A Blithe PALATE

Cookbook Spotlight Roundup: Gale Gand's Brunch

Stephanie and I initially bonded over brunch and we've been lucky enough to meet at least once a year over the last few -- always over brunch, so when relaunching Cookbook Spotlight, it wasn't hard to persuade us to begin with Gale Gand's new  book:  Gale Gand's Brunch.  Featuring 100 recipes encompassing drinks, sweet and savory dishes, it also wasn't hard to round up twenty-five friends to join us in a collaborative cooking exercise.  I'm always intrigued by what different foodies will choose to make when presented with the same book; and I'm always thrilled with the results.  Our planned event on April 17 was delayed due to a snafu in mailing but everyone was more than patient.  As one participant wrote, "I heart Gale Gand."  And another said, "I loooooooooooooooove brunch," a sentiment echoed across the board.

Thank you to everyone who participated!

Gesine is my favorite macaroon maker at Confections of a (Closet) Master Baker.  I have no idea how she has time to blog in the midst of baking, writing and starting new businesses but thank God she does -- it makes for some hilarious and mouth watering reading.  Her contribution is Angel Food Muffins - in which she makes an effort to confront long standing demons with angel food...

Sara at I like to Cook says brunch is the best meal -- and no wonder when she's putting Coddled Eggs, Caramelized Apple Crepes and Homemade Pork and Maple Sausage Patties on the table.  I have to try the coddled eggs soon; I've failed at the last five attempts to make soft boiled eggs and as Gale describes it, this is an easy alternative.

Breadchick Mary fell in love with Gale's book and wrote a Dear John letter to Waffle House.  She not only made the Baked Eggs and Ham Cups but made four variations of them!  And then there's the Bacon Waffle -- let's all acknowledge that few things in the world are as perfect as the savoriness of a strip of bacon -- but combined with a waffle?  Mmmmmm...  Mary also hosted a guest post from Sandra, one of her readers, who was one of the winners of the Invitation to Brunch.

Lizelle meets with coffee talk book group where they bring indulgently delicious treats.  For this gathering, she brought Ginger Scones.

Peabody loved a show Gale used to host on the Food Network called Sweet Dreams, and loves baking and sweets so it's no surprise that she focused on the sweets and pastry section of the book to make Chocolate Chip Crumb Cake Muffins and Chocolate Waffles with Bananas Foster.

Jamie lives her Adventures in SF and decided to make the super easy and super quick Pear Streusel Coffee Cake.  But now she's regretting not making the huge spread and is already going through the list of all the dishes she can make...which might be good for me as I'm heading out there in a couple of weeks and it would be so nice to be the recipient of her brunch largesse...

Liliana from My Cookbook Addiction was one of our Invitation to Brunch winners and did her review for The Daring Kitchen.  Liliana made the Pannetone French Toast using some leftover Italian Easter sweet bread and surprised her daughters by making this heavenly treat.

Jen at Use Real Butter says she's not a breakfast kind of gal, going for years without it because lunch was always more interesting. Still, she decided to expand her repertoire and made a beautiful Herbed Mini Popovers.  I think it might be possible to convert her...

Tanna at My Kitchen in Half Cups went straight for the cover recipe and made the Baked Eggs in Ham Cup, but followed that with the Chai Tea and the French Bread.  She's planning to cook her way through the book and I'm planning to see what she makes next.

Becke, our Columbus Foodie, was one of the Invitation to Brunch winners.  She made the Torta Rustica and has me sold on trying this recipe too -- look at those gorgeous layers of pastry, eggs, cheese, and vegetables.

Heather, aka girliechef, was one of our winners for the Invitation to Brunch.  Like all of us, she had a tough time picking a dish to make but settled on something even better:  comfort!  She made a White Hot Chocolate that the entire family loved (and there was enough left over to have over a book).

Irene at Confessions of a Tart says to give her brunch over flowers any day and is looking forward to more Sundays, Saturdays and even Mondays for brunches to come; she made a perfect Crepe with her own cinnamon apple filling.

Jasmine of the fragrant Cardamom Addict made three dishes, Baked Eggs in Ham Cups, the Torta Rustica, and this Cranberry Almond Granola.  She offers her own take on the granola and is pretty certain that once you've had Gale's recipe for hot cocoa with brown sugar, you won't bother with Swiss Miss again...

