Cake Tuesday: no cake.

We're back from our travels and they were blissful. Sydney is a spectacular city, and Hong Kong is huge and complicated and delicious.

Let's start with Sydney.  I took a million pictures of the opera house - it was surprising every time I saw it, and I saw it from nearly every angle imaginable. My introduction was walking across the harbor bridge, which was very lovely as well.

Can you believe this sky?  Everything was so pretty and sparkly and clean.
Random things I learned about Australia:  

1.  There is no drip coffee - there are espressos, and lattes, and cappuccinos, and if you want a "regular" coffee you ask for a "flat white", which is way more delicious than any regular coffee.   

2.  You need to cover every inch of your exposed skin with super-hard-core SPF 5000 sunscreen every time you go outside.  If you miss that tiny little strip of skin at the top of your face because you didn't want to get sunscreen in your hair?  It will turn bright red and peel off.  Also, the part in your hair?  Ditto.

3.  Koala bears sleep a LOT.  Perhaps they're nocturnal, you say.  No, they are not.  Apparently they eat eucalyptus leaves, which are incredibly difficult to digest and use up all of their energy.  I would like to suggest that they try another leaf.

The weather was perfect, the museums were excellent, The zoo was full of Australian critters I'd only read about (Tasmanian devils!  Wombats!  Platypuses!), and the food was great (although I did not have the opportunity to try any vegemite, which I'm told is delightful on toast, with butter). Here is a dessert I had at the Art Gallery of New South Wales:

A coconut panna cotta with pineapple custard, lime sorbet, a crispy cookie, and guava and mango with mint. Heaven. I ordered it because the week before I left I had created an assortment of miniature desserts, one of which was a coconut panna cotta with pineapple gelée. (Well, and because I love everything coconut.) But this definitely put mine to shame. (In my defense, everything I had created was intended to pick up with your fingers, eliminating the need for plates or forks or spoons at a larger event. But still. The museum's presentation was perfect and beautiful and delicious.)

Here's a shot of mine:

Layers of coconut panna cotta sandwiching a layer of fresh pineapple gelée, with a little toasted coconut on top. I also made tiny french tart tatins with fresh thyme from my garden:

and bite-sized sticky toffee puddings:

which I ended up topping with shards of homemade pralines. I love making desserts as much as cake, and luckily they're becoming quite popular at weddings, so I'm really looking forward to gaining weight in the season ahead.

Now I'm scrambling to get caught up with work (and laundry). If you'd like to see more of the Australia pics, you may; I just had too many to post here. And I'll get to Hong Kong next - stay tuned.

¡Feliz año nuevo!

We had a fantastic time in Mexico - it was warm and sunny every day, and this was the view from our doorstep:

I SURFED (actually STOOD UP and rode WAVES!), and we fished (we caught Mahi Mahi, which meant that we pretty much ate nothing but Mahi Mahi for the rest of our stay), and swam and drank lots of margaritas and read many, many books.

I hope your holidays were everything you hoped they would be.
And this year is going to be incredible, I can tell. Just nine days in and it's already been chock-full of CRAZY huge new opportunities and positive meetings with fun clients and industry professionals - I feel so lucky and grateful. I even got to kick the year off with a darling little cake:

Hand-grated carrot cake with fresh ginger, a brown-sugar cream cheese filling, and vanilla bean buttercream frosting - yum! It was a gorgeous Alison Events wedding (is there any other kind?) - elegant and sophisticated but still with suprisingly playful elements throughout.
And now we're off to Australia, and then Hong Kong, but I wanted to take a quick moment to say Happy 2012!

Holiday Season.

