I’ve been offered the great privilege of making a wedding cake for some dear friends who are tying the knot this summer.  I’ve never made a wedding cake before.  I’ve made a lot of cakes, most of them chocolate (in truth, most of them this one), but this is the big time.

I know the cake itself is going to be champagne.

I know the filling is going to be a lovely light whipped mascarpone cream, possibly dotted with fresh raspberries.

I suspect the frosting needs to be buttercream, because the bride wants to cover the cake in fondant (it’s going to be hot, it’s a cleaner look, it can be painted on with beautiful blue coloring).  But just in case I get good enough at smoothing out the buttercream, maybe we can just leave it at that.

I’ve done one practice run, for a small New Year’s Eve party we hosted (the wedding is in July, so there’s some time here).  The cake was delicious.  The filling was amazing.  The frosting was…

a disaster.

It was a simple American buttercream containing butter, powdered sugar, vanilla, and a splash of champagne to go with the cake flavor.  I think the butter was too cold.  I think the powdered sugar wasn’t well sifted.  I think proportions were off.  The resulting frosting was gloppy and grainy and oozing, and when I spread it on the cake it clumped and ran and blubbered down the sides. You know how jeans that are too long for you puddle around your feet at the bottom?  Now imagine that in white, and made out of frosting, and on my cake.  That’s what it looked like.

When I was too frustrated to look at it anymore, I stuck it in the fridge for a while, hoping it would harden up a bit so I could spread it with more success.  While that happened, I mixed some blue gel food coloring into the remaining bowl of frosting and whipped that up, in hopes that a few rosettes on top of the cake would save it a little.

An hour later, I took on the icing again.  I scraped off some of the worst slumps and filled up my piping bag with the beautiful blue I’d created.  With a star tip, I piped on a rosette.  It dissolved into a blob and blurbed toward the edge of the cake.  I somehow lost touch with reality and instead of trying to scrape it off, I made four more around the cake.  They all slumped over the edge.  I tried to pipe a pretty pattern around the bottom edge.  It looked like a long ribbon of blue poo.  I shoved the cake back into the fridge and drank a couple of glasses of champagne before serving it. It was New Year’s Eve.  It was clearly the right thing to do.

So here’s the issue: I have to make a better buttercream.  I’ve done some research and found some killer looking recipes.  I’m planning to use champagne extract instead of actual champagne to avoid any issues with acidity or carbonation.  I’m planning to use fully softened butter.  I’m contemplating blending in some mascarpone to add body and lessen the overwhelming sweetness buttercream can have.

But I’ve also seen conflicting theories about how much milk to add during the whipping process and how long to whip and whether or not to add shortening so the color is a little whiter.  I’ve seen seen creamy dreamy looking recipes for Italian and Swiss buttercreams.  I’m in a buttercream frosting float.  Or, rather, I’m floating in ideas about buttercream frosting.

So I’m looking to you, tiny multiverse of readers.  Have you made buttercream?  How did it turn out?  What recipe did you use?  Was it American, Italian, or Swiss?  Did it spread smoothly?  Was it overly sweet?

Help!

Thank goodness cooking isn’t like that. I love revising what I’ve done in the kitchen. So here, instead of telling you what I did (which involved undercooked ingredients and a side of roasted brussels sprouts in gorgonzola sauce), I’m going to tell you what I should have done. I’m going to tell you how to make this Bittman dish into a fantastic breakfast-for-dinner hash.

37. Sauté crumbled sweet Italian sausage with cubes of butternut squash in a bit of oil. Toss in cooked farro and dress with more oil and lemon juice. Serve as a salad or toss with grated Parmesan and use as a stuffing.

Here’s how it should have gone down:

1 cup emmer farro

2 cups water

4 cups chicken or vegetable broth

1 small butternut squash, peeled, seeded, and cut into 1-inch chunks

16 oz. pork sausage

4 eggs, or as many people as you intend to serve

2 cups baby spinach or chopped kale leaves, hard stems removed

Juice from ½ a lemon

Salt and pepper to taste

The night before you want to eat this, put the farro in a pot with the water and leave it overnight. This starts to break down the grains.