Ivonne, my very favorite Cream Puff in Venice waited until Sunday to make her dishes because, as she notes, Sunday is the "king of brunch."  She presents Buttermilk Pancakes, Cranberry-Almond Granola and Pear Streusel Quick Coffee Cake.  As always is the case with Ivonne, everything looks effortless and elegant -- not to mention delicious!

Don't forget to check out Stephanie's Round Up as well!  Gale Gand's Brunch is now available.

Cookbook Spotlight: Gale Gand's Crepes and Buttermilk Pancakes

Years ago Hani and I were driving our parents' friends back to their home in Georgetown. We were enjoying our time with Mark and Anne, whom we had not seen in some time.  Long time friends of our parents, we were enjoying our conversation with them.

Hani suggested meeting for brunch and Anne should her head.  "Let's do breakfast or lunch, dear," she said.  "I don't like brunch."

I think it's possible that Anne was the only person I've ever known who didn't love brunch.   As meals go, it's my favorite.  Straddling the informality of breakfast and the more organized lunch, brunch is such a lovely amalgamation of both, allowing for multiple dishes and leisurely eating.

Stephanie and I initially bonded over brunch and we've been lucky enough to meet at least once a year over the last few -- always over brunch, so in relaunching Cookbook Spotlight, it wasn't hard to persuade us to begin with Gale Gand's delicious new book:  Gale Gand's Brunch featuring 100 recipes encompassing drinks, sweet and savory dishes, bakery items, salads, side and condiments. 

When it comes to brunch, I'm much more partial to sweet - so for a friend's' visit this past weekend, we made buttermilk pancakes and crepes. 

My preferred recipe for pancakes is Marcus Wareing's; but those airy, delectable pancakes require a little more work, incorporating wet ingredients with dry, and the addition of beaten egg whites.  I was quite pleased to find that Gale's recipe is fast, easy and just as delicious.  Despite being denser, they puffed up beautifully, and the addition of melted butter on the pan, provided a wonderfully crisp edge.  The buttermilk also adds a nice tanginess to the pancakes.

The crepes were less successful, but that was my fault, not Gale's; they were entirely too thick -- crepes are meant to be delicately, Kate Moss-ishly thin.  The recipe is very straightforward but the trick is in quickly spreading the batter the minute it hits the pan. Apparently I'm no good at balancing Hoss on one arm and trying to swirl wafer-thin crepes with the other.  Despite the slightly thicker crepe, it's hard to complain about a carb enrobing macerated strawberries with mascarpone.  I'm going to have to try again, but there are other recipes I'm interested in trying first -- the egg segment is screaming my name as are the bakery items.

With so many dishes possible for this meal time, unconfined as it is to conventions dictating just eggs, cereals and pastries for breakfast and heartier dishes for lunch, I wonder, if given the time, we might have been able to convert Anne to the pleasures of brunch?

Check back soon for the roundup -- thank you to everyone who joined us!

Amaretto Vanilla Cupcakes with Raspberry Cream Filling

Cupcakes have been my go to baked good recently.  I find making them therapeutic and a lot easier than trying to bake, cut, layer, crumb coat and frost an entire cake. Their small size also allows me lee way to do fun things, like the pastillage sparrows on the cupcakes I recently made for a friend's baby shower. 

The actual cupcake is an Amaretto vanilla cupcake with a raspberry marshmallow cream filling and topped with an Amaretto raspberry cream cheese frosting (kinda like a high end Hostess cupcake).  Over Christmas, Joetta brought over a batch of cream-filled chocolate cupcakes from a Paula Deen recipe she had found.  The recipe called for a box mix for the cupcake and Cool Whip for the cream interior.  I loved the idea if not precisely the ingredients so when Jenn asked for cupcakes featuring two of her favorite flavors, I recreated the recipe in my own fashion. I was sort of operating blindly since I didn't have the recipe Joetta had used but the end result wasn't bad at all.

My sister gave me a terrific basic cupcake recipe a while ago to which any other flavors can be added for a nearly fool-proof product.  The cream filling is made with Marshmallow fluff, cream cheese, confectioner's sugar and seedless raspberry preserves.  When it comes to frosting, there are very few that have the versatility and ease of a good cream cheese frosting.  I'm a huge fan of buttercream but it's so...finicky...and I just wanted ease and flavor.  With the addition of Amaretto and raspberry, the frosting was a beautiful compliment to the cupcake and the raspberry cream interior.

