family and friends. I thought maybe it was genetic but some poking around on the web has proved me wrong. This blog entry and its comments show I am not alone, as does this.

So for those who will live with me in the future know this- I will bake when bored and I will bake because I like to so don't be worried to enter the house to the smell of freshly baked deliciousness. But if you walk in and see a lot of it? Well make sure you try some first and tell me how wonderful it tastes and how amazing I am and then ask what's wrong. ;-)

*anyone notice the list?