Marbled Buttermilk Cake

Psst...guys...  I made a wedding cake.

Oh, er, and long time no see!

I realize it's been on the order of, let's see, three years since I last posted anything but, well...life kind of got in the way.  I went back to school (and graduated in May) - that was a large part of it -, the Resident Taste Tester went back to school (and graduates in August), I was hospitalized twice, and I have received two diagnoses in three years, both of which have given me answers, but have also led to pretty major physical adjustments, one of which I am going through now.  And that doesn't count all of the other life that has simply intervened.

But here we are!  Three years later and I have made a wedding cake.  Clearly I have not stopped baking and cooking, but this, this is an accomplishment even I did not know if I could pull off, and I am very lucky and blessed to have a friend who trusted me enough to try.  I decided that if I did pull it off I would post it, and if I didn't, well, then I probably had no business ever posting anything else ever again.  I had made promises, and I had to deliver.  So I read and I read and I gathered my recipes, and then I tossed out the recipes again and I tried something different and finally, well, I fudged it.  And I fudge it pretty darned well, if I do say so myself.

The proof that I did this, no fancy tools required:

 

 

Each of the previous pictures was taken prior to the day of - baking the cakes, leveling, crumb coating, putting on a thick coat of icing and then finally, finally smoooooothing the icing to the very best of my ability.  I have never gotten a coat of icing that smooth.  Then came transport, and let me tell you guys, that was the longest hour of my life.  One slide, one slip, and boom - several hours of icing perfection gone.  Especially since I did not use a typical buttercream, one that crusts on exposure to air, oh no, I refused to sacrifice flavor, no way!  So I used a nice, soft, fluffy buttercream. I was asking for it.  But it made it!  And then this ensued:

 

 

 

 

 Tada!  The results!  Plus a shot of all the other goodies and tools I used to get the beast...er, I mean cake...to the venue and picture perfect for the reception.  And the Resident Taste Tester's nursing book.  But anyway...  For those of you who might ask, those are flourless chocolate peanut butter cookies, white and dark hearted brownies, buckeye brownies, seven layer bars, and cut out cookies, all made by moi.  I have to give a shout out here though - as much as I put all the components together, I iced and baked and rolled, the Resident Taste Tester is the one that made it possible.  He did every dish - no dishwasher, you see - without complaint, took out the trash, and helped in all the myriad ways a good sous chef will help.  Or a good Resident Taste Tester, because sous chef doesn't really cut it.

So there you have it.  One wedding cake.  Marbled buttermilk with strawberry filling (more to come on that) and fluffy buttercream frosting.  Everything I wanted it to be, for sure.

Marbled Buttermilk Cake

Adapted from Smitten Kitchen

 This makes enough for one two layer nine inch cake (do NOT use eight inch pans - it will overflow).  I made one two layer nine inch cake and then used a second batch for four six inch layers.  Two six inch layers served as a test cake, and the other is the top layer seen here.

4 cups cake flour

2 teaspoons baking powder

1 teaspoon baking soda

1 teaspoon salt

1/2 cup boiling water

1/2 cup cocoa

2 sticks butter, softened

2 cups sugar

2 teaspoons vanilla extract 

4 eggs 

2 cups buttermilk

Prepare two nine inch baking pans by buttering them, then covering the bottoms with parchment paper rounds and flouring the sides.

Combine the first four ingredients in a medium bowl and set aside.  Whisk together the boiling water and cocoa in a small saucepan and set aside.

Cream the butter and the sugar together until fluffy and yellow throughout.  Add the vanilla.  Add the eggs one at a time, scraping as necessary.  Add the buttermilk.  Scrape down, then gradually add the dry ingredients until combined.  If necessary, remove bowl from mixer and finish combining by hand with a spatula in order to avoid overbeating.