As for decorating, a pretty little pastillage sparrow in pale pink were a motif carried from the invitations I made for Jenn's shower.  Martha Stewart Crafts has a beautiful collection of craft punches that I initially found when looking for a rocket craft punch to make Pug's birthday invitations.  I discovered they were just as useful for cutting out pastillage shapes which are left to harden overnight, adding a sweet dimension to the cupcakes. 

With Easter on the horizon, I'm debating making pretty pastel little Easter cupcakes or revisiting the insanity of an egg cake....

Seasonal Eating Depression

S.E.D.

I suffer from it year round, living here.  Welcome to my Seasonal Eating Depression.  It occurs when I long to be conscientious and eat locally and seasonally.  You know what constitutes seasonal 'availability' here in Georgia in March?

Carrots, greens and strawberries.

That's it.  You know what just SOUTHERN California gets?  

Artichokes, Asparagus, Avocado, Beets, Blood Orange, Broccoli, Cabbage, Carrots , Cauliflower, Celery, Chard , Collards, Dates (Medjool), Grapefruit, Green Onion, Green Peas, Kale, Kohlrabi, Kumquats, Lemons, Lettuce, Mushroom, Mustard, Navel Orange, Passion Fruit, Spinach, Strawberries, Tangelos, Tangerines, Turnips. 

This doesn't consider the northern part of the state.  They get:  Almonds, Apples, Artichokes , Arugula, Asian Greens , Asian Pears, Asparagus, Avocado, Beans, Beets, Bok Choy, Broccoli, Brussels Sprouts, Cabbage, Cardoons, Carrots, Cauliflower, Chard, Cherimoyas, Collards, Cress, Dandelion/Chicory Greens, Dates, Endive, Fennel, Garlic, Gourds, Grapefruit, Green Garlic, Guava, Herbs, Horseradish, Kale , Kiwi, Kumquats, Leeks, Lemons, Lettuces, Limes, Mandarins, Mushrooms, Nettles, Olives, Onions, Oranges, Parsnips, Pistachios, Pumelos, Potatoes, Radish, Rapini , Rutabaga, Scallions, Spinach, Strawberries , Tangerines, Tomatoes, Turnips, Walnuts.  Closer to us, Florida also gets an unfair wealth of produce. 

Wanna cry with me?

Our little town has a farmer's market that runs every weekend from June through October.  We always go to support the local farmers.  Sure, the herbs are lovely to pick up fresh; but the produce they offer is your run of the mill bell peppers, beefsteak tomatoes, some bok choy and chard.  Our local farmers very seldom veer from what is familiar to the denizens; which makes perfect sense.  Why grow produce on expensive land that no one recognizes much less eat?  I don't begrudge them their livelihood in growing and bringing vegetables and fruits that their local customers want.

The grocery store offers a little more variety, but not by much; and with produce prices up almost 30 percent in the last few months, I'm not inclined to continue paying for vegetables and fruits that were grown in Chile and Argentina.  And I'm still stunned that my grocery store, in Georgia, home state of peaches, stocks peaches from other states and other countries.

But with what does that leave me?  Not a lot of choices.  I yearn for heirloom tomatoes.  I crave Seascape strawberries.  I want English peas in the spring to make  mint pea soup.  I'm getting sick of paying $4.99 for a bag of fresh herbs at the grocery store.  I would love a cutting garden for fresh flowers -- tulips are my second favorite flowers and Gerbera daisies make me swoon.

What this means, of course, is that I have to do this myself.

And I am the owner of a garden featuring six large beds with built-in, in-ground sprinklers, all within the confines of a white picket fence, courtesy of the previous homeowner.  I haven't got much in the way of an excuse not to grow my own fruits, vegetables, herbs and flowers.  When we first moved to the house, I planted Roma tomatoes, peppers and herbs.  Subsequent years found me traveling or too lazy to make an effort.  But with my friend Amanda's recent return to Georgia, I found a renewed inspiration, and a partner with whom to tend the garden.