After the farro has soaked overnight (and most of the next day probably won’t hurt), add it to boiling broth and simmer for two hours, or until the grains have bloomed and softened. In the last few minutes, add the spinach or kale and cook just until wilted. The farro will still be a bit crunchy, and may or may not have absorbed all the broth. If not, drain the pot and set aside.

While the farro cooks, preheat the oven to 400F. Toss the butternut squash chunks with olive oil, salt and pepper, and roast until the squash is tender.

In a large skillet over medium heat, crumble and brown the sausage. When it is fully cooked, drain off some of the grease, then add the farro, greens, and squash to the skillet and toss together, just to let the grains and vegetables soak up some of the sausage fat and flavor. Squeeze in the lemon juice and season to taste with salt and pepper.

In another, smaller skillet, heat the reserved sausage grease and fry your eggs sunny side up, until the yolks are barely runny and the whites’ edges are frizzled and beautifully brown.

Serve your hash with a fried egg on top.  With a side of sourdough toast rubbed with garlic, if you like.  Let the yolk mix with the squash and sausage and hearty grain.  It won’t take much; you’ll quickly be full. Full of warmth and goodness. It’s the right kind of meal for winter.

I don’t get sick very often. When I do, it’s usually a head cold that lasts mayyyyybe three or four days until I get frustrated with it and flood myself with so much liquid that the cold just gets flushed right out of me. This week was different. I don’t know whether this thing that hit me was cold or flu, but it knocked me over, dragged me around for a while, and then pummeled me almost senseless.

My wonderful husband has been nursing me on simple, nutritious dinners and generally keeping me out of the kitchen, which has been a strange experience. But as this morning wound to a close, with husband and dog-daughter out on a walk, I was suddenly struck with a craving for – of all things – Cup’o'noodle soup. You know, the kind in the styrofoam cup with the peel-back paper top, packed with noodles and freeze-dried vegetables and crusty little shrimp? Yeah, I wanted that for the first time in probably ten years. Maybe more.

Of course we don’t have Cup’o'noodle in the house. But we did have frozen turkey broth, made from the carcass of our Thanksgiving turkey. And I had the memory of my friend M.’s suggestion for “garlic tea” as a cold remedy. I went to work in slow, hobbling steps.

In a pot, I put:

3 cups turkey broth (shlooped out of a freezer container in one icy cylinder)

6-10 cloves of garlic, well smashed

2-inch knob of ginger

½ tsp red chili flakes

I turned the heat up and let this come to a boil, where I left it rolling for about 10 minutes to let the garlic and ginger flavors really permeate the broth.*  Then I added:

1 cup loosely packed torn kale leaves

1-2 TB soy sauce

¼ lemon (I squeezed out the juice and then added the wedge of lemon as well)

½ cup Trader Joe’s harvest blend (Israeli couscous, split peas, red quinoa, and orzo)

I let this simmer away for 10-15 minutes, until the kale was wilted and the grains were cooked.

Then I ate the whole pot. 

It was delicious. It wasn’t the over-salted, noodle-y guilty-awesome of Cup’o'noodle, but it was comforting and satisfying and spicy and rich and felt healthy. The lemon juice added a necessary brightness, and the grains blend made it filling enough for lunch. The garlic, the ginger and the chili flakes all have their own kind of spiciness, and all were welcome and throat-soothing and tummy-warming.

If you’re not feeling well (or even if you are!), make yourself a pot of this. To bulk it up, add more grains, or sub that out for noodles, or add some pre-cooked shredded chicken or squares of tofu. If you don’t like kale, add some spinach in the last five minutes instead. Using vegetable broth would easily make this vegetarian and vegan, and using tofu or rice noodles instead of the grains blend would easily make this gluten-free.

* At this point, you could strain out the garlic and ginger, and add the vegetables and grains to a clear broth. I didn’t, but then again, I’m the sicko.