Remove about a third of the batter to a small bowl.  Mix the cocoa/water combination into the smaller amount of batter.  Divide the remaining yellow batter into the prepared pans, then dollop the chocolate batter on top.  It may seem like the chocolate batter completely covers the yellow batter.  That's OK.  Take a toothpick, and swirl it through the two batters, even if it does not appear to be making any swirls. Swirl away!

Bake at 350 degrees for 35 minutes or until a toothpick stuck in the middle of the tiers comes out clean.  Allow to cool ten minutes (very important!) then remove from pans and place on racks to cool completely.  Ice with your favorite icing and enjoy!

Lime Basil Coconut Macaroons

Whew...it's been a while.  And no, thankfully I was not sick again.  The problem with trying to blog about food in August is, well, there is too much food.  Everything is ready this time of year, and if you can at all (which, of course, I do) you must take the bull by the horns and get on with it, otherwise you'll miss your chance and you won't have peach jam in January or spaghetti sauce in December.  Of course, you could buy these things, but, well, I won't.  Not can't, just won't.

This leaves, you see, not much time for blogging.  But I made something today, something wonderful, that I had to tell you about.  It started out as a challenge made by a friend who grows and sells herbs at the local farmer's market.  When I say "herbs" you think basil, rosemary, sage, thyme, etc, etc.  That's not what I'm talking about.  Ever heard of shiso?  Lemon catnip?  (Makes great tea.)  How about Greek Lesbos basil?  Or cinnamon basil?  Or, of course, lime basil?

It was the lime basil that inspired the challenge.  For almost every one of the dozens of herbs sold at the Blue Owl Garden Emporium stall, there is a recipe to be tried.  For the lime basil, though, there isn't.  Or wasn't.  Until I received the challenge:  lime basil coconut macaroons (or meringues.  Whichever you like.  The premise is the same.).

Two large bunches of lime basil, two types of coconut, and four egg whites later and I now I have "put the lime in the coconut" stuck in my head even though, up until a quick Internet search two minutes ago, I hadn't actually heard the whole song.  Which consists mostly of limes and coconuts.  And might never get out of my head.  Anyway...

Make these macaroons!  If you can't find fresh lime basil at a farmer's market near you, try some other variety of basil.  Try cinnamon basil.  Try lemon basil.  Try sweet Italian basil.  Yes, before you ask, I have become obsessed with basil in the past two weeks.  First cinnamon basil ice cream (a secret yet to be told...), now these.  I'm a convert.  Basil is no longer simply for Italian pasta dishes.  Basil is for everything.

Lime Basil Coconut Macaroons

4 egg whites
1 teaspoon vanilla
1/4 teaspoon cream of tartar
1/8 teaspoon salt
1 1/3 cups sugar
2 cups unsweetened flaked coconut
2 cups sweetened flaked coconut
1 loosely packed cup lime basil, finely chopped using a knife or food processor

Preheat the oven to 375 degrees.  Line cookie sheets with parchment paper.  Do not skip this step.  You will thank me later when you want the macaroons to come off the pan without making a mess.

In a large mixing bowl, whip egg whites, vanilla, cream of tartar, and salt at high speed until soft peaks form.  (The soft peak stage has been reached when the tips of the egg white mixture curl over.)  Gradually add sugar, a spoonful at a time, and beat the mixture until stiff peaks form.  (The stiff peak stage has been reached when the tips of the mixture stand straight.)  Gently fold in both kinds of coconut and the lime basil until fully mixed.

Spoon mounds of the macaroon mixture onto the prepared cookie sheets.  Use a tablespoon for large macaroons or a teaspoon for small macaroons.  Place extra macaroon mixture in the refrigerator, covered, as other batches are baking.  Bake for 20 to 25 minutes per batch or until the bottoms are lightly browned.  Cool for a few minutes on the cookie sheet and then remove and place on cooling racks.

The New Look!