The rosemary bush has taken over its box as have the thyme and sage.  The recent addition of curly and flat leaf parsley completes the Simon and Garfunkel song; and I reintroduced basil.  I also decided to try my hand at germinating seeds - and stunningly, they took -- so chives and Thai basil will enter the herb boxes next.  Our tomatoes from Laurel's Heirloom Tomatoes will be arriving soon:  we have Green Zebra, and Goose Creeks and Laurel herself is selecting some varieties that will flourish in our climate.  Seascape strawberries have been ordered from Raintree Nursery.  We are also planning to add blueberries and corns; it's too late for carrots this season but we'll add heirloom carrots to the garden for next March:  purplish Dragon carrots, yellow Amarillos and the Atomic Reds.  I'm thinking about artichokes, cabbages, melons and oh the list is just endless, isn't it? 

I'm hopeful that by this time next year, my S.E.D. will have been transformed into a nice little O.C.G. (obsessive compulsive gardening).  Wish me luck.

Invitation to Brunch...

Stephanie and I are co-hosting a new edition Cookbook Spotlight on April 17 with Gale Gand’s new book. 

You may remember from the last few Cookbook Spotlights that food bloggers select recipes from the same cookbook, make the dish, and blog about it.  We follow with a round up of everyone's choices and pictures.  It’s always fun and interesting to me to see what different people pick to cook or bake from the same book.

This go-round we’ve been offered a chance to cook from Gale’s new book, Gale Gand’s Brunch!

I have an extra book and would like to invite one reader to participate.

If you would like to join this food blogging event, please send me an email at ablithepalate (AT) gmail (DOT) com with your snail mail address by noon EST on Friday, March 27.  I’ll have Puggle randomly select one person to join us.  If you don’t have a food blog but would like to participate, I’ll be happy to post your blog entry here.  

Look for the event on April 17 and the round up on April 20!
 

Beef and Guinness Stew, Redux

I forgot it was St. Patrick's Day today or I would have been better prepared.  I was a little sleep-deprived:  I was on calls with colleagues in India until 2:30 am EDT, Pug was having sleep issues in between calls, and I only managed sleep between 4:30 and 7:30, when 12 week old Hoss woke, ready to play.  Then, it was time for the day job.

It's probably a good thing I don't need much sleep.  It's probably also a good thing that my sense of humor isn't tied to adequate shut eye.

Hubby called me at 4:30 and said, "Did you get my voicemail?"  No.  What voicemail?  "I left you a voicemail at 9 o'clock this morning!  It's St. Patrick's Day!"  Yes.  I remembered when I was at the grocery store an hour earlier and the  clerk pinched me for not wearing green.  Did she know how close she was to physical harm?  Oh, and I'm making chicken for dinner.  "But it's St. Patrick's Day!"  Yes, and?  "Listen to the voicemail."  Click.

I dialled voicemail.

I kid you not, this is what Hubby had the temerity to leave as a message:  "Woman of the house!  Guinness stew tonight or be prepared for a beating!"

Moments like these, I'm convinced God has a sense of humor, or is a preservationist.  How else to explain Hubby's lack of survival instinct?  How else to explain the extra cuteness which saves him from certain death?  He's watched "The Quiet Man" one too many times (Sean refers to his wife as "woman of the house" when ordering her to fetch him something in one notable scene; and in the scene where Sean drags Mary Kate back to their home, a local village woman helpfully offers him a stick with which to beat his recalcitrant wife.  They don't make movies like this anymore.).

How on EARTH am I to make a beef and Guinness stew in less than 2 hours with another grocery run required?  The trick, it appears, is to find beautifully marbled boneless chuck roast, cut the meat into relatively small pieces and pray hard.  But surprisingly, everything came together in less than 90 minutes and the meat was decidedly tender. 

Unlike last year's stew, I modified the recipe and decided not to discard the vegetables; having soaked in Guinness and beef stock for almost an hour, the leeks and mirepoix were incredibly flavorful and it seemed terrible to be wasteful so I simply added the sauteed bacon, mushrooms and shallots to the casserole.  Once again accompanied by mashed potatoes (Pug asked for rice with his stew instead of potatoes, having never fallen in love with Mommy's preferred starch), a more than lovely stew.  Of course, it would have been perfect had it been cold, rainy and misty outside instead of sunny and dry.  Or maybe because it was so achingly gorgeous outside (and the stew so delectably steeped with Guinness and stock), I could laugh off Hubby's lunatic voicemail.