And then the Bittman project drifted into my mind.  With the dissertation winding down (amazing what a few afternoons of post-Christmas reading at the in-laws’ will do for brainstorming!) and my on campus schedule quite manageable this term, I feel a slow and only slightly unsteady confidence that I can inject enough regularity into my weeks this term for blogging to take place.  That and getting my year end report from WordPress yesterday made me feel a certain hunger to get back to my regular schedule here.

So that’s my resolution: I will finish the Bittman project.  The original list of sides was 101 items.  Eliminating those I knew N. and I would never eat, we began with 82.  Last year I made 39 of those, including one about which I hope to post sometime this week.  I know, pitiful.  So that leaves 43.  Doable, right?  Less than one a week, especially if I get my act together and double up occasionally.

It feels a little sad to be resolving to complete my unfinished resolution from last year, but I guess that’s what a lot of people do with these things: lose weight, get in shape, year in and year out.  Here I have exact numbers, exact quantities of what must be done.  Exact numbers of soups, chutneys, relishes, salads, desserts and breads and sides.  And so we’ll plow on!

Happy 2012, everyone.  May your resolutions bear fruit.

N.’s family does a big Christmas dinner, and I mean big: think Thanksgiving.  There’s a turkey, there’s stuffing, Christmas would be ruined without mashed potatoes, and there’s N.’s dad’s specialty: an ambrosia fruit salad complete with miniature marshmallows.

So on December 26th, while we listen to new music and test out our new toys and break in our new clothes, there are also new dishes to be considered.  After all, you can only re-eat Christmas dinner so many times in its original form before you long for a pizza.  On my work-off-Mom-in-law’s-chocolate-fudge walk this morning, through the deer-infested, hill dotted neighborhood in the Sierra Nevada foothills with the smell of fire and pine in my nose, I thought of a few tasty ways of working through the leftovers that I wanted to share.

For breakfast, or mid-morning, or mid-afternoon snack: toast a piece of whole-grain bread, with lots of nuts and seeds sprinkled along the top.  Spread it thick with cream cheese, then drape some whole berry cranberry sauce atop that.  Fold the bread over, or approach it open-face, and rejoice in the creamy rich sweet tart flavor.

As a dinner time side dish, take your leftover mashed potatoes and sprinkle with a hefty helping of black pepper and garlic powder.  Spread out on a plate or in an oven-safe dish, then cascade on a blizzard of parmesan or extra sharp cheddar cheese.  Microwave or bake in the oven until the potatoes are burbling hot and the cheese has melted into a gushy thick layer of melted awesome.  Eat.

For the turkey, there are a billion recipes out there.  This Turkey Pot Pie might be my favorite.  It’s rich, it’s homey and comforting, and as an extra bonus, it can take care of your leftover gravy too!

Hope your holiday was joyful and delicious.

“Saute sliced shallots in olive oil, then add chunks of butternut squash, some rosemary and chicken stock or water to cover. As the soup simmers, bake strips of prosciutto until crisp. Puree the soup, swirl in some cream if you like and serve topped with crumbled prosciutto.”

This sounded easy and tasty, and with no less than 20 cups of homemade turkey stock chilling in the freezer after Thanksgiving, I had just the thick, tasty broth to add extra flavor to this soup.  Given vegetable availability and my preferences, I changed things up a little.  I used:

1 whole acorn squash, halved, seeded, and brushed with olive oil, salt and pepper

1 TB olive oil

1 shallot, sliced thin

2 cups turkey stock

2 sprigs rosemary, stems removed and leaves minced

¼ – ½ cup heavy cream

salt and pepper to taste

4 slices prosciutto

I preheated my oven to 400F and put the acorn squash halves cut side down on a cookie sheet, leaving them to roast for almost an hour, until a knife inserted went through the skin and flesh like jelly.  Then I took them out and set them aside to cool until I could handle them without searing my own flesh. 

I replaced the squash in the oven with prosciutto, spreading out four slices on parchment paper on a cookie sheet and baking until they got crisp, about 15 minutes.