There will be no recipe today, but I wanted to show off the new look!  A big, big thank you must go out to the Taste Tester in Absentia, my sister, who redid the look of the blog for me.  That's why she is the artist and computer scientist, and I bake and cook (and study brains.  Brains.  Not braaaaaaaaaains.  I'm not a zombie, just a neurobiologist.).  I intend to do some fine tuning, but I am quite happy with it.  Especially everyone's favorite mascot, the literal kitchen mouse.  Like the new look?  Let me know what you think!

PS:  It may be a little while before I have another recipe for you.  Pretty much immediately after I made my last post, I became very sick.  I haven't baked or cooked anything for days.  Remember those beautiful peaches?  Still sitting there.  Hopefully I will be able to remedy that soon, but until then, I get to stare grouchily at my beautiful fruit as it wastes away.

Fresh Peach Crepes

This post will be short and sweet, appropriate to a light summer treat that needs very little hype.

Fresh peach crepes.  The "crepe" part might sound scary, but they are incredibly easy to make in a six-inch skillet.  Be prepared to toss the first one or two as they soak up the excess vegetable oil and come out looking less like crepes and more like...well...you know what I mean.

Fresh Peach Crepes
Adapted from Better Homes and Gardens

6 medium peaches
Sugar to taste

2 beaten eggs
1 1/2 cups milk
1 cup flour
1 tablespoon vegetable oil
1/4 teaspoon salt

Wash, dry, and slice peaches into thin slices.  Peaches may also be peeled if you do not wish to eat the skins.  Add sugar to taste.  Be sure to stir the peach and sugar mixture well.

Whisk remaining ingredients in a medium bowl.  Heat a teaspoon of vegetable oil on a 6 inch skillet over medium-high heat.  Place a large spoonful of batter in the center of the skillet and quickly tilt the skillet back and forth until the batter covers the entire bottom of the skillet.  The edges may be thinner than the center.

Replace skillet on burner at medium-high heat.  Cook for two minutes.  It is easy to tell when the crepes are cooked because the batter turns a deeper yellow color, usually from the edges into the middle.  The edges may also show a tiny bit of brown.  When crepe is finished, invert the skillet over a plate covered with a paper towel.  Shaking the skillet usually will dislodge the crepe, but if this is not successful gently peel back one edge of the crepe with an egg turner.  Inverting the skillet again should make the crepe flip out.  The first one or two crepes will be less-than-pretty.

Assemble crepes on a plate by spooning the peach mixture into the center of a flattened crepe and folding or rolling the crepe up.  Powdered sugar, honey, or whipped cream may be added over top as desired.

Makes approximately 10 to 12 crepes.

Klobasnek and Kolaches

Soooo...long time, no see is right.  But let's take a poll, shall we?  Raise your hand if you now know what a derecho is.

Mmmhmm...mmmhmmm...

That's what I thought.  100% of you living between Indiana and the East Coast raised your hands, plus a good number of those who live outside this area.  For those of you who didn't raise your hands, a derecho is the biggest, windiest, most destructive storm short of a hurricane that you can think of.  In fact, some of the winds present within the derecho were clocked at speeds that would qualify as Category 1 hurricane winds or F1 tornadoes.  That's right.  Hurricanes and tornadoes.

Needless to say this left me without a kitchen to bake in and, without the luck of parents who own a generator and had space in the freezer, would have left me with hundreds of dollars of wasted food.  In the end I probably only lost about fifty dollars worth, which I know is a hugely lucky break.  However, it has still taken almost three weeks to return to some sense of normalcy and actually bake and cook again.  (And clean, and do laundry, and...)  Although I have to tell you, as I write this, I keep glancing out the window at the pouring, sheeting rain thinking "No, not another one.  Please, please, please, please give us rain but not another derecho!"  We need the rain, we sure do, but I can tell you right now that with power pole supplies east of the Mississippi depleted we do NOT need the wind.