That's me:  Woman of the House.

Red Velvet Hell, Part Three

When my friend Dave was five years old, he was traveling with his family through the Grand Canyon.  Whilst at a rest stop, Dave went about his business, then flushed the urinal, which promptly exploded, spraying him mercilessly with water while he screamed in terror.  Relaying the story thirty-some years later, Dave noted, "Even now when I flush, I still jump back and flinch."

Such is it for me and red velvet cake.  There's a reason the post is entitled "Red Velvet Hell." Red velvet cake is my own personal kryptonite.  In its presence, I wilt.  I die.

My experience three years ago was so traumatizing that for some time, when I saw red velvet cake, when I heard someone talking about it, when I even thought about it,  my heart would race and my skin would go clammy.  I would have visions of my four failed baking attempts --in a single day.  I remembered being curled on the ground wondering what to do about producing a red velvet wedding cake twelve hours hence. I would recall crying over broken, exploded bits of red cake fluff.

My friend Jenn, who had been roped into taste testing twelve different recipes of red velvet cake, was likewise haunted -- subsequently she was able to discern within a few bites if a red velvet cake had been made with butter, Crisco or oil.

The bride for whom I made the cake did not know about the horror for years until recently when she met up with another friend of mine who had been present through the whole trauma and my friend, upon being introduced to the woman, exclaimed, "OH!  You're the red velvet cake bride!" 

Maybe it was the distance lent by intervening years; the haze of post traumatic cake syndrome where you forget how awful it was.  Whatever the case, for Pug's birthday party, which fell on Valentine's Day, I got this idea to make vanilla cupcakes for the kids and red velvet cupcakes for the adults.

What the @#$%^&*( was I thinking?

I've had Vivian's cake; it is delicious.  It is a perfect red velvet cake.  But I must accept it is not a perfect recipe for me.

Using her recipe once again yielded disaster, late night heart palpitations and a resoundingly blue vocabulary, the likes of which can only be indulged when Pug is not around to repeat in his newly parrot-like state.  The fact is, I think I'm cursed by this recipe.  Either Vivian has omitted a step, an ingredient, or I'm just incompetent when it comes to her red velvet cake. 

The first batch came out of the oven so light and airy in texture that they exploded into bits when I attempted to upend them on to a baking rack.  You know that sinking feeling when it's ten-thirty p.m. and your time is limited because Pug's younger brother (oh, yes, the newly born 11-week old Hoss, whom I will post about another time...) is about to wake up any minute and you've got to have forty cupcakes ready the next morning?  Yeah, that feeling.

The second batch fared no better, Crayola-red in color instead of that wine dark color created by the cocoa, and surprisingly frail and withered looking.  They didn't pulverize when I popped them out on to the baking rack to cool  But when I went to peel off a cupcake paper, half the cupcake went with the paper.  The cupcake was so hole-y on the inside that had I been making French bread instead of cupcakes, I would have been elated. 

The problem I have with this cake recipe is that it goes for lightness and airiness at the expense of texture and substance.  Having made my baking bed and determined to lie in it, I chucked her recipe and began scouring the cookbook arsenal and Internet for red velvet cake recipes.

After reading through some twenty or so recipes, I began formulating my own version.  I wanted a strong, moist cake, not an ethereal puff cloud.  That meant banishing the White Lily flour and sifting just once.  I also wanted a stronger chocolate flavor so I used the good cocoa -- Dagoba, rather than Hershey's -- and lots of it.  I also can't stand the idea of Crisco so I used good rich European butter (Plugra) which is more butterfat than water.  I'm still trying to figure out the vinegar since I really couldn't taste it in the final batter, but it was a required ingredient in nearly every recipe, so why screw with something that clearly has provenance?  The final result was a rich, dark red, moist, balanced and more importantly - yummy red velvet cupcake with that distinct cocoa aftertaste.

I still have some tweaks to work out, and am intrigued enough to try again...but not so soon.  Even though the cupcakes came out lovely and got rave reviews...some wounds run really deep.  Shudder.

