Three Cakes, Including Pancakes

Not many little girls get the opportunity to make their world ballet premiere and turn five years old in the same weekend.  But that happened to my daughter Saturday and Sunday. 

Saturday began with ballet-slipper-shaped pancakes (not hard, most of mine usually turn out more oblong than round anyway.)

Then it was off to the local junior high for her debut dancing the song Deep in the Jungle. (She's the tallest one – and once she got going she was a regular ballerina ham! She knew ALL her dance steps and appropriate expressions.)

After the ballet recital, we tried out a new gelato place downtown. My littlest ballerina (the one always imitating her big sister’s dance moves) approved highly of the wild berry gelato.

Saturday afternoon my daughter completed the task of decorating ladybug cupcakes for her Sunday School class. It was most arduous, as you may imagine, having to stop to lick hot pink butter cream frosting off ones fingers every few seconds. Her sister helped by thoroughly cleaning frosting off the electric mixer beaters. To transform the hot pink cupcakes into ladybugs, we used black frosting and piped it onto each cake in a stripe and two dots. A piece of black licorice was the ladybug head. Upon sampling, the tiny cake was divine. We used the Vanilla Cupcake recipe in Whimsical Bakehouse’s Little Cakes cookbook which uses cake flour; this made the cupcakes as light as air and used half the sugar of a cake recipe using all-purpose flour. The lower sugar content made this dietitian a feel a bit better about subjecting preschoolers to cupcakes mid-morning.

And then there was the birthday cake; with the last of the Meyer lemons we brought back from Florida, we made a yellow cake shaped into one 9-inch round, one 8-inch round and a 5-inch round baked in an oven-safe mixing bowl. To top the finished cake, we mixed up some Meyer lemon butter cream. I must pause to comment on the flavor of Meyer lemons – and this frosting. In one word, it was heavenly – but with more descriptors, Meyer lemons taste less bracingly acidic than regular lemons, they are floraly, but still pleasantly tart. The flavor made the frosting seem ultimately richer.

There’s nothing better than watching the pleasure and excitement in a child’s eyes as she watches you frost her birthday cake and ‘magically’ turn it into a bee hive! And it was magic! We stacked up the cakes, filling the layers with The Kings Cupboard Orange Chocolate Sauce. It was topped with the Meyer lemon butter cream and the little marzipan bees we colored and created a few days ago. My daughter was left alone with the black piping frosting and instructions to make stripes on the bees. She emerged with a very black tongue and a good effort at stripes. Her dexterity will improve when she turns six. But for now, the bees on their hive were completely obvious. And what could be better than a cake- and gelato-filled weekend?

Happy Yellow Chicken Day

It’s only a day away from the month of March and the snow is piled high and it's still really cold outside.  When you've been inside the house for the past five month, your ability to come up with ‘something to do’ wanes. So yesterday was Yellow Day. I told my 4 ½ year old that Yellow Day was the day we said, “Happy Yellow Day” to Daddy first thing in the morning and said the same to anyone who phoned.  On Yellow Day we wear yellow clothes. (She was pleased that the only yellow attire she could find in her closet was a yellow and orange polka-dot sundress.)  And we play with yellow toys and games and of course we eat yellow food.

Breakfast was Cheerios® from a yellow box, lemon yogurt and banana. Morning snack was a graham cracker with peanut butter, banana and honey; and to drink a smoothie of yogurt, orange juice and yellow food coloring. (No, I didn’t drag out the blender; I often make “smoothies” for my girls in a cocktail shaker with a couple spoonfuls of yogurt, juice and an ice cube or two. The cocktail shaker makes a super foamy smoothie in which they love all the bubbles.) 

After snacks, we all went out to shovel the driveway for the 50th time this winter. So when Daddy came home for lunch, I sent the girls in with him while I finished the job. Daddy forgot it was Yellow Day and made them very un-yellow PB&J for lunch. But some bright yellow corn with butter and canned pineapple for an afternoon snack put us back on track!  And a dinner finale was yellow spaghetti squash, roast chicken and for dessert, thawed-from-frozen guava was a perfectly-yellow tropical treat from a local Hispanic grocer.

Now, about the just-mentioned roasted chicken; I’ve been craving a beautifully golden roast chicken lately. After buying the whole chicken, I consulted my trusty Cook’s Illustrated cookbook, Here in America’s Test Kitchen. The authors denounced roasting the whole bird and said it would result in uneven cooking. Instead they instructed, cut up the whole bird, pan-sear the pieces and then roast to perfection in a hot 450° oven. So we set out to make Pan-Roasted Chicken with Sherry-Rosemary Sauce.

Now, I haven’t cut up a chicken since my daughter has been alive. I’m way out of practice. But of course she helped and it was a fantastic lesson in anatomy for her. As I hacked away with a pair of kitchen shears, she learned all about bone, muscle, cartilage (like in her nose!), and the yellow chicken fat. In the end, we had eight pieces of chicken that were marginally discernable. But best of all, my daughter wasn’t afraid to get her hands all gooey with chicken meat/fat/skin.

