Just Cuz

I am the youngest of four, each a year apart in age.  I was always a little risk averse; a little cautious. Certain siblings might have said a little cowardly.  On my sixth birthday, my brothers and sister told me that I was a big girl now, and I had to stand in the attic, in the dark, for one minute without screaming or crying.  Other big kids might have done something to make it creepier - not let me out, made spooky noises.  But I stood there quietly, and at the end of a minute they let me out and congratulated me on being "all grown up." No parent could have topped that gift.

Over the years I've confronted a lot of my fears: motorcycles, worms, souffles.  But I am still scared to fly with this child of mine - and all my relatives live 3,000 miles away.  I get it, you have to be prepared for six hours of suckiness and then it's over and you get to see your family, but I'm totally chicken.

Luckily I have family members who will still indulge me - the youngest, the scaredy-cat who still screams if you turn the lights off when I'm in the shower.  This summer I got visits from my sister and brother with their kids (that's right, they each flew, alone, with two).  I didn't realize how much fun it would be to see little J, the only child, interacting with her cousins. And can we just be honest and say that playing with 6-8 year olds is a relief after reading Night-Night Moon AGAIN?

I had so much fun with my bakers - there is one in each family, so it goes without saying that I challenged them to a Top-Chef bake off against each other.  That key lime tart I made awhile back was fairly straight-forward and allowed room for decorating where they could really show off their style, so first baker up was eight-year-old Amari. Strike a pose, girl.

Her older sis joined in for the decorating:

And the final products - how about those kiwi flowers?!

It was so fun to have these girls here - I especially love that they taught J to say "night night" whenever she sees someone falling asleep.  It became a game for her on a long drive to Vermont - one girl would start to drift off and she'd scream "NIE NIE!!!"  Now the whole neighborhood can hear us putting her to bed.

Next up was my sister with her two kids.  DJ, is the six-year-old baker in that family.  Here he is with his creations:

He hid his kiwi slices under the mounds of strawberries and raspberries for a mid-bite surprise.  And it may be that my sister and I got to the mini-tarts before he did, so we'll take credit for that mess. I loved his alternating raspberry/blueberry border.

While he baked, the girl cousins debated the merits of dump-trucks v. front loaders.

They are less than two years apart, and it was so cute to see them acting all sisterly in the twinsy shirts I made them:

Finally, DJ runs a lemonade stand during the summer with fruit picked from his Southern California backyard (why do I live in New England?) and requested an apron with separate pockets like a waiter apron for making change.  I'd found this lemon fabric at the Cambridge Quilt Shop,

so we whipped this up one afternoon:

Pose like you're serving!

It's been a great summer, but I know if I want some winter warmth I'm going to have to get on that plane.  Maybe Mr. Responsibly can watch J while I'm gone!

Made for the Fourth

I got a new camera!  And my garden is blooming!

I was made for the fourth anniversary.  The traditional gifts, flowers and fruits (especially when you dessertify them) are some of my favorite things.  It's so much easier than the leather anniversary (I gave him permission to buy a pair of boat shoes) but not as easy as paper (a card - I mean, hopefully we'll be doing this for many years to come, so let's try to keep expectations low, right?).


Lucky for me a couple weeks before the big day Gesine Prado posted this fruit tart on her blog with the kiwis shaped like fleurs and I was like, I see fruits and flowers. Done.

And done:

I love this recipe – a custard that doesn’t get cooked on a stovetop (I’m an excellent custard curdler) and such a unique and lovely shape.  It’s the easiest recipe I’ve done of hers, and the bake time was exactly right. 

I ended up with both extra crust and extra filling, and I’m still kicking myself for not using my little tartlette pans to make a couple individuals as well.  I was in a rush and serving it right away, so I skipped the jam-glaze top.  I expect I’ll be making this again soon.  Different designs on top will be fun to do and how else am I going to use up the graham flour?

Now for the quilt! While not an anniversary present, I do consider this my marriage quilt; a fabric chosen by each of us (you'll never guess who chose the red) and made for our a king-size bed.

The quilt top is the Orange Peel (oh, see, this does tie into fruits and flowers!) from Denyse Schmidt's Modern Quilts, Traditional Inspiration.  She does it applique, but the thought of appliqueing 162 x 4 moons made me want to cry.  Also, I consider myself pretty amateur at everything from free motion quilting to paper piecing, but there is one thing I do expertly, and that is sew a curve!  So I made some plastic templates and sewed 648 moons.  I kept to a strict and disciplined schedule (this was back  in the world of two daily baby naps) and sewed eight squares a day. There were some miscalculations (oh right, the squares are on point! Twice as many!) so I got to know the ladies at the Cambridge Quilt Shop real well.  It took me two months.

