Let Me Eat Cake

2009-07-01T04:34:00.002-05:00

Originally posted 4/06/07.

Lately, I've been enjoying a little personal cake-baking craze.

I think it started when I became infatuated with the teeny, tiny cakes I saw in a store bakery case. I knew better than to buy one ~ I knew it wouldn't be as tasty as it looked unless I made one for myself ~ but it was just so awfully CUTE I could hardly stand it! It was a little round cake, several inches in diameter and only a little taller, iced with dainty pink icing.

A friend who knows me well gifted me with a set of tiny cake pans which included: round ones (for a layer cake like the one I'd seen), plus a tiny bundt cake type pan and a tiny tube cake pan. They are all so adorable! They remind me of a kids' kitchen set, like the play ovens that use a light bulb and really cook. Not that I ever had personal experience with such, but I did fantasize.

So far even the smallest fractions of a batch of batter are a lot, for filling those pans! I continue to experiment, but so far the "Dinette Cake", from the old Betty Crocker, seems to do the best. I used that recipe to make one small round layer cake, and the rest of the batter went into a loaf pan. That "loaf", cut in half, made a second little layer cake (nearly square). I found a small recipe for Orange Chiffon Cake, which I think I'll try, but haven't yet.

I had fun hosting an informal dinner party recently. We invited my folks, a neighbor couple and Mark's grandmother, who was unfortunately unable to attend. I made Chicken Paprikash (from Taste of Home magazine), served with Sour Cream Gravy and egg noodles. For our vegetables, we had broccoli and cooked carrots and my mother brought her lovely fresh homemade bread.

When we were small, my family only used homemade bread, made in large (4-loaf) batches several times per week. It was delicious, and a tangible example of savoring the most luxurious simplicities in life. Now that she and my father are retired, the schedule again permits a supply of homemade bread to flow freely.

For dessert at the dinner, I got to indulge my recent cake craze by having Chiffon cake with chocolate icing. Nice!

The recipe I'd like to feature today and add to kitchen beckworld is for a variation on a recipe already in the kitchen, "Fourteen in One" cookies, from the new "Joy". This variation adds toasted coconut to the buttery sugar cookies, for a tasty, textured treat.

I found a few interesting food-related web sites worthy of mention:

Vintage Recipe Collection ~ I came in on the "vintage cakes" page, but am now enjoying the whole site.

Diana's Desserts Newsletter for March ~ Notice a focus on cute and tiny treats. I want to try some of these!

An article about the powers of pastry ~ I like the photo image of "angelic" angel food cake.

Grab an Apron, a blog featuring "stylish" (?) recipes.

How I love Joy of Cooking!

2009-07-01T04:31:00.002-05:00

Originally posted 1/26/06.

How I love Joy of Cooking! Throughout its various incarnations the Rombauer family and its assembly of experts collected a fabulous scope of recipes, researched socio-cultural aspects of food, and ironed out chemistry issues to make recipes turn out nicely! Joy is one cookbook that has never cut corners. I enjoy it as my finest general food reference source.

Obviously, I'm not alone. It is the best selling American cookbook. I've discoverd an artist who drew inspiration from the cookbook, who says: "this cookbook is like a Bible, a Torah or Koran of sacred already tested information for people who prepare and make food to nourish and preserve." (http://www.betsykrebs.com/joy_of_cooking.htm) Whew! Heady stuff!

The older edition covers food nowadays considered more more elaborate and time-consuming, but with its strong and basic roots, it grounds me...and I DO like those details! I like the wealth and depth of culinary history and information for reference. Many of those recipes are deceptively simple. The newer edition (1997) adds modern sensibilities of convenience and a new vocabulary of ingredients. Used together, I might need no other cookbooks!

Recently, when Mark and I felt a need to satisfy our sweet teeth, I became inspired. First, I tried a very interesting-sounding recipe from the old edition, Maple Curls. They are elegant like fancy pastry, yet take their sweetness and flavor from glorified humble native tree sap. Although this recipe didn’t make the cut into the new edition of Joy, they are so very worth trying! They’re a little elaborate, but fun to make.

I was happy with the Maple Curls, but wanted a more traditional cookie-like texture/taste experience. I turned to my Lemon Butter Cookie recipe, from the new Joy, and used the dough in different ways to make three kinds of cookie.

Which Joys am I using?

My "old" edition is a 1964 reprint, Bobs-Merrill Plume paperback edition.

My new edition is copyrighted in 1997 by Simon & Schuster Inc.

welcome to beckworld

Let Me Eat Cake

How I love Joy of Cooking!