Popovers

Popovers remind me of my cousin Wendy, and of one of the sweetest periods in my life, when I was living and working in San Francisco.

It was a strange time:  at once unsettled and upended, yet bearing inexorably towards a very pragmatic end.  I was commuting between San Francisco and New York with stopovers in the south to see Hubby, who at the time was The Fiancé.  As we were to be married in Napa, being in San Francisco made it easier to make runs into wine country to plan and tweak the wedding. 

I have very fond, very happy memories of being in San Francisco and not a day goes by that I do not miss being there.  The city offered so much and strikes a chord in me that no other city before or since has been able replicate.  If Paris is feckless and spirited and London my soul's home and haven, then San Francisco is indelibly magical, misty and foggy, all romance and sensory overload in one sophisticated package.  I have so many beautiful wonderful memories associated with this city; of exploring it with Hubby; of eating in so many spectacular restaurants; of hanging out with beloved family; of traversing its streets with friends and engaging in earnest conversation.

Most of my time when I lived in the city was spent in Wendy's company.  I was staying at her home in Sunnyside which was high on a hill and had a great view.  One of my favorite escapades involved looking at the long, unmoving line of traffic on I-280 from her balcony and deciding not to go to work until later that afternoon.  We elected instead to settle in on the couch and watch The Haiku Tunnel.  Then too there was the night we went salsa dancing because I decided I wanted to learn how to dance and Thursday night was Salsa night at a local club.  I don't know why I torture myself (or others) with this continued desire to learn how to dance.  I lack timing and I have no rhythm to speak of; a dance instructor was once rendered speechless by my inability to wiggle my hips ("But you're a woman!  It should be natural for your hips to sway!").  But it didn't stop me from having fun at my own expense.  Late night forays out having drinks and talking about everything under the sun.  Exploring the city from top to bottom.  And food.  Oy, if there was a food run to be made, there we were.  Crepes, lengua tacos, chocolates, sushi, In'N'Out burgers;  cooking in San Francisco was like a slice of heaven:  farmer's markets, high end grocery stores stacked with every conceivable odd item -- whatever you wanted, there you could find it.  Whatever there was to be consumed, there was my cousinly cohort accompanying me or cooking with me.

One particular excursion found us in Union Square searching for wedding dresses.  After a morning of trying on dresses and doing mental wedding gymnastics, we considered where to eat; and Wendy said decisively, "Neiman Marcus.  We need to go have their popovers."  And indeed we did:  with strawberry butter, the ginormous popovers were airy and delicate.  It was the first time I'd ever had popovers; and until this past Saturday, the last time. That was five years ago.

Another cousin has been posting pictures of her baking mania to her facebook page recently and one photo reminded me of popovers; and suddenly I was consumed with the memory of how those Neiman Marcus popovers tasted and how nice it would be to have a Saturday brunch with popovers and strawberry butter.  I hunted down the Neiman Marcus recipe, which is terribly fussy:  everything needs to be at room temperature before mixing and even then the batter needs to rest for an hour.  It can't be made the night before so requires a just-in-time approach, which doesn't make it convenient.  But oh, when those popovers came out of the oven, spilling out in soufflé-ish domes, the smell brought me back to that day in the city with my cousin and it was worth the hassle.  And smeared with strawberry butter, I could almost pretend for one moment that I was back in San Francisco with Wendy -- and maybe I was.

Will work for chocolate

A project I'm working on needed some serious graphic design layout work.  I called my friend Dani in a panic and she said, 'No problem!  I have just the guy for you -- and he'll do it for an affordable price!"

Affordable price = chocolate.

I'm serious.  The guy said he'd work for chocolate.

I have a rough estimate of what his work would cost on the open market -- so do I buy an equivalent amount in chocolate?  It's a sure bet that your run of the mill, pedestrian stuff is not considered appropriate currency; but somehow buying a block of Callebaut or Valrhona seems so prosaic.  Clearly quality should exceed quantity? 

Should I buy chocolates enlivened  by beautiful transfer sheet designs?  Or go for straight chocolate?  You could pay me with Naga chocolate bars or Manon Blancs all day long but maybe he's more of a purist.  Do varietal chocolate bars have the same caché as a truffle?  Should I make my own?  It's been a while since I've made chocolate truffles.  Which reminds me that Jenn's baby shower next week will require some sort of delicious little favor goodie and a chocolate truffle is probably the way to go.  I could make some for her baby shower and have some to send to Pierre?

