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Cake for No Reason

Cake for No Reason

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It was near the end of a fascinating Zoom book group conversation — which moved from the book itself to a discussion of memoir — that one of us mentioned having just sampled the best white cake ever. 

Baking the perfect white cake is something of a holy grail for me, the attempt to duplicate the most delectable wedding cake-like texture, dense and fine of crumb. I don’t have much time to devote to this quest, but I have experimented with several recipes over the years and was delighted to have another one to try. 

When I saw the King Arthur Flour “Tender White Cake” recipe I was immediately encouraged. I had all the ingredients in my pantry and fridge — or so I thought; it turned out I was missing almond extract. But a quick stop at the grocery store remedied that, which is how I found myself up to my elbows in flour and sugar at the end of a long work week. 

Thanks to my power mixer, though, I was able to cream the unsalted butter with the (sad to say not King Arthur brand) flour, add one egg white at a time, and finally whip in the cup of yogurt laced with vanilla and almond extracts. 

The cake was as exquisite as advertised, with a rich, old-fashioned flavor that my mother would have said reminded her of a cake my Aunt Mary made. Beyond the taste, though, was the experience.  It was fun to bake a cake for no reason — that is, for no reason other than the cake itself. 

Jammin!

Jammin!

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Every year at Christmastime, Mom made a jam cake. It was a recipe from Dad’s side of the family, and was passed down with great care. Mom copied the recipe over several times, but she saved the old versions. Reading through them, which I did to make sure I was getting the ingredients right, was like an archaeological dig; there was the same fragility to the oldest artifact.

Once I figured out that the “modern version” (which included purple crayon scribbles, proof of its age) was indeed a fair and true copy, I still had to make the cake, which began, as it did for Mom, with an all-out search for jam with seeds. In my case, the search took me 20 miles away, to a Walmart Super Store in Sterling. (I found this highly ironic since Mom never visited a Walmart; she thought the stores were destroying small-town America — and in this case, as with so much else, she was right.) 

Once the jam was purchased and the other ingredients assembled, I proceeded to make the cake. Mom had always made a very big deal of it, as if she was making a four-tier wedding cake. How hard can it be, I wondered. 

Pretty darn hard, it turns out. There is the sheer muscle involved in stirring the thick batter. There’s separating the six eggs, beating the whites till frothy (I was convinced I had botched this part) and pre-mixing certain ingredients (such as vinegar and baking soda) before adding them to the batter. 

By the time I got the cake in the oven, it looked like a small tornado had ripped through the kitchen. But after a tense baking period (I can remember holidays where the jam cake fell — and that was not a pretty sight), the cake emerged more or intact. I couldn’t have been prouder. Now all I had to do … was frost the thing.

Filling the Fridge

Filling the Fridge

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It has come to my attention that today is Saturday, a day I usually get groceries into the house. It has also come to my attention that I have not completed said grocery expedition in several weeks. Oh, I’ve run out for powdered sugar and cold cuts. But I’ve been neglecting the tried-and-true, list-driven expedition.

I kind of dread the trip, if you want to know the truth. It seems too much like work, which I’ve sworn off these last 10 days. But we’re running low on milk, eggs and salad —  things that don’t freeze well, you may notice — and you can’t live on chocolate cake and Christmas cookies forever.

So here I go, back into a routine. I’m sure it will be fine once I get in … a little like the shock of cold water in a pool, which ultimately refreshes. And even if it isn’t, the fridge will be full again.

Cooking Up Memories

Cooking Up Memories

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I just pulled out an old cookbook that falls apart when you open it. There are a few recipes in there I still use, and one of them is the cranberry salad I make at Thanksgiving. It’s a molded salad that involves Jello — yes, Jello! — but goes way beyond church potlucks in its appeal. It’s tangy and elegant, a different way to do cranberries.

This cookbook is a window into my past, a long-ago birthday gift from a friend I still count among my dearest, given to me at a pivotal point in my life, when I was moving back to Lexington from Chicago. 

The move was designed to let me try teaching and writing at the same time and see which one “won,” which one I would pursue further. There was no contest, and generations of high school English students are the poorer for it. 

Only kidding, of course. It’s I who am the richer for it. And seldom a day goes by that I don’t realize it.

Musical Chores

Musical Chores

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I’m always listening to music while walking with my iPod, but until recently I’d lost the ability to blare symphonies or musicals or folk tunes at home. But now, a jerry-rigged system is once again filling the house with sound. 

