"LET THERE BE LIBRAS!" or "¡El Bigote!"

I am an embarrassing older sister. When I discovered this recipe for cupcakes with faces on Xiaolu's page, I totally bookmarked it with absolutely permanent plans to make them for my brother on his birthday.

When October 9th rolled around, I whipped out the recipe and baked up a bunch of these little cuties giggling while I put their little eyes together on their little cupcake faces. Yes I giggled, the whole time, like a dork.

I kept picturing my brother's face when he saw them, what he would think about their little mustaches and junior mint eyes.

Why is this embarrassing? Well...

My brother isn't exactly 4 Or 6. Or even 12.

He um... just turned 20...

I know. What's wrong with me?!? My brother though, he expects this from me. It has always been our relationship. We're not the type of siblings who will sit around with beers telling dirty jokes and eating boob shaped cake when we're  40.

Our relationship is this: every year he will get older, every year I will pretend that it isn't happening and make things for him that he and his preschool friends will enjoy, and every year my 6'1", goateed, fully grown brother will smile sweetly and genuinely thank me. Every year. I have no idea how I got lucky enough to get a brother like this. No clue.

Though I'll confess that if I gave me these cupcakes, I'd thank me too.

These cupcakes are AMAZINGLY good. And if it turns out maybe you want to be a grown up and leave off  the tiny faces, they won't turn out any less amazing because what we're dealing with here is chocolate cake, with oreo inside. I didn't really know what I was getting myself into when I baked these (I was mostly in it for the faces), I got a sort of hint they might be good when I smelled them baking, but when I sunk my teeth into that very first warm chocolaty bite, it was so good I had to sit down. True story.


They are love sonnet good. They are break into song good. They are chuck your boyfriend out the window because who needs a man when you've got this cake* kind of good.

... what?

It's a very lucky thing that the recipe only makes 18 cupcakes because they are dangerous. It is also very lucky that 12 of those 18 cupcakes actually made it all the way to my brother's house. Because really, eating all the cupcakes before they got there would be even more embarrassing than just putting eyes on top of them. But only slightly more.

Oreo cupcakes. With or without the eyes, you need these in your life. I won't tell your boyfriend. 
I  promise.

You can find the original recipe here.

* P.s. I totally love my boyfriend (who always reads my blog) just slightly way way more than cupcakes. Duh. (p.p.s.Hi Alan!)

"She is Fast, Thorough And Sharp As A Tack. She's Touring The Facility And Picking Up Slack"

Once upon a time there was a wild little girl named Ashley Elise.

She had long curly hair, tall strong legs, and skin the color of sunshine.

She did not like rules or dresses or keeping still, and if she had things her way (as she usually did) she'd spend the day doing cartwheels, singing songs, and dancing, dancing, dancing.

That girl is my sister (and she's having a birthday!).

When I think of my sister I think about cheesecake. Cheesecake and apricots.

I spent a lot of time studying her when I was little, she was two years older and my absolute heroine. The way she laughed and ate and styled her hair were cataloged in my mind, so that when I was old enough I could do things exactly the same in that perfectly effortless way.


The eating part though, it never really stuck. My sister's food habits are weird. While I was always pretty consistent, (delicious food all day every day) she was (and is) a tiny dancer and for the most part all I remember her eating was dried apricots, sushi and iced tea. The quirky part came when it was her birthday,  and instead of continuing the pattern of light, dainty, and healthful she always requested a cheesecake. A cheesecake,  pretty much the densest most decadent dessert you can make. It blew my mind! For ages this confused me, baffled me, since it seemed to be completely out of character. But when I think about it now it makes total sense.

From the day she was born her personality has always been that of go big or go home, it's partly why I studied her so much. She isn't a toe in the water type of girl, with worries and sunscreen and plans, she's a run, and a jump and a CANNONBALL!!!  Blue hair? She had it. Party til dawn? Been there, done that. Charm artists, steal airplanes, command snakes with your parseltongue? All in a day's easy work.


So if we're talking birthdays you sure better believe that we're having the cakiest cake there is out there. We're having a cheesecake. And we're totally eating it.  We are EATING. IT. ALL.

These days I rarely see her. Life gets in the way, or I have to work or she's off on a pirate ship somewhere. But every year around this time I still think about my heroine.  I think about her infectious laugh, her cartwheels and the ferocious way she lives her life and I find myself baking up things for her like she was still close by. Things like cheesecake, and apricots.