And the chicken was divine! First we brined it for only 30 minutes, patted dry, and pan-seared in a tiny amount of oil. It was then roasted for only 10 minutes in the same pan and removed to a plate. For the sauce, we sautéed a shallot, deglazed the pan with sherry and broth, let it simmer with rosemary, whisked in a few knobs of cold butter and then added the chicken back to the pan to warm through.

Cook’s Illustrated was right. Every piece was tender and so, so flavorful. The few bits of chicken skin that I didn’t hack off in the beginning were crispy and golden. And when my husband asked for another thigh, I knew he could at least partially tell which piece was which. Happy Yellow Day!...Happy Yummy Chicken Day...Happy Yellow Chicken Day!!

Paczki Day

It took us all Fat Tuesday, but we did it. Yup for dinner (yes, dinner) last night we had jelly donuts….or paczkis as they’re called around here. And being that my husband is from Michigan, where in Detroit they call Fat Tuesday, Paczki Day, my husband thought eating paczkis at any time of day was just fine. (They were actually quite delicious with my homemade Curried Pumpkin Tomato Soup.)

We had several bumps in the road along the way to puczkis (pronounced POONCH-ki) making:  My 4 1/2 year-old spilled some of the yeast on the floor (so it had to be swept up and the amount in the dust pan carefully measured!); then there was the exploding resealable plastic bag used to jelly-fill the 'donuts.'  But in the end they were warm, yeasty, sweet and delicious!

In full-dietitian-disclosure, they were a brilliantly lightened version of the deep fried donut. Good Housekeeping developed this version which is actually a sweet yeast dough filled with jelly. Hint: My girls couldn’t tell it was lightened. They still loved having my homemade strawberry rhubarb jam squirt all over their faces. And my husband just loved having ‘donuts’ for dinner.

(Yes, my 4 ½ year old did do her own hair yesterday – with 2 different colored ribbons – but at least one of them matched the color of the jelly!)

Happy Birthday Teaspoon

It's the one-year anniversary of Teaspoon Communications!  This small business that I own with my two sensational partners, Deanna and Bonnie, has made it one year and we're looking forward to another happy year of being moms and running our little business on the side.

To celebrate, we sent a little 'Happy Birthday Teaspoon' note attached a box of matches printed with our name and a pack of candles to a few folks who mentored or helped us along the way.

I'm quite pleased with my own box of Teaspoon matches; they will come in very handy for the next birthday at my house.  In December, we used up the very last restaurant book of matches.  And we had quite a stash.  Since smoking bans went into effect, have you noticed restaurants don't give out match books anymore?

To accompany my Teaspoon matches and candles in the mail, my baking genius of a partner, Bonnie, included the most delicious cupcake I've eaten in my life in a nifty little cupcake-holder.  It was Kirsch liqueur cake with champagne buttercream frosting and topped with a delicate sparkle-sheen of glitter.  Unfortunately I cannot share the recipe.  But maybe she will share it with us here!  In the meantime, this is the alcohol-infused cupcake recipe I intend to make for my Valentines: Chocolate Red Wine Cupcakes. 

Fishy

We're at the end of our Florida vacation and we've seen a lot of dead fish. Luckily two of them have been delicious! The week before we arrived, it was so cold here that the beech is littered with fishies which got way too chilly. (We even saw them floating next to the alligators in the Everglades - so you KNOW it was cold here.)

But what I really want to tell you about is the delicious fish that were healthily swimming in the morning and ended up on our plate that night. We know they were healthy because our favorite fish market, Paradise Shrimp Company in Marco Island, goes to the docks every morning for the freshest catch.

Scott, the chef/fishmonger at Paradise Shrimp recommended the Florida Pompano. We were excited to give the girls an extra lesson in where their food comes from by purchasing the entire fish to cook. Although those eyeballs staring up at us were a bit daunting, the cooking couldn't have been easier. Scott instructed us to fill the fish cavity with lemons, then salt and pepper the outside after sprinkling the smooth silvery skin with a slick of olive oil.

We cooked the Pompano at 450 degrees for five minutes per inch. And Scott's instructions were right on. The fish was tender, super moist but not at all oily and the flavor was incredibly delicate and almost sweet. The girls ate it up, almost right off the thick, jagged bones.

Last night, we cooked an entire yellow-tailed snapper. Same instructions. Same results: Delicious! However, this time, the flavor was different in a good way. The snapper had a stronger fish flavor and was not as moist, but not dry or 'fishy'. It only needed a little black pepper and Meyer lemon (from our tree out back!) We did need to watch for pin bones for the girls. And my mother-in-law liked it so much, she ate the snapper's eyeball!! (She'd heard it was a 'delicacy' somewhere in the world.) In case you're curious, she said it tasted fishy and squishy.