As for the actual quilting, which is just the most lovely thing, echoing the pattern of the piecing, this was done by Georgette Gagne of Black Wolf Quilting Studio.  I wanted it quilted the way it was in the book, which would have meant stopping, clipping threads and starting over again six times for each square and no long armer in their right mind wants to do that.  I mean, that's just crazy.  So we came up with a design that would be similar, using one continuous line.  But in the end Georgette decided that the design we'd come up with looked too much like a spider's web and did it the super-hard, time-consuming and annoying way ANYWAY.  I can't tell you how much I love and appreciate it.

164 times, people.

I plan to sleep under this myself for many years to come, so it's incredibly satisfying to look at the quilting pattern and know that it is just right, just how I wanted it, no compromises.  So thank you Georgette, for what must have been a hard week!!

You can really see her work on the back, I unintentionally got a reversible quilt!

I had it back from Georgette, in a corner of my room for about six months, thinking it was going to take forever to bind.  But when the weather got a little warmer and the Killing started up again, the binding went pretty quickly.

For our wedding we wrote our own (matching) vows and someone had the genius idea of memorizing them.  Of course I forgot one.  So I embroidered it onto the edge that would fall on his side of the bed. “I promise to protect you and take care of you and allow you to take care of me.”  

The quilt top came out to 108 by 113 inches, which turned out to be too big, so I cut off a row and made pillowcases out of it.  Here it is all together.  I never have the heart to move sleeping cats.

 So happy fourth babe!

I hear the for the fifth you should be making me something out of wood, so get planning!

I Prefer Months With Three Letters

I finally figured out April Fool's Day - it's just funny people imitating a New England Spring.  Like, 'ha  ha you are so relieved to see those snow drop flowers peeking out of the ground after that long hard winter and you think spring has sprung, well check the weather tomorrow because I'm sending some REAL snowdrops to kill them.'

(survivors)

I really love/hate April - it brings those first reminders that life is really worth living, but it's also the month I'm most likely to get frostbite, because it's freaking APRIL so why shouldn't I wear ballet flats and not take gloves?  But there are finally signs of REAL spring here; we are reportedly hitting 70 today after a week in the 40s.  No magnolias or cherry trees in bloom like you west coasters, but little signs.  Crocuses.  We start small.

We moved last year and I love my new neighborhood.  A 12" wide strip of dirt by the sidewalk? These people will put a deer and a daffodil on it.

.
It's with a mix of regret and excitement that I give up my community gardening plot and try to do something with my very own first yard.  And while I'm grateful and lucky to finally have one to call my own, the whole thing is shaded by a huge maple so anything that wants sunlight better be up and done by May when the leaves grow big enough to block the sun.

Which leads me to bulbs - bulbs - bulbs.  I went crazy last fall and planted upwards of 200 daffodils, iris, crocus, snowdrops and tulips.  For those that have planted bulbs, you know that 200 is actually 34 after you account for pillaging squirrels.  All October and November I watched the scheming little buggers running back and forth across our back patio, but I was encouraged that I never saw them in the front where the majority of my bulbs lay hidden under the ivy.

This weeks stuff has really started popping up and it's cute... but wrong.  All those iris that were supposed to shoot up through the ivy are turning out to be two inches tall.

And the daffodils too.  

Apparently my subconscious  started planning this April Fools joke last Fall when I bought an entire garden of micro flowers by "mistake."  I'm so frustrated, I dug out the labels, and Home Depot actually had the nerve to call them plain old "Iris."

My mixed April feelings continued for Easter.  I should mention I'm having real issues with my oven, it's being really passive-aggressive. ("It's so interesting you think I'm under-baking all your fancy desserts, when those frozen pizza always seem to come out perfectly")  My sister-in-law requested a flourless chocolate cake with raspberry accents for her birthday so I turned to my favorite and most trusted recipe of all time - the Chocolate Cloud Cake from Classic Home Desserts.  I have made this cake flawlessly for 20 years, but recently it's always undercooked (it's hard not to second guess myself because the last instruction in the recipe is "be careful not to overbake").

The trick to baking the cake is you have to bake it until the top cracks, otherwise it isn't done.  I actually wrote that in the margin of the recipe 13 years ago.  And yet, on Saturday - after baking the cake for 1.5  x the suggested time, I took it out of the oven, crackless.  And then had to start over.   Why am I so dismissive of 20-something Julie? Why would I write that in the margin if it weren't true?  I baked the second one until it cracked, and it was fine.