I know, I know, I hear your cries, "But where's the FOOD?  You promised me food!"  And I shall deliver.  In fact, today I shall share with you one of my favorite doughs of all time.  Those of you with a little Czech background have almost certainly heard of the klobasnek or the kolache.  Those of you from Texas have also certainly heard of these, but by an incorrect name.  What the Kolache Factory calls a kolache is, about fifty percent of the time, not.

What's the difference?  A klobasnek (klobasnicky in the plural) is a soft yeasted dough wrapped around a savory filling.  A kolache, on the other hand, is the same dough, but around a sweet filling, perhaps pie or (my personal favorite) poppyseed.  The Resident Taste Tester, who grew up in Texas, has taken a while to learn the difference, but he knows he won't get any if he doesn't call them by their proper names.  Of course, without him I probably wouldn't even know what a klobasnek or a kolache was, but once I had the traditional sausage and cheese variety I was bent on replicating them. 

This search led to my favorite dough, so light and airy it is practically insubstantial.  In fact, the next time I make klobasnicky, I may just have to make some without filling, just because.  So here it is, dough for klobasnicky and kolaches.  Try it with sausage, try it with poppyseed, try it plain - just be sure to try it.

Klobasnicky

The most important instructions for the following are those pertaining to the dough.  For the fillings you may use anything that suits your fancy.  I have made sausage and cheese, blueberry pie filling, and s'more varieties.  I hope to make poppyseed kolaches when the filling shows back up in stores closer to the holidays.  Also, a note about the dough.  It WILL be sticky.  You WILL make a bit of a mess.  I would not add much extra flour, although you can use it on your hands to make the dough stick less.

1/4 cup warm water (about 115 degrees)
1 cup warm milk (about 115 degrees)
1/2 cup sugar
4 1/2 teaspoons yeast
1 3/4 cups flour

1/2 cup vegetable shortening (melted a cooled, but not resolidified)
1/4 cup warm milk (about 115 degrees)
1 1/2 teaspoons salt
2 egg yolks
2 1/4 cups flour

Fillings of your choice

Warm the 1/4 cup water and 1 cup milk in a saucepan over medium heat to approximately 115 degrees.  Stir together warm water, milk, sugar, yeast, and 1 3/4 cups flour and let raise for one hour in a warm place.

Add shortening, 1/4 cup warm milk, salt, yolks, and 2 1/4 cups flour.  Beat until well-mixed and let raise again for approximately one hour or until doubled.

Stir the dough down to release the air.  Prepare klobasnicky or kolaches.  For klobasnicky, wrap sausage and cheese or other savory fillings entirely in the dough.  Half of a good quality beef frank and a piece of cheese takes approximately a golf-ball-sized piece of dough.  Do NOT overwrap.  The dough expands in the oven.  Traditional kolaches are formed by making an indentation in a ball of dough, then filling the indentation with filling such as lemon, strawberry, or poppyseed.

Let prepared pieces stand on greased cookie trays for 15 minutes.  Preheat oven to 400 degrees.  Just prior to baking, you may coat the klobasnicky or kolaches with an egg wash made of one egg and a tablespoon of water.  This is optional. Bake each tray for 15 minutes until pieces are golden brown.  Remove with caution and allow to cool a bit before eating.  Makes approximately 20.

Eating Cape Cod

So when a food blogger doesn't have air conditioning and it is threatening to hit 101 degrees, what does a food blogger blog about?  Other people's food!  In my case, this food just happens to be from Boston, Cambridge, and Cape Cod.  I visited the Taste Tester in Absentia this weekend (my sister) with the Resident Taste Tester (who wouldn't let me drive.  Good thing too once we hit Boston because it was AWFUL.) and we packed an awful lot into three days.  Not just food, either.  The weekend started with this:

We went to the Cape Cod National Seashore and it was awesome!  We didn't swim in it but we did walk along it for quite a while and picked up shells and rocks along the way.  And got wet.  Very, very wet.  At least from the waist down.  That was mostly a mistake though.  The tide was coming in and sometimes the waves came up higher than I expected.  It was COLD, and even though the day got very warm I don't think it ever reached a point at which I would have liked to swim in it.  Towards the halfway point of our walk we saw these:

Seals!  We have no idea what kind, but it is likely they were harbor seals.