In a deep pot, I heated olive oil over medium heat and added the shallot slices, letting them soften and then caramelized a bit, till they were pale gold in color and smelled sweet.

When the squash was cool, I scraped all the flesh out of the shells and dumped the flesh into the pot with my caramelized shallot.  I added my turkey stock just to cover the squash, the rosemary, a little salt and pepper, and brought it to a slow simmer.

Once the soup was simmering and seemed evenly heated, I pulled it off the stove for a moment to use my immersion blender until the soup was a glistening puree of gorgeous autumn velvet.  Back on the stove with a perfect texture, I added the cream and stirred gently to integrate it, watching the bright orange mellow into a rusty gold.

Dolloped into warm bowls, I crumbled prosciutto over the top of the soup and, as a last textural element, inserted a slice of sourdough toast, broiled with olive oil and rubbed with a raw garlic clove before sitting down to eat.

This was so tasty.  Lik Orangette, soups sometimes leave me feeling wanting, especially because I use my own stock, which is so much less salty than any processed broth or soup out there.  But this one was far from bland.  Roasting the squash and caramelizing the shallot lent a lovely nutty richness.  The rosemary added a sharp herby punch to the smooth creamy velvet of the soup.  And the prosciutto was just the right salty meaty indulgence, though for a vegetarian version you could certainly use a frico of parmesan cheese instead. 

If you’re not in the mood for soup, I think this could be a nice change-up to mashed potatoes as well.  Just reduce or drain off the stock and serve nicely pureed alongside a frittata, or some roast chicken and pan-crisped green beans.

Appetizers: tomato and cucumber bruschetta, along with (maybe) some nice dill havarti I forgot I had

Wines, red and white

Main course: lemon garlic herb butter roasted turkey

Sides: Giblet gravy, Stuffing (also with giblets, probably…), baked creamed spinach, chipotle mashed sweet potatoes, homemade cranberry sauce

Desserts: Mom-made pumpkin pie, currently in transit up from Northern California, and Pumpkin cheesecake.  Both with fresh whipped cream, if desired

Today’s tasks include: baking a cranberry swirled, well streuseled coffee cake for breakfasts.  I first baked it three years ago and my sister adores it so much I now cannot escape the task of making one every year (not that I mind… it is pretty delicious).  Making the cranberry sauce.  It needs to set up in the fridge, although the fact that one shelf is completely taken up by a 17 pound, still mostly frozen turkey makes that whole storage thing difficult… Making the pumpkin cheesecake.  Here, too, a night in the chiller is required, which makes me slightly anxious.  Where will it go?  Why did I buy such a big turkey?  Why, when I liberated it from the freezer section of the grocery store on SUNDAY, is it still rock hard to the touch?  What would happen if I stored it in the garage overnight?  It’s kind of like a walk-in fridge out there, isn’t it? 

These are my pre-Thanksgiving preoccupations.  But I suppose they are largely good ones, because they mean I get to be in the kitchen today AND tomorrow.  And I do like it there. 

What does your Thanksgiving menu look like? 

Roasted Root Vegetables

3 carrots, peeled and cut into chunks

3 parsnips, peeled and cut into chunks

2 purple topped turnips, peeled and cut into chunks

2 rutabegas, peeled and cut into chunks (see a pattern here?)

1 sweet potato (or 1/2 of a mammoth yam), peeled and cut into chunks

1 tsp dried rosemary, or to taste

1 tsp sea salt

1/2 tsp freshly ground black pepper

olive oil to coat

Preheat your oven to 400F.  Peel and cut all vegetables into equal, bite-sized chunks.  Toss them with seasonings and olive oil in a 9×13 inch glass baking dish.  Use enough olive oil so that all chunks of root vegetable get an even coating and glisten slightly.  Depending on size of vegetables, this might range from between 1/2 – 1 cup of oil.

Roast until all vegetables are tender and begin to brown on the outside, 45 minutes to an hour, depending on size.