Apricot Cheesecake Bars For Ashley

Martha Stewart Living

18 graham crackers

1 cup plus 2 tablespoons sugar

Coarse salt

1/2 cup (1 stick) unsalted butter, melted

10 ounces apricots (about 4), halved, pitted, and cut into eighths

1 tablespoon fresh lemon juice

OR 3/4 cup Apricot jam 

2 packages (8 ounces each) cream cheese, room temperature

1/2 cup sour cream, room temperature

1/2 teaspoon pure vanilla extract

2 large eggs, room temperature, lightly beaten

Directions

1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees. In a food processor, process graham crackers, 2 tablespoons sugar, and 1/4 teaspoon salt until fine crumbs form. Transfer to a medium bowl and stir in melted butter until crumbs are moistened. Wipe processor bowl clean. With a flat-bottomed 1-cup measure or glass, press crumbs evenly into a 9-by-13-inch baking pan. Bake until crust is firm, 15 minutes. Let cool on a wire rack. Reduce heat to 325 degrees.

If you're not using jam

In a small saucepan, bring apricots, 1/4 cup sugar, and pinch of salt to a boil over medium-high, stirring, until sugar dissolves. Reduce heat and simmer, stirring frequently, until mixture is shiny, 10 minutes. In food processor, puree apricot mixture, lemon juice, and 1 tablespoon water.

2.  In a large bowl, using an electric mixer, beat cream cheese and sour cream on medium until smooth. Add 3/4 cup sugar and beat until smooth. Add vanilla and pinch of salt and beat to combine. Add eggs and beat until smooth, scraping down bowl as needed. Pour cream-cheese mixture into cooled crust and smooth top.

3. Randomly drop small spoonfuls apricot puree or jam on cream-cheese mixture. With a skewer or thin-bladed knife, gently swirl puree. Bake just until set, about 25 - 30 minutes (mixture will still be a little jiggly until it fully chills) Let cool slightly in pan on rack, then refrigerate until chilled and firm before cutting into squares, 2 hours.

"Breaking The Crumb Curse" or "Strawberry Jello Cake Redux"

Cake and I had broken up. I'd tried for almost a year to get along with cake but it became clear that we had... issues. 

You might remember, the falling, the splitting, the ugly frosting, and the flavorless. There have been some vulgar slang terms, explictives, #$@'s between us and for a while I just told myself that cake and I were just ill suited to each other. That we should go our separate ways for now and maybe revisit our problems when we were older, wiser. It was an ugly breakup filled with heartache. I often thought about going back but I've told myself this many times, I even thought it was burned into my brain, AVOID CAKE! Cake's no good for you.

I thought I knew these words by heart. That is until I realized I had promised a friend from work that I would totally bake them a birthday cake, no problem.

What on earth was  I thinking?

So after a few hours of beating myself up I started thinking about just what it was that cake and I just couldn't work out. And then it hit me, if you want to get friendly with cake you have to play by cake's rules.  But I never want to do this. When I'm in the kitchen, I tend to run out of stuff, I sing at the top of my lungs, I may or may not be wearing pants and I don't have the patience for some bossyface recipe trying to push me around.

Cake doesn't want to let its hair down, it doesn't want to negotiate on ingredients, it wants you to do as you're told and not argue. I thought to myself I don't have time for this, I don't have the patience. But I was in a bind. We're talking about birthdays here. So I invited cake over to talk it out and see if we couldn't make peace for one day.


Okay, we'll try it your way first, just please... weapons down.


'Alright'. cake seemed to say, expressionless and unmoving. I took a deep breath, and with a heavy sigh I  went about whipping up batch one (cupcake style). Cake barked the orders and I baked it into existence. I did what I was told but I was on edge, irritated. Cake was really rubbing me the wrong way. I had to bite my lip to keep from screaming. I was so annoyed in fact, that I think I left out a thing or two. But cake didn't need to know.We set the batch in the oven, and glared at each other while it baked.

 A few minutes to cool, a taste and... Eh, a little bland I think. Needs a bit more of something.  Cake just shrugged, and flipped through the pages of a dust covered Gourmet magazine, ignoring me as I rambled about just what might be missing here, you know... flavor-wise...

 I'm thinking more strawberry. You know? Or vanilla? Okay, cake.  My turn! Let's try it my way, and... just see what happens.


No measuring spoons, just a dash here and an eyeball it there. We were out of this so I subbed in that. Dump in the strawberry, give it a taste. A mix, a dash, and another taste. Answer the door, check the mail, baking times set by smell, and with an excited giggle and a few wrist burns, batch two was born. But...