We checked out the Nauset Light and the Three Sisters as well, but they were one beach up from our original parking spot, and after what the first beach did to my toes (I don't want to talk about it and you don't want to hear about it, trust me) we didn't go back out to the beach.

By that time we were getting hungry but it wasn't quite 5 o'clock which is when dinner at our restaurant of choice, the Bookstore and Restaurant, was set to start, so we stopped off at the Chocolate Cafe in Eastham and got truffles the size of a golf ball.  This is not a joke people.  They were massive.  And so good, I didn't even get a picture.  Don't worry, that's the only time I missed getting a picture of the amazing food.  I got a Wicked Chocolate truffle of course, but the Resident Taste Tester tried Cappuccino and the Taste Tester in Absentia had a Peppermint truffle, which were both covered in white chocolate.  I prefer dark chocolate any day!

That got us to the Bookstore and Restaurant just about on time.  It overlooked Wellfleet Harbor and had two stories.  As a rule, if a place has two stories I sit on the top story on the balcony.  How else are you going to see anything but the parking lot?  It really, really paid off this time.  A beautiful view, warm temperatures with a breeze, and oh...the food...

The bread was a lovely crusty little thing, and the oil (which I don't recommend choking on, like I did.  It is much tastier in the stomach than the lungs.) is a lovely olive oil, paprika, herb concoction.  The bottom picture, the surf and turf, is apparently one of their specialties, done a different way each day.  I can't remember the specifics of this one - grilled, maybe?  But the Taste Tester in Absentia sure liked it.  The middle one though?  The one that looks like I just single-handedly destroyed five species at once?  Well...I hate to say it but those were the tastiest five extinctions I ever met.  Shrimp, mussels, scallops, clams, and cod in a buttery herb sauce.  I think the people at the next table might have been considering getting up to leave before their meals came as I attempted to drain every last bit of my sauce with a clam shell.

Ordinarily the Resident Taste Tester and I will pick two different dishes and share, but boy was I glad he chose the Fish Pot too.  How else would I have been able to con that last scallop away from him?

After such a big dinner I think we were all wishing for a nice drive back to the apartment, but the Cape wasn't about to give us any such thing.

But we made it and when we did...

How can you turn down key lime pie?  Needless to say, I heartily recommend the Bookstore and Restaurant.  A bit pricey perhaps, but would you expect otherwise for good seafood on the Cape?

That's enough food for now.  Day two will be forthcoming.  In the meantime, are there any recipes/things to try/recommendations that you would like to see me test out and post?  Due to the aforementioned 101 degree days the Resident Taste Tester and I have purchased a window air conditioner.  I do not expect it to bring the house down to 68, but I do hope that the upright and chest freezers don't die and, perhaps, I'll get to cook.  Man, I wish this weather would go back where it belongs...

Cardamom Bread

Here is the problem with being a bit avante-garde in the kitchen:  when you make something once and it turns out beautifully, you may never be able to make it turn out that way again.  This situation doesn't totally apply to the recipe I am going to give you today, but there is one very important ingredient that the Resident Taste Tester and I believe I may have goofed unknowlingly the first time I made this bread, only to find the loaf lacking the second time I made it earlier this week.

Cardamom seems to be an acquired taste, a bit like anise (more on anise later.  What?  I'm half Italian, anise is bound to show up sooner or later!).  In fact, the first time I made this bread, I wasn't sure I liked it.  Neither was the Resident Taste Tester.

So we ate some.

And ate some.

And ate some more.

And in the end we both discovered that there is only one way to eat this bread - with a great big heaping spoonful of nutella slathered on top.  I'm telling you, it's a beautiful way to go.