It's a flurry of holiday baking in my neck of the woods. Two kinds of shortbread, Italian chocolate drops, cardamom wreaths, and chocolate ginger cookies. We're hosting family in a couple of days, after which we're planning on escaping to somewhere sunny and warm again - last year's Christmas in Hawaii spoiled us forever, I'm afraid.
The tree is trimmed, cards are nearly finished, presents are halfway there and Christmas music is basically on from the time we wake up 'til the time we sleep. And I just finished putting up a couple dozen bottles of limoncello! My very favorite time of year.
You know how crazy I am about the tree - collecting ornaments on every trip. This photo shows a small puppet ornament I got with some girlfriends in Europe 13 years ago; an ornament I made from a couple of coasters from the Inn at Langley on a family trip to beautiful Whidbey Island a few years back; a mask ornament from Venice commemorating our Carnivale visit (we got a little golden gondola this year at Vogalonga); and part of a handmade penguin (with a tiny knit scarf!) from my mom. Every year since we were born she's made each of us an ornament, mostly felt animals. They're all adorable.

This is a glass ball, painted by Frances for Drew, Thanksgiving 2004. She was 94 years old and painted beautifully. She signed it for him, too - it's a treasure that I look forward to unpacking every year. It's the barn in Sun Valley, one of her favorite places to visit - she lived there briefly when she was first married, and when asked about her son who was born during their stint there she would laugh and coyly quote the Glenn Miller song, "It happened in Sun Valley".

In keeping with the holiday spirit, here is a wonderful surprise from the yarn bombers in Edenton, North Carolina - He's so festive! I hope you all have a terrific, peaceful, fun, enchanting, relaxing, magical holiday season.

 

Cake Tuesday: reluctant traveler.

Thanksgiving was hosted by my younger brother this year, in North Carolina. He and his new girlfriend did a terrific job - pumpkin ice cream cocktails to start (similar to these, which I can't wait to make), TWO whole birds (one deep fried and one brined and grilled), and lots of deliciousness appearing from all members of the family - collards, corn pudding, sweet potatoes, smashed potatoes, two kinds of stuffing and two kinds of pie. And a mess of grilled oysters to kick everything off. Painful amounts of food, and a great visit all around.
North Carolina is always pretty, but the cotton fields in the fall are snowy perfection:

And the cypress trees are as hauntingly lovely as ever:

It's a truly breathtakingly beautiful state.  Maybe everyone feels that way (care to weigh in, Nebraska?), but I could drive those back roads or drift around on the sound all day.
It's become a sort of tradition for the whole family to take in a movie on Black Friday (our contribution to boosting the economy without too much excess), and this year we saw The Muppets. I was prepared for it to be hokey and maybe stretching for old jokes or perhaps aiming a little low; I was not prepared for the sweeping nostalgia, or for tearing up at the re-creation of the classic intro. The voices were a disappointment but eventually we stopped noticing them and overall it was good fun.
And even though after the Thanksgiving gorge-fest I was sure I wouldn't eat again, I did have some amazing chicken and dumplings, some of the best grits ever, excellent she-crab soup (though not as good as my brother's), delicious key lime pie, and gallons of sweet tea.

And then we flew home.  I fly quite a bit, and have developed a pretty solid list of necessities that help make the whole thing more bearable:
- earplugs
- headphones
- down pillow
- cashmere blanket
- book
- snack
- phone (loaded with podcasts, games, additional books)
- external battery (don't forget the USB cord)
- once inside the terminal I pick up a big bottle of water so I'm not pestering the flight attendants for more than their standard scheduled drink runs and I'm also not getting dehydrated.
After flying home yesterday, I retained a tiny amount of sanity during the five hour flight by cataloguing some helpful tips for what I can only assume are newcomers to air travel. Please feel free to share them.

1) SMELLS. You know how lots of restaurants and professional offices request that you not wear strong perfumes because they affect other people? News flash: people are more closely confined in airplanes than in restaurants or professional offices. Please bathe, and brush your teeth, and stop there.  Save your smelly, headache-inducing perfume for your own home or car or family. And food - I haven't worked in an office in a number of years, but remember without any fondness at all some coworkers who would heat up the most OBNOXIOUS smelling leftovers in the microwave of the office kitchen, permeating the entire place and leaving everyone feeling queasy. I like stinky food as much as the next person - tuna fish sandwiches, Indian curries, Cambodian fish paste - but please don't bring these things onto an airplane.

