This morning the day felt heavy for the first time this summer. The clouds are low and gray and the day looks dim.

But I went for a walk in the forest just now. There the light is trapped between the dark sky and the ground. Every dead leaf, blue flower, patch of moss and white stone glows with reflected light. Maybe there are more shadows, but everything stands out. The leaves on the trees are dark green and flat in this light, but the wheat-colored grass and the earth underfoot, that shines.

Hot cocoa is on the stove and I’m waiting for the foamy milk to rise to the top in the milk frother.

Defense Against the Dark Hot Cocoa
(Adapted from THE FANNIE FARMER COOKBOOK, 12th ed. Revised by Marion Cunningham with Jeri Laber. New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 1986.)
4 Tablespoons unsweetened cocoa
2 Tablespoons sugar
Pinch of salt
2 Cups milk
Vanilla

Foamed milk
2 Cups milk

Makes 3 giant cups of cocoa and milk or 6 small ones.

Mix cocoa, sugar, and salt with 1/2 Cup water in a small saucepan and boil gently for 2 minutes. Then add 2 Cups of milk and bring gently to boil. Add vanilla and pour into cups.

Pour 2 Cups of milk into the milk frother and heat gently. [A metal frother can go right on the stove, a glass one (no metal!) can be microwaved.] When a ring of bubbles form around the rim, the milk is hot enough to froth.

To froth the milk, hold the handheld frother right at the surface. It’s going to splatter, so pick a deep container.

Take the pump type frother off the heat, hold the finger grip on the lid and pump it up and down 10 or 12 times. Let stand until the foam collects itself at the top. Lift off, pour some liquid milk into your cocoa to taste and tilt the white foam onto its dark surface. Dark can be okay too.

Add a friend and a cookie for each and you have Defense Against the Dark Hot Cocoa. Enjoy!