A Birthday Buche de Noel

As I lick the last crumbs of orange-almond cake with chocolate buttercream frosting from my fork today at tea time, I realize it is this delicious Buche de Noel cake that should bring me back from my sabbatical. I’ve taken a few months off to deal with morning sickness – that hormone-induced nausea that saps all energy and makes you feel rotten no matter the time of day. I’m five months pregnant and again able to indulge in sweet delights, like the traditional French Christmas cake shaped like a Yule log.

I decided to make this sweet indulgence for my little girl’s second birthday. We wanted it to be a special day for her – even though the date is so close to Christmas.

Despite the fact that the Buche de Noel was for her, my precious toddler was more of a hindrance than a help baking the cake. I used Julia Child’s recipe (I found it in Food & Wine’s Holiday Favorites not in Mastering the Art of French Cooking) and now I know why Julia did not have toddlers helping her in the kitchen. The second that I turned my back to reach for a spatula to scrape the last of the ground almonds and sugar out of the food processor, my daughter was upsetting the bowl of egg whites I’d just separated. And so it went with me measuring and re-measuring, mixing and folding very, very slowly through the creating of an almond, orange chiffon jellyroll cake using orange zest and juice, almond extract and a scant amount of cake flour. My daughter watched the entire process from the second rung of the step-stool. Luckily I started two days before her party.

What fun it was to show my four-year-old daughter that after taking the jellyroll cake from the oven, it was to be rolled up in a dishtowel! She’s baked many a cake with me, but never a jellyroll. She was flabbergasted!

The next day, both girls helped me knead the food coloring into almond paste (inside a plastic bag to avoid red/green stained little fingers) to create marzipan insects. Julia didn’t suggest them; and I suppose there aren’t many bugs crawling around the snow-covered logs in French forests...but it was a kid’s birthday cake. And while we didn’t resort to gummy worms, we thought a few bright green caterpillars with red spots and red ladybugs with yellow spots were in order.

That night, after the girls were in bed, I made the meringue mushrooms. I felt like a French pastry chef! Well, almost; they easily turned out looking like real mushrooms. Without a Julia-prescribed pastry bag, I used a plastic sandwich bag and piped them onto parchment paper; just little 2-inch wide domes and then a separate stem that stood straight up on the paper. They baked to a golden-cream mushroom color.

And on the day of the birthday party, I whipped up the chocolate buttercream with yummy ingredients like brandy (because our liquor cabinet is fresh out of rum), rum flavoring (just in case the rum was an essential flavor), coffee, rich chocolate and leftover meringue.
Decorating the cake was tricky at first, but easier once I discovered that Julia’s chocolate buttercream could cover a multitude of torn jellyroll cake sins. (Yes, when I unrolled the cake, it cracked quite a bit; more powdered sugar on the cake and dishtowel next time.) Seeing the evergreen boughs on our advent wreath made me think that dying coconut green would make it look like pine boughs. It didn’t. Instead, sprinkled around the cake, it looked like bright green grass. However, it was perfect into which bright green and red marzipan bugs could nestle. Thus I held off on the traditional dusting of snow on the log, since that would confuse obvious summer seasonal look of our log.

The buttercream was lovely glue for attaching the mushroom stems to the tops. Dusted with cocoa, they were fine looking mushrooms; melt-in-your-mouth tasty ones too! And they were the finishing touches to the Yule log.

All the kids, adults and my little girls devoured what became a whimsical (and not very traditional) but most scrumptious Buche de Noel birthday cake.

Organic Brown Eggs $2

We just returned from what I’m calling our ‘farmcation,’ (similar to the popular and economical staycation, but instead of staying home for our summer vacation, we stayed on Grandma’s farm.)

The hand-made brown wooden sign down the road from Grandma’s was painted in white, hung from a tree, and advertised “Organic Brown Eggs $2.” The new neighbor had around 50 beautiful Isa Brown laying hens; he also had new baby chicks only a few days old. My little girls adored seeing the chicks under a heat lamp in a cardboard box in his garage. The neighbor told us they were even hatched by the hens. (We didn’t have chickens on our farm when I was young, but all our neighbors ordered their chicks from a catalog and they arrived in a box by mail.) The lone rooster, it was reported, crowed every morning at 4:17!

My baby was so excited to see all the fluffy brown hens running around – and also, no doubt, to know where the eggs she was about to eat came from – she screeched with joy! We bought two dozen of the beautiful brown eggs for $4.00. (We would have paid $10.00 at our local farmers market.)

At home, I curiously conducted a taste test against conventional store-bought eggs. At 20 months and 4 years, the members of my tasting panel did not have most discerning palates; they liked all the eggs hard-boiled and scrambled. My husband and I also participated. Here are our results:
· Egg shells: Conventional – pale brown; organic brown – darker, but still relatively pale brown with (pretty) brown speckles
· Egg yolks both when raw and cooked: Conventional – yellow; organic brown – brighter orange-yellow
· Taste: Conventional – the egg-y taste I’m accustomed to and adore; organic brown – richer, deeper egg flavor