Today in the garden. I was unable to tear myself away from my safe place this morning to brunch with friends. I hope they can understand and forgive me some need that I don’t fully understand myself. But I made the most of a quiet day at home — I almost wrote ‘alone’ except that I’m not alone here. Just look. Surrounded by Life.
Same tree above and below, different times of day, different angles. We spent a good hour yesterday morning wandering the woods with our infrared phone camera. I’m grateful for technology and terrified of it at the same time. I heard today from a reliable source that bots sicced on Reddit users were six times more persuasive in changing humans’ minds as other humans. This is how it is right now. So I turn back to what’s real. The forest. The garden.
Meet the Trees, the second in a series of Meditations with Nature, will be a half-day retreat here on Saturday, June 13 from 9 am through noon. Some meditation experience is helpful but not necessary. If you’re in the vicinity and the weather holds, come enjoy the garden and the forest with me. Registration closes June 9.
After that thought-provoking soul-nourishing walk communing with ancient junipers in the morning, I baked margarita cupcakes in the afternoon. In the latest installment of the Birthday Cake Challenge, I took these treats to some margarita-loving friends, an amazing couple who share the same birthday. We sat on their deck enjoying gin-and-tonics looking out across the West Elk Mountains. I didn’t tell them what flavor the cupcakes were, intending for them to guess. I was tickled pink when I saw him take the tiny lime slice and squeeze it over the frosting as though it were a cocktail, before he even knew it was one!
There was tequila in the buttercream frosting as well as lime juice, and a lot of lime zest and juice in the cakes, which I brushed with tequila as soon as they came out of the oven. Highly recommend. And lots of leftover frosting! What to put it on next?
In further bird news, an American Robin is nesting above my back porch light. She flies fast each time I come out the door so I’m learning to open it more mindfully. After I sat awhile at the patio table I was able to catch her on the nest. I love the new life incubating amid the reminder of impermanence.
I’m grateful for fresh rhubarb from Neighbor Fred, and organic grocery strawberries, and Cousin Mel’s suggestion that I make strawberry-rhubarb jam, her favorite. I set to work this morning on another Birthday Cake Challenge, a Victoria Sandwich Cake. First, I made the jam…
Then I baked the sponges, which couldn’t have been easier. It took longer to find a recipe online for this classic British tea cake that didn’t use self-rising flour, which all sources say is impossible to correct for altitude. But I finally found one essentially the same as Paul Hollywood’s but with all-purpose flour instead, and I adjusted the baking powder for altitude. The sponge wasn’t perfect, but next time I’ll adjust flour and liquid to lighten the crumb.
The classic cake is filled with raspberry jam, but why do it the easy way? Strawberry-rhubarb was delicious between the golden sponges made with duck eggs and caster sugar. More caster sugar is sprinkled on top for a delicate crunch.
The birthday girl and friend showed up right on time as one rain squall departed and a wan sun peeked through the clouds. We enjoyed tea and cake at the pond, and a long overdue visit for the three of us.
I’m grateful to have shared this sweet, long-overdue visit with two vibrant women. We’ve talked about it for a couple of years and it finally came together at the perfect time. While they strolled the garden as I made tea inside, they spotted a Lazuli Bunting. I’ve only seen a couple in the yard in all my years, but I saw one a few days ago and it was also caught by Bird Buddy’s camera, which I was grateful to discover since the distant image on my phone was dismal.
Okay, this image isn’t great either, but I blame that on Apple Photos’ inability to retrieve a still shot from a video. At least it conveys the gorgeous colors of this delicate migratory songbird.
It’s unfortunate that major media expends so much energy rehashing bad news, when there is actually a lot of good news happening every day. I’m grateful that Jess Craven publishes Extra! Extra! every Sunday to elucidate the good news that shows an undercurrent of positive, hopeful change in this country.
I made an interesting chicken and cauliflower soup over the weekend. It wasn’t simple or exactly delicious, but did introduce me to a tasty trick. The chicken thighs were seared in the pot first, then the crisp skin pulled off and roasted until it was “shatteringly crisp,” and crumbled on top of the finished soup.