I totally get being paid in chocolate.

But for Heaven's sake I have no idea how to pay in chocolate.  Anyone know the proper exchange rate of cacao to dollars? 

Three Tales About Love and Chocolate

Faking It

The first love plain and simply, sucks.  This was the first time she understood her friend Jay's blistering declaration that "Love is a willingness to be bludgeoned."  She's still not sure what it was that precipitated this tumbling; the guy in question  was an awful boyfriend, thoughtless, heartless and careless in a way that as a friend he had been nothing short of exemplary.  But at 22, having never let go of her feelings, she fell in love.  She began to fall in love, when at the opera, during Cherubino's Voi che sapete aria, he kissed her in the dark and said, "I love you."  It seemed so romantic, so sophisticated:  but in looking back it was little more than self-indulgent aggrandizing.

Before him she had had other serious relationships; but in those circumstances she had simply floated through, faking emotions she didn't really feel.  She once jokingly said to a friend that she reserved her greatest passion for inanimate objects like her books and fountain pens.  Karma is a bitch.  It wasn't until the night he broke a third date with her, when she was writing a letter to him to articulate her disappointment, that she realized she was in love and there was neither accompanying joy nor elation; how could there be when she was alone, unable to voice these feelings to him, and knowing deep down that in love, she has chosen poorly? 

There used to a restaurant in Georgetown called Au Pied de Cochon.  They went there a few times to have the chocolate mousse and a cup of coffee.  A well made chocolate mousse is light and airy, relying on the perfect incorporation of whipped heavy cream with melted chocolate and a yolk meringue (egg yolks + simple syrup).  Everything needs to be the right temperature to produce a lighter-than-air consistency and not a soupy mess.  It's time consuming.  It takes effort and patience.  For all its pretense at sophistication, the chocolate mousse at Au Pied de Cochon was a heavy handed concoction that lacked subtlety or finesse:  it was little more than melted chocolate mixed with the beaten cream and then cooled.  The omission of the egg meringue would be noticed only by someone expecting silkiness and delicacy.  As fakes go, it was a good fraud, a thick chocolate brute in a white ramekin topped with over beaten whipped cream one shade away from the canned stuff.

She knew the relationship was at an end when took her to the airport, kissed her and said, "I love you."  The thing about sincerity is that it's hard to fake.

The Box Step

This is not the One That Got Away.  There's no such person in her life, nor should/will there ever be.  Life and love are sacred arts; we should not be dilettantes at either; and so she's never allowed a moment to pass without marking it, or a person to enter or leave her life without noting them.  This one...this one, oh I suppose this was the one that restored her to a state of balance from the enervation of her first love to the exultation of her last love.

People fall in love over a kitchen table at a friend's house when it is late and they talk endlessly.  They fall in love because there's seduction in being heard.  They fall in love because there's no alternative to the moment.  But they do nothing about it:  they never talk about it, they never acknowledge it, and they never act upon it.  There's a third person in the picture and neither of them are willing to transgress; interestingly, there's always a third person.  In their long relationship, there's never a right moment to allow the option of exploring.  But they both know.  They always know.  They know when they're driving to her boyfriend's house.  They know when they walk companionably with the Gotham skyline in the backdrop.  They know when their long conversations meander from topic to topic and they finish up conversational threads from days, months and even years earlier.  They know when her relationships and his relationships rise and fall.  And they know, when in a quiet moment he inexplicably breaks The Rule of Silence to tell her that he has sometimes wondered how differently their lives might have been if they'd had the chance to find out if their mutually mute and requited love could have met the high bar of their hopes.

There's a little cafe across from his old office that serves terrific French pastries, including Opera Cake.  Opera cake is so intricate, so complicated:  six layers of Biscuit Joconde (an almond sponge cake), three of which are soaked in coffee syrup, sandwiching coffee buttercream, one layer of ganache, and covered with chocolate glaze.  It's time consuming to make, and honestly, never tastes as good as you think it will.  It's so pretty to look at, so appealing to all the senses -- but the buttercream and the ganache make it tricky to serve:  too chilled and the cake becomes clunky and dry in your mouth; too warmed and you risk the mushiness of the same.  The chocolate glaze needs to be near perfect for that shine and texture; else it's cloying.  Opera cake, as you can imagine, is all about timing.