As you can see, this is almost ridiculously easy.  You can substitute for any of these vegetables you don’t like – easy additions or change-outs would be regular or fingerling potatoes, beets, even celery root.  Choose what you love, mix them well, and enjoy!

Two Bittman recipes for you, then, and a brief assessment of each.  Oh, and an apology: since it has been several weeks since I made either of these, even my rough estimate ingredient quantities have long since flown my mind, to be replaced by such niceties as why Beowulf never had a male heir, how many pages my 33 students will produce together during the next week, and how I can make my 54 page first dissertation chapter into a 20 page writing sample.

72. Trim and shred raw brussels sprouts (the slicer on a food processor works well). Toss with lemon vinaigrette and shaved or grated Parmesan. Crumbled bacon, as usual, is a welcome visitor here.

Brussels sprouts are one of those near-universal vegetables no one seems to like.  They are bitter and, when boiled, smelly, and can only be saved when eaten in combination with copious quantities of cream or sugared vinegar.  Or, as it turns out, raw with lemon, cheese, and cured pork.  I used prosciutto instead of bacon, baking it for fifteen minutes or so on a cookie sheet lined with parchment paper, and the effect was fabulous.  The prosciutto snapped into sharp fragments of pink shrapnel, and so the textual combination of the dish was amazing.  The sprout shreds (I did use my food processing slicer, and it worked perfectly) were crunchy and crisp but thin and light, like miniature tufts of coleslaw.  The cheese was chewy and grainy, and the prosciutto was crisp and flavorful, filing my mouth with saliva that the tart astringency of the lemon-honey vinaigrette I made just barely dried away.  This would be a great replacement for the heaviness of coleslaw, and is a near perfect quartet of ingredients.  Chopped salted walnuts or roasted, soy sauce drenched shiitake mushrooms might be a vegetarian-friendly replacement for the prosciutto or bacon, but I wouldn’t dare replace the cheese with anything.  It was far too perfect a nutty saltiness against the green resistance of the baby cabbages themselves. 

83. Onion-Rosemary Skillet Bread: In a 12-inch cast iron pan, sauté half a large, thinly sliced red onion in about ¼ cup olive oil until soft and beginning to color. Combine a cup of whole wheat flour with 1 teaspoon salt and 1 tablespoon rosemary leaves; add 1 ½ cups water and whisk until smooth. Pour the batter into the hot skillet and bake in a 450-degree oven until the flatbread is crisp on the edges and releases easily from the pan, about 30 to 40 minutes.

Since I got my cast iron skillet (a birthday gift that was purchased using last year’s Christmas present [don’t ask, it confuses me too]), I’ve been looking for recipes that let me use it as much as possible.  Though I am having trouble getting used to the whole well-seasoned thing (no soap?  Really?!), I adore the quick, crusty brown sear it imparts to anything you dump into it.  The appeal of making bread in this stove-to-oven vessel was too strong to pass up.

The challenge?  I bought a 10-inch skillet, and my math skills are weak for anything more complicated than halving or doubling a recipe.

I… estimated.

I did a pretty good job too, with two exceptions: the onions and the oil.  As a consequence, we ended up with a very onion-y bread that was also quite greasy.  Additionally, I was impatient in trying to emancipate my funny little bread from the pan, which resulted in some severe aesthetic imperfections (by which I mean, the whole thing broke up and we ate it in chunks rather than cutting slices). 

Still, it was really tasty.  I’ve never tasted fry bread, but I suspect this is probably similar.  The onion and rosemary worked well together, and the crunchy exterior of the bread was a delightful texture.  No leavening, no sweetening, and no rise time, just bread for dinner in less than an hour?  And out of a cast iron skillet?  We’ll be having this one again, and I intend to get the measurements right this time.

I will still post when I have time, and I have not abandoned the Bittman Project (in fact I’ve made two things I haven’t had the chance to tell you about yet… both tasty…); I just see the time upon me when I am stretched thinner than a crepe, and just as delicate, in my responsibilities and ability to multi-task.

Don’t despair!  I’ll be back!  I’m just not sure when.

Be well.