I was grateful for a splendid success in the Birthday Cake Challenge. Not only did the cake turn out beautifully, but I acquired some new skills. Unintentionally, I learned how to make sweetened coconut shreds out of unsweetened flakes. There was no sweetened coconut in the store so my dear resourceful personal shopper purchased unsweetened flakes, above.
Locating instructions was the hard part; once I found them it was easy. I pulsed the flakes a half cup at a time for just a few seconds in my coffee grinder—it was a great excuse to give it a thorough cleaning. Then for each cup of shreds I dissolved a quarter cup of water and a teaspoon of sugar in a saucepan, took it off the heat, and stirred in the coconut. But first, I experimented with one cup replacing white sugar with maple syrup. Confident in the technique, I spread that out to dry and use later, mixed the remainder with white sugar, and set it aside for morning.
Then I baked the ‘Upgraded German Chocolate Cake’ from Sally’s Baking Addiction. I usually just fudge the high altitude adjustments, but due to my recent baking record I followed them all precisely, using the table on King Arthur’s website, tweaking flour, sugar, liquid and leaveners as well as baking temperature and time. The sponges were perfect.
After they cooled completely and before heading to bed, I stacked them with their parchment papers between layers so I could store them safely under the cakestand lid to prevent drying out or interference. I didn’t think Wren or Topaz would get to them, but better safe than sorry.
Sunday morning I enjoyed the cherry blossoms again, and a quiet read with Wren during coffee.
And then I started on the frosting. I toasted the pecans, beat the eggs, measured the coconut and brown sugar, and cooked everything to perfection in plenty of time to let it cool completely and chill for an hour in the fridge. Then I commenced construction.
But I couldn’t let it go at that. The day before I pulled out a bag of frozen apricots from the last bountiful year and cooked a quick compote with a bit of sugar and a squeeze of lemon juice. The consistency was perfect, and I hid it inside the frosting between the first and second layers. After all, the cake was to celebrate the apricot king!
I finished assembling the cake in time to check in at Cousins’ Zoom, and then delivered the cake next door right on time. It was precarious. Frosted, the cake was just too tall to fit under the lid so I grabbed a spare cardboard box and braced the stand with more cardboard, leveled the box on the back seat, and Wren and I drove around the block slowly.
Neighbor Fred has been pruning and consulting on the apricot tree for however long it’s lived here, neither of us can recall, but at least twenty years. I’m forever grateful for him. He seemed happy with his cake.
And after we each enjoyed a piece of it, Mary sent me home with a generous tithe that will see me through the next few mornings’ coffees. Now, who’s birthday is next, I wonder?
The wild plum has rained the last of its petals in the winds, and now following the apricot erupts with tender green leaves. But last week, I caught a few lovely pollinators in its fulsome flowers, including many painted ladies…
I remember asking Marion one time, decades ago, with a distinct whine, “Isn’t anything ever not a lesson?” She was older by thirty years and wiser by far, but I don’t recall her response. All I know is that I’ve learned in the interval that every living moment is always a lesson, or can be.
… one gorgeous sphinx moth…
I’m grateful that the Colonel gave me a solid foundation in using tools and the gene to enjoy solving engineering type problems, and the confidence to tackle all kinds of household situations. I’d suspected a propane leak at the tank for a few weeks when I noticed a faint odor as I walked past one day in late fall but I promptly forgot about it. A few weeks later I was home when the tanker driver arrived with the next monthly fill, and asked him to please check for a leak. I watched his bubble solution, and I didn’t see anything either, so we left it at that. But by the end of January I wasn’t convinced, and when a different driver came I mentioned it to him. He did a bubble spray test and confirmed that there was a tiny leak at the very old regulator, and said “I’ll send M to replace that.”
… a single Great Purple Hairstreak, which is almost impossible to catch with open wings…
Last week I started wondering if M had ever come by and meant to call the company to inquire, but once again I forgot. I did not inherit the genes for executive functioning. So yesterday when T returned, I was outside reading in the freakishly mild weather, and went over to greet him. “I see M hasn’t been here yet,” he began, and we chatted for a long time, only partly about the leak. He mentioned that the price per gallon went up, and I said, “That’s what we get with war… and a government in chaos,” which I think I get political action points for saying, and he didn’t respond. He still didn’t think the leak was bad enough to be affecting my bill, “only if you’re baking a lot of cookies every day,” he said… Little does he know.