Then when the cake cools, the center sinks leaving a hollow chocolate shell you fill with whipped cream, or in this case raspberry mousse.  Kind of reminded me of an easter egg.  I topped with raspberries and chocolate curls.  I'd give it a solid 8.

Also got a new cookbook out of the library (I'm a big fan of trying a couple recipes before investing money and shelf-space).  This was  Bake It Like You Mean It from Gesine Prado - tried the Tangerine DreamTea Ring, and was pretty happy with it.

Pastries can be a real doozy - I mean anything that involves rolling out dough and egg wash pinching can be dangerous for me and my low tolerance for frustration, but this went together easy and had a lovely presentation pre-baking:

And check out my little fishy!

It looked pretty perfect post-bake too!

Now unfortunately, despite a 25 degree hike in temp it wasn't cooked in the middle, but it was good enough I didn't mind re-baking it piece by piece.  Just like I won't mind planting 200 more life-size bulbs in October, or putting on gloves again next week.  Ready for May, though.

You Are One

WARNING: this post is a sentimental baby post, but you can skip to the end for some birthday cake!

J is one.  These are the things I want to remember when I think back on this time:
Saturday she ran up a ramp for the first time without falling - until now I had no idea that was a skill.  She laughs in anticipation when I get close to her bare toes because she knows I can’t resist them and that it’s probably going to tickle.  She likes to pull heavy things out of the dishwasher and pass them to me so that I can put them away and when I say thank you, she responds “doo doo,” in a thoughtful voice. Her dad is so proud when she calls him dada and pretends not to notice that she calls everyone else that too.  Her favorite game is standing up in the bath like it’s time to get out and then falling back down laughing when I reach for her, which probably isn’t the safest game, but I think it suggests a budding sense of humor.

I have never been a baby person, though she was sweet, sweet, sweet.  

But I love a toddler, and that is what she officially became this week!  She is one – and she plays big girl games

Eats grown-up food

And wears old lady shoes.

Things I've learned about my parenting this month: 

1.  I will let her eat as much sugary buttercream as she likes on her special day, and will not take it away even though my internal voice and everyone else’s external voices are saying “I think that’s enough”

2.  When I have to decide between the super-cute adidas and the orthopedic shoes the salesman recommends (because her feet are almost as wide as they are long) I will reluctantly choose the ugly shoes. 

3.  I didn't realize it, but I'd been avoiding giving her olives, cooked peppers and eggplant  because I assumed she wouldn’t like what I don’t like.  But it turns out she likes these things.  While there is a little part of me that is sad we aren't on the same page here, I’m also excited by these signs that she is her own person.

OK, so on to the CAKE.

I do not come from a family where an entire cake gets sacrificed to the birthday girl for her to smoosh her grubby hands all over – we are way too considerate of the other cake-eaters, but I’ve always secretly coveted that experience.  So on J’s big day I gave her a huge red velvet cupcake decorated with a buttercream flower and let her go to town.  She ate the entire thing. 

For her family party, and the official first cake, we agreed she seemed like a strawberry girl, but I also felt very strongly that if you haven’t had chocolate before your first birthday, it was very important that you get that experience before you are 1 and a day.  So I decided on a chocolate cake with strawberry icing.  I got the The Cake Bible out of the library and may be investing in it soon.  Although I wanted chocolate, I chickened out on something ‘too intense’ and went with a chocolate genoise that I soaked with some kirsch simple syrup (hey, she's teething)– that part was really disappointing – chocolate cake that is not intensely chocolate is just brown air.  

The strawberry whipped cream that I used for frosting, however, was out of this world.  

It involved reducing the juice from frozen strawberries and then pureeing it with the defrosted berries for an intense but fresh (not cooked or jammy) flavor.  I have to say, reading the recipe I didn’t think it would work - adding a bunch of heavy puree, mixed with gelatin to the whipped cream - but it did.  It would be really amazing on top of a flourless chocolate cake (cloud cake, anyone?) or with brownies.  I’m not a huge fan of buttercream because I tend to over-frost my cakes so that they’re pretty, and buttercream is far too rich to be half an inch thick.  So this was a fantastic substitute.   

The Cake Bible also had instructions for peach, raspberry, etc. whipped cream, and I might invest in it just for those two pages.  I’ve been into the Miette cookbook for cakes this year.  Their typical size is six inches, which I've fallen in love with; it is the perfect size for a cake if you're serving 8 or fewer.  It’s totally spoiled me for other recipes – I didn’t love how wide and short this one was. 