2) PERSONAL SPACE. When you heave yourself up out of your seat during the flight, and you use the headrest in front of you for leverage, you might be surprised to know that there is an actual living person in that seat who is thrown backwards (and often has his or her hair pulled) when you do this. Try using your armrest instead. Same thing when you return to your seat. Is it really necessary to grab that headrest and lean on it as you're dragging yourself into your designated place? No it is not.

3) SOUNDS. Tapping your feet incessantly is (surprise!) audible. And if I can hear your headphones from two seats away, you might be damaging your ears. And you're annoying. But at least you're using headphones. Hey, guy with the laptop (or iPad or cell phone) watching your movie or playing (I am not making this up) a Vegas-style slot machine game? GET HEADPHONES. No one else needs or wants to listen. (And no, I have never seen a woman do this. Yet.) I think playing cards are fine - lots of old-fashioned appeal and so many options, but I had a guy sitting behing me and every shuffle seriously involved at least twenty loud rifflings of the cards, with two or three aggressive TAP TAP tampings for each.

4) CHILDREN. It's hard to know where to begin here. If your kid makes a mess on the plane, the polite thing to do is clean up the mess. If your kid is kicking the seat in front of him/her, the polite thing to do is to force him (or her) to stop. If your kid is trying to be all independent and drag their own (super cute! often furry!) suitcase up the jetway, and it's constantly falling over and blocking the way for EVERY OTHER PASSENGER ON THE PLANE, many of whom have connections, it's not as cute as you think it is. I think a couple of nice options might be 1) carry the suitcase or the kid or both up the jetway and let the super-cuteness resume in the airport where there is room, or 2) wait until the other passengers have deplaned and then take as much time as you like. Oh and finally (this could belong in the sound category, I suppose) - two words... INSIDE VOICES. If your child insists on singing the alphabet song, please insist on inside voices. And if your child insists on singing the alphabet song twenty times in a row using nothing approaching an inside voice (again, not making this up), may I suggest duct tape? (I jest. But seriously.)

Flying brings out the misanthrope in me, mostly because there seems to be a steady decline in societal graces and a gigantic surge in personal entitlement. [Please note: I do understand that a) society has been claiming the demise of manners and civility for hundreds of years now and the world has not ended, and b) the best place to witness manners and civility is probably not on a Southwest Airlines flight a few days after Thanksgiving.]

On the bright side of society and manners and traditions - weddings! This is my most recent cake - nothing earth-shattering, but lovely white chocolate, fresh flowers mixed with sugar leaves and acorns - presented on a beautiful November afternoon. Ahh. I feel better already.

Cake Tuesday: lemons and popcorn.

So I'm fairly well recovered from last weekend, although I'm up to my chin again in mini pies (sour cherry and key lime), gingersnaps, and mini bars (lemon and pecan) for the week ahead. And lemons. A mountain of them. With around 50 pounds of Meyer lemons all ripe at once, I'm making huge batches of limoncello, and also several jars of preserved lemons, which I can't believe I've never made before. I'll try to stop and take pictures in the middle of the madness - they're so pretty and cheerful.
I knew after last weekend that dessert buffets are a solid hit, but this clinched it -I just found out that Martha Stewart Weddings featured a dessert buffet I did in her latest issue! So, so exciting. It was a gorgeous location and a beautiful setup, all orchestrated by the extremely talented team at Alison  Events.
In other exciting developments, Cruzin' Courses is just two days away, and it's another sold out event! I got the program to the printer barely under the wire, and have a couple of small treats (times 65) to knock out before Thursday, but it's all coming together. The weather has been spectacular - eighty degrees and cloudless - so it's going to be a perfect evening for strolling downtown.

On the cake front, here is a recent four-tiered cake I made for a lovely wedding at Tehama. Rough frosting seems to be another (welcome) trend - it looks so luscious and inviting, very natural. It was whipped cream cake layered with fresh organic sliced strawberries and strawberry buttercream.

Along with this cake was a less natural-looking but wildly fun creation. The groom's mother had come along for the tasting but was very disappointed that the couple hadn't selected any chocolate for their flavors. So the groom arranged for her to have her very own chocolate cake, but it was to be a surprise.
And in addition to chocolate, she's apparently a huge movie popcorn fan. So I shaped the entire cake to look like a jumbo box of popcorn, complete with hand-shaped sugar popcorn for the top.