… and many magnificent Red Admirals.
“Funny you should mention that,” I said, then asked if he’d like a cookie, and he kept chatting, about how he seen a coyote over there one time and too bad he didn’t have his gun then, and from there it devolved into how many coyotes he’s shot through the years, “seven in one day!” he proudly proclaimed; he spoke about cattle camp and losing calves to coyotes, then moved on to speak about a lion no one ever saw who was hunting deer on a particular ridge. All the while, my heart was sinking further, and my lungs were choking on exhaust from the truck, and I was starting to wish I hadn’t offered him one of my last cookies.
“That’s interesting,” I said, “but I can’t breathe the exhaust any longer, so I’m going in to get you a couple cookies, and I’ll be back in a minute.” When I took him the cookies he said he thought he might have enough dope in the truck to replace the regulator right now, and he’d just have to turn off the gas to the house for a little while, and did I have an on-demand hot water heater? No, but I figured if I didn’t use the hot water it should be ok, but really that was a lesson right there, which I keep learning over and over again, which is to ask more questions, don’t assume I know anything about something I know nothing about.
I had just been coming in to make lunch when he arrived, so I went back in to start that. The last of the curried cauliflower cold with mayo, plus an egg and some bacon, yum, I was looking forward to it. The bacon was cooking perfectly until it wasn’t, almost done, but then no flame. Duh. Again with the executive function issue. I knew not to use the hot water and was very careful as I washed my hands after putting the bacon in the pan to use only cold, but I failed to make the obvious connection that I couldn’t use the burner either. I went back out to see how things were going, and to ask if I’d need to do anything with the stove once the propane was back on, and we had another incomplete conversation which reassured me.
This week’s Birthday Cake Challenge started off well!
After he left, the burner lit effortlessly and there seemed to be hot water. Although it did seem a little less hot, but I let myself ignore that symptom, because every time I turned it on to wash my hands or a dish or two it was still hot enough. Surely the boiler couldn’t keep it that hot overnight if it wasn’t fueled. But after a couple hours of yard work this morning, I had to face the truth as I stood under a warm shower gradually cooling. I’ve never had to light that particular pilot, and thankfully it didn’t require getting down on the dirty utility room floor and contorting myself to stick a match inside a small opening whilst pressing and holding the red button. Grateful it was also a piezo starter. It lit right away, and flared up when I turned the dial, and it’s been happy hot water all afternoon.
The batter looked perfect in the pan.
But the other water heater, the one that provides the radiant floor heat, that of course was also out, and that’s the pilot I didn’t want to face, so I just turned it off til fall, grateful that there’s plenty of firewood since it’s going to get cold again for the next week, and grateful in a perverse way for the freakishly mild spring that’s likely to resume after that, and grateful either way for the forecast moisture. I never thought I’d be grateful for Mud Season, but here I am eagerly awaiting it.
Sadly, more lessons were learned after baking…
So many lessons in the last two days! Excellent practice listening to his murderous pride with as little judgment as possible and much more open-heart than I could have before mindfulness, understanding his perspective, feeling kindly toward him, feeling grateful that he fixed the leak. And then letting it all go once it was over, rather than perseverating. But wait, oh, it was after that that I walked in grief the rest of the day. Okay, so but at least I didn’t feel blame or anger or hatred, and I did cultivate compassion and loving kindness, so that’s progress.
… including perseverance!
Some other lessons revolved around the Year of Birthday Cakes Challenge, among them that I really need to practice bake ahead of time for each new cake I try. Today’s epic fail was technically a Technical Challenge rather than a Signature or a Showstopper, as the birthday girl asked for a specific kind of cake. It seemed easy enough: a lemon bundt cake with raspberry filling. And in Bake Off Technicals there’s no tossing a failure into the bin, you have to present something to the judges. So when (after following instructions to the second) I turned the cake out after ten minutes leaving the bottom fifth attached to the bundt pan, it turned into a salvage operation. One lesson was “ten minutes exactly” isn’t enough time to cool a cake in that pan. Maybe it would have held together after another five or ten minutes cooling in the pan. Or, maybe not. Other lessons I’m learning are non-attachment to outcome, and humility.