On Saturday morning, while putting away the groceries, it was Simon and Garfunkel’s “Old Friends.” “Bye-bye Love”  is a surprisingly apt tune for wiping down packages of peppers and strawberries and finding a place for them in the fridge. The “bye-bye” part is good for jettisoning leftovers.

Later in the day, I listened to Benny Goodman while chopping vegetables for potato-leek soup. “Sing, sing, sing” mimicked “Chop, chop, chop,” the driving bass beat perfect for making quick work with the potato peeler. Dad must have been behind the scenes for this pick, loving both food and Big Band.

And finally, while making pot roast in the crockpot, I matched the cool, foggy weather outside with the Hernon Brothers’ “Across the Sound,” an album picked up two summers ago on the isle of  Inishmore. 

Chores fly when they have a musical accompaniment. 

Tiny Harvest

Tiny Harvest

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The single cherry tomato plant I bought in June has grown taller than I ever thought it would. It’s been tied and jerry-rigged and is still producing flowers and fruit.

Last week, I harvested this bunch of beauties — just enough to drizzle with olive oil and mix with fresh-ground pepper, basil snipped from the pot right next to the tomatoes on the deck, and fresh mozzarella. 

The salad was yummy … and what made this tiny harvest taste even better was knowing we’d grown the tomatoes right on the deck. 

Hunted and Gathered

Hunted and Gathered

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On my way to breakfast, I found four ripe blackberries, courtesy of my morning walk. It’s a bush I’ve known for years, quite accessible to deer and other passersby. 

Since four berries do not a breakfast make, I sliced some peaches on my cereal, from a bag our neighbors gave us after they had picked them at a local orchard.
This means that two parts of this breakfast were locally grown, hunted and gathered. And then … there’s the Special K. 
Tomatoes!

Tomatoes!

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The tomato plant on the deck is bending from the weight of its top-heavy stalk. There are almost a dozen little tomatoes-in-the making in various stages of fruitiness. Toward the bottom of the stalk one of a trio is almost completely red. It will no doubt ripen while I’m gone next week.

Meanwhile, in what seems like Jack-in-the-Beanstalk fashion, the plant continues to climb, with clumps of tomato flowers turning, magically, into tomatoes themselves, albeit still tiny.

As backyard garden operations grow, it’s not a big one. But like any backyard garden operation it’s a reminder that much of what we eat comes from the soil — or from animals who eat things that come from the soil — not from hermetically sealed packages in the grocery store. 

Soil, fertilizer, summer sun and rain … when the combinations are right, there is growth, there is harvest … there is a tomato on your plate.
Gloveless

Gloveless

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It’s ironic that after months of wearing gloves for grocery shopping, a doctor’s visit and most any other time I’ve ventured into a public space, I wasn’t wearing them when I needed them most — in my own kitchen.

Last night’s dinner was a Thai shrimp dish I’d never made but which sounded good when I found it online. It called for a jalapeno pepper, two of them, in fact, with or without seeds. I settled on one and one-half without seeds. That was about right, flavor-wise. Blended with the coconut milk, fish sauce and Thai curry paste, they provided just enough kick.

But my hands told another story. Hours after I’d rinsed, de-seeded and diced the peppers my fingers and palms felt like they were on fire. A couple of hours of keeping them wrapped in a cool wet washcloth or on top of a bag of chipped ice left them little better than before.

When I finally googled the symptom, I learned that I should have been slathering my hands with milk or yogurt instead of cold water — and, most of all, I should have been wearing gloves. Now you tell me!

(Entries from a salsa competition last year at work.) 

Something’s Cooking

Something’s Cooking

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As the physical reality of my world shrinks to house and yard, each individual room looms larger. The living room has become my primary work space, the basement an entertainment hub and gym, and the kitchen — ah, the kitchen is getting a workout.

Like many of us stuck at home, I’ve been eating more — and better — than usual. This is because there’s more food in the house and because my typical excuses for not cooking — what a horrible commute! such a day I’ve had at the office! — are no longer viable.

So when I come downstairs in the morning I’m greeted with distinctive cooking smells — with the tang of last night’s curry or the aroma of last week’s (reheated) quiche.

It’s a more full-bodied, full-aroma’ed house I live in these days. And I have to say … I like it.