It was very well-received - the guests didn't realize it was a cake at all. Six layers of bittersweet chocolate cake, sandwiched with a dense, rich ganache. It doesn't get more chocolaty than that.

Cake Tuesday: DONE.

Even after spending 90% of Monday in bed, I still feel like I've been hit by a Mack truck (and I actually do know what that feels like), so this will probably be a very short entry.
Thanks to some extremely close (and talented) friends, some insanely competent assistants, an incredibly patient husband, a little luck, and a lot of coffee, I made it through the weekend. It was already fairly full when I got a call a few months ago about doing a bona fide CELEBRITY wedding - how could I say no?
So I called in all favors and the troops rallied and every single thing turned out better than I had ever hoped. I don't think I'm supposed to talk about any details at this point but I can probably share a photo with you of the prep work:

These were tiny little apple galettes. The apples were from my tree, the thyme was from my herb garden. We hand cut around 250 perfect circles out of perfectly even slices of apple, then we layered three circles on a round of puff pastry over a teaspoon of tiny diced apple that had been sauteed with organic butter, cinnamon, brown sugar, and a touch of Meyer lemon. Then baked it, brushed it with a mixture of 8-year-old Calvados and warmed organic apple jelly, and topped it with a tiny sprig of thyme. This was ONE type of dessert out of over a dozen - there were over 850 individual desserts created for this wedding, all with the same degree of care and love (of course). It was amazing.
But the rest of the weekend was fun too. Here is one of the cakes I made on Saturday - the bride's colors were bright orange and turquoise, and she wanted shades of orange and the turquoise in circles all over the front of the cake. It was vibrant and fun and I really liked the way it came together:

Now please excuse me while I go back to bed.

Cake Tuesday: Mah word and Mahler.

Ok, first? I love North Carolina. Posted yesterday on Craigslist:
++++++++++
free opossum for opossum stew (havelock nc )
Date: 2011-09-19, 8:17PM EDT

Reply to: sale-catw7-2607367794@craigslist.org
this opossum keeps on coming in my home if you can get it you can heave it for opossum stew. i have ran it out of my home 4 times now. if you want to bring a cage around here and try to trap it you can. I do not have no money to pay you to come get it. hoping you can take the opossum with you if you want to cook it or something i heard of people getting to cook opossum stew. I do not care what you do with it i just want them to stop coming in my home. Every night after 11pm this opossum comes in my home it keep on coming back in here if you want it for free come and put up a cage under my home so when it comes out again you can get it. this is relay annoying.
Brian

252-XXX-XXXX
Location: havelock nc

it's NOT ok to contact this poster with services or other commercial interests
++++++++++

If you're really interested let me know and I'll give you his phone number.  There were photos too (but I couldn't figure out how to embed them), of the possum peering out over bottles of spices and sauces from what I assume is some sort of pantry. CUTE. But not stew, please.
And perhaps the polar opposite of possum stew - Mahler! We're going to our first symphony performance of the season this weekend - it seems like it's been forever and I am so, so looking forward to it. Maurice Sendak was on Terry Gross today talking about Mahler's 2nd (the Resurrection) performed on September 11th. It was a wonderful interview and you should go listen. But this weekend will be Mahler's Third. Which should be equally magnificent but maybe not so heart-wrenching. At the end of the interview, Sendak says simply, "Live your life, live your life, live your life." Sound advice that is ignored too frequently.

This week's cake is one I just did for an adventuresome couple who have traveled extensively and are clearly living their lives. They asked for a cake shaped like a photo album using edible versions of some of their favorite travel pictures. It was really fun to make, and even more fun to see the reactions of people when I walked into the restaurant with it.

It was a huge album - 14" tall by around 30 inches wide, and everything was edible - down to the buckled straps. Half was Meyer lemon with fresh organic raspberries and raspberry buttercream, and half was bittersweet chocolate with fresh organic strawberries and strawberry buttercream.