The final offering, of which I kept half and made her promise not to share it with anyone else. I gave a verbal IOU for a good cake some other time.
Among today’s successes, I count maintaining equanimity, compassion, and good humor; recognizing repeatedly that I am not my thoughts; and creating an absolutely perfect loaf of sourdough.
Lemon curd just before it bubbles and is ready to come off the stove.
I made up the Redemption Cake from a lot of recipes. I’m grateful for the convenience of online recipes and search engines and all the creative cooks and bakers out there sharing their mad skills. Though technology is a trade off, it’s here to stay (at least until it destroys us all), and I use it for good instead of evil.
I started the cake on Saturday afternoon, making the lemon curd filling so it could chill overnight, then making the orange sponge. I set out six eggs earlier to come to room temperature, then separated them. The yolks got whipped til thick, then mixed with orange zest, orange juice, and sugar, then cake flour, which I made by switching out two tablespoons regular flour for two tablespoons corn starch per cup of flour. This creates a lighter flour, necessary since the only leavening is the airy eggs.
Then the whites got whipped with cream of tartar and more sugar til stiff peaks, and then folded into the yolk mixture.
I could have whipped the whites even more, but was overcautious to avoid breaking the meringue, which can happen if you over beat the mixture. But I never used to be afraid of that before watching GBBO and seeing it happen.
The batter is poured into an ungreased pan so it can climb the sides as it rises.
The sponge turned out pretty well, but if I make it again I’ll start the oven when I put the pan in rather than preheating. I’ve read that some cakes do better starting in a cold oven but I had forgotten, and that instruction wasn’t in the recipe. Nor did it say to preheat the oven, it was just habit.
As the cake cooled I made the shortbread and shaped the logs so the cookies would be like tiles the height of the sponge. Those chilled for awhile and I baked them right before bed. Then I tackled the white chocolate mascarpone frosting. It actually whipped up beautifully this time, but it was late and I didn’t want to assemble the cake until Sunday morning so the fillings and frosting didn’t soak into the sponge and make it soggy. I also felt they should be refrigerated overnight, with eggs in the curd and cheese in the frosting.
In the morning I cut the cake into thirds and layered in the fillings, lemon curd in the lower and calamondin jam in the top layer.
I’d taken the frosting out of the fridge a couple of hours earlier. It had set pretty hard and I thought it would soften up and I could spread it. But it didn’t soften enough, so I beat it for just a few seconds and it immediately started to break up just as it had with the caketastrophe. I stopped, and used it as is, grateful that I was already planning to hide it with ganache. At least it didn’t completely fall apart as before, and I was able to cover the cake. I may give up on this frosting. But I do believe that it would have been perfect if I’d spread it as soon as I made it. So maybe I’ll try one more time, when I’ve got the cake ready to frost.
One big culinary success with this particular cake is confident ganache. It couldn’t be easier, just heating heavy cream and pouring it over chocolate, but you do have to be careful not to get the cream too hot, and not to overmix. Timing is everything. But I know now that I can make chocolate ganache, and that opens up a lot of creative possibilities.
Sadly, the ganache had to go on while it was still a little warm, which further melted the white chocolate frosting. I was sure glad I had the shortbreads ready to cover the slippy sides, and they perfectly wedged the cake into the stand. The cover fit perfectly as well, and I was grateful to get a ride to the party so I could hold it carefully the whole way.
It was a beautiful thing to see Philip dancing to his special birthday song, along with a dozen friends, some going back half his eighty year lifetime, some recent, and some like me who’ve known and loved him for twenty years. I explained that he had to cut the first piece for himself, because that’s what I learned: you don’t get your birthday wish if you don’t get the first piece of your cake.
So, it doesn’t look perfect inside, but it looks just fine. And it tasted delicious. I have even more admiration and respect now for those amateur British bakers. No matter whether they create amazing showstoppers or tragic technicals, they do it in an hour or two or four, clock ticking, people talking at them the whole time, under tremendous pressure. I’m glad I set myself this challenge, and glad that Wren’s my only kitchen companion. I look forward to the next birthday cake next week!
Wren stole Biko’s strawberry but she wasn’t sure she liked it.