J has given up long naps for her birthday week.  I'm hoping she goes back to them soon so I can get out of the kitchen and back to the sewing machine!

Burning Bûche

I was denied sugar as a child.  The deprivation started when I was five.  I like to blame my brothers who required multiple root canals when they joined our family that year, but the truth is by the time I was eleven I had already had eleven fillings myself (despite six years sugar free).  Some of us just have teeth that feel more deeply than yours.

The house rule was pretty extreme, and included potato chips, honey and raisins - anything that could stick and start a r(i)ot in the crevices.  But somehow we convinced my mother that baking was an "educational experience" (algebra! chemistry!), and that after the fact, it was cruel to deny us the (marzipan) fruits of our labors.  Sugar was suddenly allowed if you were using it to cook.  And so began my love affair with baking - souffles, cakes, 100 almond meringues for my mom's birthday when I was 8, the flaming cherries jubilee flan when I was 10.

When this gas station went up for sale this year, I may have briefly fantasized about starting my own cafe/bakery, opening the garage door so people could dine al fresco, planting morning glories that would climb the rusty gas pumps.  J would stop in for a milkshake on her way home from school and I'd pretend not to eavesdrop as she told her friends about her latest crush. I'd paint everything in the colors of Frida Kahlo's house and decorate the walls with works by local artists...  But reading  Confections of a Closet Master Baker was a reality check- 3:00 a.m. is a good occasional bedtime, not an hour to wake up on a daily basis, and really would I want to do this all day every day?

I always thought I really loved baking, but I'm coming to terms with the idea that maybe I don't love it that much after all.  I remember when my mother met my husband for the first time.  After seeing our tiny, open-to-the-rest-of-the-house kitchen she asked him "where do you hide when she bakes?" I was totally puzzled, but  he seemed to know just what she was referring to and replied "I try to just get out of the house when that's happening."  If all goes well with a dessert, I am focused, annoyed by interruptions (your presence is an interruption) but pleased with myself in the end.

When things do not go well, however, I throw things.  On the floor, in the sink, in the trash prematurely.  I have an early memory of getting banned from baking for a month after removing a sheet of smoking cookies from the oven and taking them outside where I threw them one at a time against the side of the house (no mom, I still don't know what I was thinking).

Baking is not relaxing for me.  I like decorating (when it works), I like presenting pretty desserts to an appreciative recipient and I really, really like eating sweet things when I master a recipe I like.

This Christmas, I decided to try a bûche de noël (aka yule log).  My mother-in-law had suggested it last year, and if ever there was a dessert that was all about the decorations, this is it.  I figured if I gave myself enough time, I could do each of the difficult things in advance, and how hard is it to bake a jelly roll the day of?

So I made some meringue mushrooms and attached the stems with milk chocolate from instructions I got here.  And I painted holly leaves with three types of chocolate (semi-sweet - in the freezer for 15 minutes before peeling worked best)

And I made birds out of both egg white and marzipan to see which would come out better (marzipan looked less like silver poo).

and I even got crazy with a spun-sugar nest for my birdie.  I was having a grand ol' time!

And then, ho-hum, I thought I'd just throw together a cake.  I wanted a chocolate sponge with mascarpone filling to keep it light, and a chocolate ganache frosting because it's so pretty.  I started with Julia's sponge, but I added rum to my chocolate after it started melting and the whole thing seized (the person who suggested I try to salvage this mess for truffles narrowly escaped getting hit with a whisk).

My whisk-assault victim braved the store on Christmas eve at 4:00 to present me with $16 of replacement chocolate, which I managed to ruin again, I'm still not sure how.  At that point I cried.  Loudly. And I would have totally given up, but what a waste of decorations!  So I sought the most basic cake recipe I could find (Joy of Cooking) and with the help of my mother-in-law, managed to bake, sprinkle with khalua, fill and roll it without a hitch.  We cut off the ends to make a couple of limbs.

The ganache (recipe here) couldn't have been easier, and I thought the spatula made it look bark-like without me having to take a fork to it, so I left it alone.

Then I dressed it.  First I added my bird's nest with a couple of chocolate 'eggs' (truffles made by my sister-in-law).

Did I mention I made a chocolate Joyeaux Noel sign, but forgot the y?  There is no erase on chocolate. Fortunately I had tools to numb the pain.

Joyeaux

People!