Gummy. Crumbly.

 It wan't until after I tasted the syrupy sweet tang of failure, that I realized cake never actually agreed to this idea. Hm, tricksy. I looked across the room to spot smug eyes, casually avoiding mine. Silently laughing.

Ugh!  What is the problem?! It's only cooking!


'Baking. This is baking, that you're doing'

Whatever. Same thing.


'But it isn't. You need rules.'

WHATEVER CAKE!
*   *   *   *   *

After a break to clear my head and a run to the store for a little more butter, I cleaned up the kitchen and flicked on a Jazz record as the sun started sinking into a purplish dusk. I hummed to myself as I rummaged around in the fridge and readied the counter-top for strawberry battle (round three) when I noticed that cake... seemed to be looking at me differently.
'I love this song' cake seemed to say with a certain subtle twinkle in the eye, almost a glow.

Me too,... it's really great.


 I looked at cake quizzically but said nothing more and we worked in silence for a while.  I followed cake's instructions to the letter, and while crooning the wrong words to Diamonds On My Windshield I added just a little extra this and that to the batter as the mixer hummed and whipped, and cake... said nothing. Just nodded along with a toe tap and a stray lyric here and there.

Thirty minutes passed and the record stopped, we took the warm pastry from the oven and it was... just perfect. It slid out of the pan nice and easy. It cooled without falling, had just enough sweetness and frosted pretty and clean.

As I sliced a few strawberries to decorate the top, cake squeezed my hand and started to leave.

'See you later' cake seemed to say.  Wait! But... what changed? What happened? Why no disasters?

' I already  told you, this is baking. You have to get to know the rules, and know them by heart before you can play with them... and you know them now.'

Oh.

Cake put the record back on and headed towards the door to leave.

                                                   

         But what about the fight?

'What fight?  You need to relax honey, you think way too much. I mean, it's only cake'

...it's only cake.

*****

Strawberry Cream Cake

2cups white sugar

1 (3ounce )pkg of Strawberry Jello mix

1 cup (2 sticks) butter softened

4 eggs, room temperature

1/2 tsp salt

3/4 cup strawberry puree (from frozen sweetened strawberries)

1/2 cup milk

1tsp vanilla extract

2 1/2 tsp baking powder

3 cups cake flour, sifted

In the bowl of an electric mixer, cream together the butter, sugar and vanilla extract on medium low. Slowly add the eggs, one and a time,then the jello powder. When the eggs are fully incorporated, add the salt, strawberry puree and milk.  Stir in the flour and baking powder, being careful not to overmix.

Divide batter evenly between two 9 inch cake pans, that have been greased and lined with parchment paper. Baked a 350 degrees for 25-30 minutes or until it passes the toothpick test.

Let cool 15 minutes before removing from pans to cool completely.

Strawberry Cream  Cheese Icing

1 8ounce pkg Philadelphia cream cheese at room temp

1/2 cup (1 stick) butter, softened at room temp

1 tsp vanilla extract

1/4 cup strawberry puree

4 cups powdered confectioners sugar

Cream all ingredients together until fluffy. Serve atop, Strawberry and Cream cake.

"RELEASE THE GLUTEN!" or " I Don't Speak French, But I Can If you Like"

My mom's having a birthday (HI MOM!) She loves croissants, so I made some even though she won't eat them cause she broke up with carbs (Noooooooooooo!). I ate them though. Plenty, I even split them in half and made them into little tea sandwiches with Parmesan, home grown tomatoes and basil. I'm claiming to have eaten all this in her honor. She won't correct me, cause she's nice.

We used to eat croissants together, back in the day. One summer we went to a little cafe every week and ate croissants, talked about dreams and people watched. That winter we joined a gym, together. But that's a different story.

The first time I ever made croissants was last year (also for my mom's birthday) although they turned out... sort of comically large. Like "hey you forgot your handbag, oh wait no... that's a croissant." kind of large. So this time around of course ( and you knew it would happen) in my efforts to make sure that embarrassing size was not repeated I kind of overshot the mark and came out with little bite sized ones. But hey you don't have to be the reach toothbrush guy to eat them so I'm not complaining.

Croissants are notoriously tricky. Some call them a labor of love, I say it's more like wrestling a bear. It's almost way too annoying to even attempt, but if you try and succeed the rewards are amazing. What? You can't prove I've never wrestled a bear.