This is the dessert they are sharing at the cafe when he makes his confession.  It sits unfinished after she puts her coffee cup down and says, "It's pretty to think so, isn't it?"  He understands.  He knows.  It's what Jake Barnes says to Brett Ashley at the end of "The Sun Also Rises" when she muses about how good it could have been between the two of them.

When she calls him a day later to tell him there's a line from an Edith Wharton short story he must know; and the quote is, "We've been too close together - that has been our sin.  We have seen the nakedness of each other's souls" they know that the shared reverie is at an end, as necessarily quiet in its death as in its naissance.

Third Time Lucky

The simultaneous reactions to The One:  "Finally," and "This is going to effing hurt."

...Sometimes she'll catch a glimpse of him in a quiet moment when he's preoccupied with something else and she just aches.  When she hears his laughter from another room she pauses and wishes that delicious sound were directed towards her.  The best time is in the still night, when he's sleeping and she can stare at him at will without feeling as though she is trespassing or being intrusive.  She's stopped wondering why the pleasure she derives in his company marches side by side with wistfulness?  Oh yes, she knows:  because love hurts.  In all its myriad, poignant forms:  watching your parents age and realizing that your adult love for them is tempered with the realization that they're not immortal; kissing your babies and accepting that having children is tantamount to allowing your heart to walk outside your body; but these loves you don't have much choice.  It's the love you choose for yourself -- the person next to you, the one you wake up with and go to bed with (and thank whatever high power in which you believe for allowing you these privileges) -- okay, that's the one where you've willingly allowed yourself to be exposed and the one over which you have no control, the one where you do stupid things willingly...

A friend once described an incident in which his then-girlfriend ran out of the bar where they'd been having beers when he told her he was leaving for a job out of town.  Of course he followed her out, whereupon she tearfully berated him for not thinking to ask her to come along with him; but as it turned out, it was little more than a show of dramatic bravado on her part.  When the time came to actually go, she balked and the relationship fell apart.

"I am never doing that again," he said.  He meant that he was never going to chase a girl out of a bar again and lay himself out at her feet - and risk being disappointed again.

Oh but you should.  Read above about love and life being sacred arts.  Why cut off any part of yourself?  Why not throw yourself in whole-heartedly each time?  Why not risk everything you have to give?  Risk is half reward as much as half failure.  Wouldn't it be better to go into every relationship risking everything you are, everything you hope for, all the parts that make up the sum of your being?

At the lowest point in their relationship, when she was most hurt and disappointed, she wrote the most beautiful love letter ever about him. 

"I had to write it," she said.  "so that I could remember - 'Why him?' So that I could remember why I was in love with him, THAT I was in love with him."  It allowed her to fall in love with him again.  (Note again about love being a sacred art and risking everything over and over).

Everything she feels is always out there, right on her sleeve where he can see it.  It's kinda messy and sort of sloppy.  She doesn't care:  everything.  Everything.  There is no point in being half-assed about it.  He's much more inscrutable but in moments of doubt, she recalls something he told her once in earnest:  "I feel tethered to the universe because of you."  She remembers lots of moments like these because they are the real things that bind her to him, that make their life together seem less ephemeral, less oneiric.

The first time they went out, she had a chocolate tart for dessert.  The first few times she tried to duplicate the recipe, something invariably went awry.  How can something as simple as a ganache be so ridiculously difficult to make?  When you add hot cream to melted chocolate, depending on the portions of cream to chocolate and the additions (butter, oil), the ganache can be used to make cake fillings, truffles, a shiny glaze or whipped to become an icing.  A really good ganache is the result of very compatible ingredients - so harmonious that even if you make a mistake like adding water and causing the chocolate to seize and harden, the mixture can actually be saved by the further addition of cream.  Chocolate is forgiving if you have the patience to work with it; if you have the actual desire to make the whole greater than its parts.  Ganache was supposedly a culinary accident, created when a chocolatier's apprentice spilled cream into melted chocolate.  The chef screamed, "Ganache!" which means, "fool."  But the happy accident was so delicious the name is actually an homage.

Huh:  sounds like falling in love.