Then I made it again, just this Tuesday, and that's when the trouble started.  I added a teaspoon of cardamom, just one teaspoon.  Cardamom is quite strong as spices go, so that was a good amount.

It wasn't enough.

Somehow, someway, we are 99% positive that the first time I made it, I misread the recipe and made it with a tablespoon of cardamom, not a teaspoon.  That would explain not only the lighter flavor, but the lighter color.  No wonder we didn't know if we liked it!  I wholeheartedly endorse using a tablespoon, but if you are unsure of whether or not you will like such a strong spice, by all means, use a teaspoon.

One final note.  It is very possible that there will not be much in the way of recipes going up for at least a few weeks.  For those of you living in your air conditioned offices and homes, it is a balmy 90 degrees out there with no signs of slowing.  And we, unlike all of you, have no air conditioner.  If you think you feel too hot to eat, just think how we feel.  In fact, it was 74 in the house this morning when we got up at 6:30.  It's 78 inside now.  So I hope you'll forgive me, but the recipes may be few and far between, at least until I figure out how to cook outside over an open fire.  Which may or may not be happening, depending on how desperate I get to eat something other than lunchmeat and grapes...

Cardamom Bread

This bread is actually meant to be made for Christmas in the shape of a wreath, but I found that it works just as well as two loaves.  I will include the wreath-making instructions just in case you would like to try it that way, but the pictures here are for the loaves, and the loaves only, since I have never tried it any other way.


1 cup sugar
1 teaspoon salt
1 teaspoon OR 1 tablespoon ground cardamom
2 packages active dry yeast
7(ish) cups of flour
1 cup butter or margarine
1 1/2 cups milk
3 eggs
1/2 teaspoon almond extract

In a mixer bowl, combine sugar, salt, cardamom, yeast, and 2 cups of the flour.  In a 2 quart saucepan over medium heat, heat butter or margarine and milk until between 120 and 130 degrees.  Turn mixer onto a low speed and beat liquids into the dry ingredients.  Turn mixer speed to medium.  Reserve one egg white and add the rest of the eggs to the mixer bowl with the mixer at a lower speed.  Beat in almond extract and about 2 more cups of flour.  Use a wooden spoon to stir in approximately 2 more cups, or as much flour as you can handle.  Turn out and knead the dough on a well-floured surface, adding more flour until the dough is soft and elastic, perhaps even a little oily and does not stick to your hands.  Place the dough in a greased bowl and allow to rise.  The original recipe says that it takes an hour for the dough to double, but that is a lie.  When the house is 74 degrees and it takes 2 hours to double, there is no way that a shorter amount of time will do.  Go read a book.  Take a bike ride.  Lie in front of the fan and try not to pant.  You're going to wait a while.

Punch down the dough (the above picture should prove that this is my favorite part).  Turn out on a clean surface.  Grease two loaf pans.  Cut dough in half and shape into loaves.  Place in pans.  Allow to rise until doubled again, up to two hours.  Read another book.  Take another bike ride.  I'm sure you'll find something to do.  Preheat oven to 350 degrees.  Brush loaves with reserved egg white.  Bake for 1 hour, covering with foil for the last 15 minutes.  The bread will still come out pretty dark on top, but do not be worried.  This is perfectly normal.

Instructions for wreath (beginning after the first paragraph break above):  Grease a large cookie sheet and the exterior of a 2 quart oven-safe bowl.  Invert the bowl onto the sheet.  Reserve a handful of dough.  Mix egg white with a dash of milk.  Roll the rest of the dough into a 30 inch rectangle.  Roll longways into a rope and curl it around the bowl on the cookie sheet.  Roll out the reserved dough and cut out holly leaves, then roll the scraps into balls.  Position the leaves and balls on the wreath like holly berries.  Affix them with the egg white and milk mixture.  Allows to rise until double.  Brush with egg white.  Bake at 350 degrees for one hour.