The whole process starts out romantically, wrist deep in flour and yeast, air full of possibilities. This time was no different. I didn't start the project until the late afternoon when it was too hot to go anywhere and the opportunity to get my hands busy was more than welcome. When it came time for the dough to rise I just covered a bowl with a tea towel and set it out on the still warm balcony as the sun was setting. Wonderful, fantastical, breathtaking. I started fantasizing about becoming a midnight bread maker who baked up croissants on a whim easy peasy, that was of course until I got past the easy part.

 "Laminating the dough" which is basically making lots of tiny layers of butter and flour so your pastry comes out flaky and delicious, is damn near impossible if you're incredibly lazy  a novice cook. You have to be patient and careful and possess superhuman upper body strength to wage a battle to the death with the gluten monster and roll the dough out completely flat four maddening times  without squishing the butter out! 

There were some angry screams from the kitchen. Maybe a few expletives. Possibly.

Unlike bear wrestling, croissants are pretty much a win win no matter how it goes.  There are three sticks of butter in there. Even if you're terrible at it and they come out all lumpy twistums like mine did, you've still got a giant basket of delicious buttery carbs. Yeah. Think about it.

If you can make it to the end though you won't be sorry. I may have emptied my pockets into the swear jar but today I had ugly delicious croissants for breakfast and it was heaven. I had croissants for lunch too. And if I hadn't been smart and frozen half the bread dough I'd probably have croissants for diner and fourthmeal... and also laid atop my coffin when my heart stopped.

Croissants; sassy, high maintenance, but worth it. See what you're made of, wrestle that bear.


Fresh Croissants
Originally from Baking Frame By Frame and Peter Reinheart's Artisan Bread's Every Day


3 1/2 cups white bread flour, plus extra for dusting
3 tbsp super fine sugar
1 tsp salt
2tsp bread maker's yeast
1 1/4 cup lukewarm milk
1 1/4 cups + 1 tbsp butter softened, plus extra for greasing
1 egg, lightly beaten with 1 tbsp milk for glazing


1. Mix the dry ingredients together in a large mixing bowl, make a well in the center and add 1 tbsp of butter and the milk, Mix to a soft dough, adding more milk if too dry. Dough should coarse, wet and shaggy.

Knead on lightly floured work surface until smooth. Place in a large greased bowl (you can also spray it down with cooking spray), cover and let stand in a warm place until doubled in volume.

2. Meanwhile place the butter between two sheets of parchment paper and flatten with a rolling pin to for a 1/4 inch thick rectangle. Set aside in the refrigerator until needed.

3. Knead the dough for 1 minute. Remove the butter from the refrigerator. Roll the dough out on a well floured work surface to 18 x 6  inches, or just a little more than twice the size of the butter square.

4. Lift the parchment with the butter block and set it down on the left side to check for sizing. The butter should only cover half the dough with just a 1/4 in border. If it covers more than that remove the butter block and roll the dough out a little wider or taller as needed.

5. When the dough and the butter are properly matched remove the top layer of parchment from the butter block and flip the butter block over onto the left half of the dough. When you've got everything situated in the spot you like, remove the second sheet of parchment.

6. Lift the right half of the dough and fold it over the butter block to sandwich the butter. Press along all the edges to create a seal. Tap the rolling pin over the top of the dough to work out any bubbles and working from the center, gently roll out the dough smoothing the butter to all corners and all sides. Continue rolling until you have a 1/2 in triangle that's about 16 x 9. Square off the sides and the four corners, then fold the dough into thirds as if folding a letter. Fold the right one third to the left, then fold the left one third to the right in the same way. Use a rolling pin to press out any air pockets so that the folds lay flat, then let the dough rest for 10-15 minutes so the gluten can relax.

7. Give the dough a quarter turn and roll out as big as the original rectangle, and fold again. If the butter feels soft, slide the dough onto a baking sheet and put it in the fridge for 10-15 minutes to let if firm up. Repeat the rolling process twice more.

8.Cut the dough in half and roll out each half into a 1/4 inch thick rectangle. Use a template (or just eyeball it) and cut out triangles with a base of 4 inches and long side of 8 inches. (note: If you're like me, a don't want to bake all your croissants right away, right now is the time you can freeze them. Just shape the triangles you want the freeze into croissants (without proofing), and put them in individual ziploc bags and toss them in the freezer. When you want to bake them take them out of the fridge to thaw for three hours before you bake them. Don't bake them frozen or they'll bake all funky in the oven.)

9. Brush the triangles with the glaze. Roll into croissant shapes, tucking the point underneath. Brush again with the glaze. Place on a parchment paper lined baking sheet and let double in volume. Bake at 400 degrees for 15-20 minutes until golden brown.

Let cool at least 1 hour before serving

"Alan's First Birthday" or "French, French, Chocolate"

This week the menu was basically "boyfriend's choice" and I'll confess here on Thursday afternoon, I'm a little worse for the sugar carb wear. Sunday was the Oscars which is apparently a HUGE deal around here, and there was much consumption of sour patch kids, M&M's and popcorn. Then on Tuesday when my dashing boyfriend turned 23, we ate (unremarkable/ not as good as Panera's) French Onion Soup,  (delicious) home made french bread, and (absolutely amazingly good) Chocolate cream pie that we busted out at midnight Tuesday morning and ravenously consumed long before the sun came up. Here's what it looked like.

"A Cake-y Weekend" or "My Favorite Tea is Theraflu"

"A Hot Pink Birthday"

candles on the cake, and a little traditional decoration

Saturday was my birthday, I turned 23! I took the day off work, got a brand new hair cut, tried my hand at bar tending (more on that later) ate crab Rangoon (my favorite) and baked wonderful magnificent strawberry cake!

new hair cut!

I know it seems lame in theory to bake your own birthday cake but this cake is so easy it didn't seem like work anyway.  At first glance this seems gross I know but, I grew up eating this cake. My grandmother has been making it for as long as I can remember for just about every occasion (it's the very same I raved about on new years) and I just love it to death. I'll even be scandalous and tell you that even though I'm mildly allergic to strawberries this is (in all my 23 years) my favorite cake ever. It wasn't until a couple of weeks ago I even knew the recipe was written down someplace so I could make it ( a true rarity among southern cooks) and just like I'm sure you did, the moment I read down the list and found Jello mentioned as an ingredient I was shocked, confused and a little icked out. I mean, Jello? In a cake? Really?

(What turned out to be )Yellow Cake with Nutella Fudge ganache and a few reeses

Pretty dishes aren't really my area. In fact I'll be honest and say that at this point I'm pretty much terrible at making thing look delicious. My passion really is flavor.  In fact I spent sleepless hours pondering how to make this cake taste absolutely toe curling. Three days, some tears and nightmares later I'll say I think it was a success


Let me start by saying I was sleepy, I'm pretty sure every step of the way here. I was sleepy when I volunteered to do this, when I bought ingredients for a completely different icing then I had the intention of making and when I decided that the cakes had baked level enough that I shouldn't have to bother with leveling them with a knife before I frosted them.

Yeah. I know.

Needless to say this whole thing was a debacle. This cake just didn't seem to want to get along with me. Sleepiness aside I even baked the cake in advance in case anything terrible happened like say, oh I don't know, you bake two cakes in the same oven at the same time at the same temperature, meticulously rotate and check for done-ness and one of the two falls for no reason at all.

Hm, can't imagine that happening.

moments later a giant hole appeared  right at that crack

Oh, wait.


*Wah wah*

I cried to my mother about it. What should I do? what if the cakes sinks in the middle when I'm finished?
"Oh just fill that shit in with frosting, that's what it's for. It's only cake."

Sounds good to me, until....


 I made the sour cream chocolate icing,  and it came out a little too boston cream pie-ish for what I wanted. Not that there's anything wrong with boston cream pie (believe me there isn't) but it doesn't really have that classic yellow cake/ buttercream birthday taste I was expecting. So I decided to alter it to suit my tastes by adding Nutella. Why Nutella you ask? Why not nutella, is what I always say. Well really, I just grabbed the first no-fail chocolately substance I could find and nutella and I have always had a good relationship. I have never once regretted adding it to anything so far and I think that's more than enough reason to dump an entire bottle of it into my sour cream icing. Don't you agree? No? Well... it's what I did anyway.

It didn't turn out being a terrible move actually. In fact as I expected Nutella makes everything better, the only problem was now the icing was the thin syrupy texture of nutella and refused to stay on the cake and fill in that giant cavern between the two cake layers that I hadn't bothered to level off.
What was I to do? I couldn't exactly take the top layer off and go hacking away at the middle portion now that everything was all slimy with chocolate.

Think think think.

Hey remember when I bought a bunch of ingredients for an icing that wasn't this one? In that fateful grocery bag was the second ingredient that never fails to make everything better : Reeses.
Quick chewing gum fix with some mini cups and HAPPY BIRTHDAY LET'S CUT THE CAKE BEFORE ANYONE LOOKS TO CLOSELY- I mean...uh... MAKE A WISH!