I am so grateful for digital cameras – to easily capture images & to remember good times. At Gretchen Rubin’s Happiness Project blog she states that the years are short but the days are long. I must whole-heartedly agree. Where on earth has the first one third of our summer gone???
LEMONADE CAKE
in the background of the above photograph with the raspberries
Cake:
1 1/3 cups granulated sugar
6 tablespoons butter, softened
1 tablespoon grated lemon rind
3 tablespoons thawed lemonade concentrate
2 teaspoons vanilla extract
2 large eggs
2 large egg whites
2 cups all-purpose flour (*I used bread flour & it was fine.)
1 teaspoon baking powder
1/2 teaspoon salt
1/2 teaspoon baking soda
1 1/4 cups fat-free buttermilk
Cooking spray
Frosting:
2 tablespoons butter, softened
2 teaspoons grated lemon rind
2 teaspoons thawed lemonade concentrate (*I use regular lemonade; pink is too sweet & takes away from the flavor of the cake & the frosting.)
1/2 teaspoon vanilla extract
8 ounces 1/3-less-fat cream cheese
3 1/2 cups powdered sugar
Raspberries for garnish
Preheat oven to 350°.
To prepare cake, place first 5 ingredients in a large bowl; beat with a mixer at medium speed until well blended (about 5 minutes). Add eggs and egg whites, 1 at a time, beating well after each addition. Lightly spoon flour into dry measuring cups; level with a knife. Combine flour, baking powder, salt, and baking soda; stir well with a whisk. Add flour mixture and buttermilk alternately to sugar mixture, beginning and ending with flour mixture; beat well after each addition.
Pour batter into 2 (9-inch) round cake pans coated with cooking spray; sharply tap pans once on counter to remove air bubbles. Bake at 350° for 20 minutes or until wooden pick inserted in center comes out clean. Cool in pans 10 minutes on a wire rack; remove from pans. Cool completely on wire rack.
To prepare frosting, place 2 tablespoons butter and the next 4 ingredients (2 tablespoons butter through cream cheese) in a large bowl; beat with a mixer at high speed until fluffy. Add powdered sugar, and beat at low speed just until blended (do not overbeat). Chill 1 hour.
Place 1 cake layer on a plate; spread with 1/2 cup frosting. Top with remaining cake layer. Spread remaining frosting over top and sides of cake. Store cake loosely covered in the refrigerator.
The Perfect Chocolate Cake
CAKE:
Solid vegetable shortening for greasing the pans
Flour for dusting the pans
1 package (18.25 ounces) devil's food cake mix with pudding
1 cup sour cream
3⁄4 cup water
1⁄2 cup vegetable oil
4 large eggs
1 teaspoon pure vanilla extract
room-temperature semisweet chocolate to grate on top
DIRECTIONS
1. Place a rack in the center of the oven and preheat the oven to 350°F. Lightly grease three 9-inch round cake pans with solid vegetable shortening, then dust with flour. Shake out the excess flour. Set the pans aside.
2. Place the cake mix, sour cream, water, oil, eggs, and vanilla in a large mixing bowl. Blend with an electric mixer on low speed for 1 minute. Stop the machine and scrape down the sides of the bowl with a rubber spatula. Increase the mixer speed to medium and beat 2 minutes more, scraping down the sides again if needed. The batter should look well combined. Divide the batter among the prepared pans, smoothing it out with the rubber spatula, and place them in the oven. If your oven is not large enough to hold them on one rack, place two pans on the center rack and the third in the center of the highest rack.
3. Bake the cakes until they spring back when lightly pressed with your finger, 20 to 25 minutes. Be careful not to overcook the layer on the highest oven rack. Remove the pans from the oven and place them on wire racks to cool for 10 minutes. Run a sharp knife around the edge of each layer and invert each onto a rack, then invert again onto another rack so that the cakes are right side up. Allow to cool completely, 30 minutes.
4. Meanwhile, prepare the Sweetened Cream by whipping heavy whipping cream with 2 T sugar.
5. To assemble, place one cake layer, right side up, on a serving platter. Spread the top with half of the whipped cream, spreading it to within 1⁄2 inch of the sides. Place the second layer, right side up, on top of the first layer and spread with the remaining whipped cream, spreading it to within 1⁄2 inch of the sides. Place the third layer on top, and cover the cake lightly with waxed paper. Place it in the refrigerator to chill.
6. Prepare the Chocolate Ganache.
7. To finish the assembly, spread the top and the sides of the cake with the frosting, using clean, smooth strokes. Slice and serve. Store this cake, in a cake saver or under a glass dome, in the refrigerator for up to 1 week.
Chocolate Ganache
From the kitchen of The Cake Mix Doctor
Difficulty: Easy
This frosting can be used on the cake of your choice. This recipe makes two cups, enough to thinly frost a two- or three-layer cake.
Place the cream in a small heavy saucepan over medium heat. Bring to a boil, stirring. Meanwhile, place the chopped chocolate in a large mixing bowl. Remove the pan from the heat and pour the hot cream over the chopped chocolate. Stir until the chocolate is melted. I just put the cream in the microwave in my glass measuring cup (Lisa, do you have any?) & do it for 30 seconds at a time.
To use this ganache as a glaze, let it stand at room temperature for 10 minutes before spooning over a cooled cake. To use the ganache as a frosting or filling, let it stand at room temperature for four hours, or chill it until it thickens and is spreadable.
Now suppose your day is crazy & you make the ganache but then step away to help Christopher’s friend mow the lawn, run to the pool to share a key & chat, & run to Zaxby’s for a snack. The ganache will set up hard; just add a smidgen of heated heavy cream to the ganache & mix again. The color will be a bit darker but it will spreadable.
The Cake Mix Doctor, c. 2000
4 eggs
1 cup sugar
1 tsp. vanilla
¾ cup flour
¼ cup cornstarch
1 ½ tsp. baking powder
¼ tsp. salt
1 quart strawberries, mashed
1 cup sugar
1 pint whipping cream, whipped and sweetened with about 3 T. sugar per pint
Preheat oven to 350-degrees. Grease and flour an 8-inch round springform pan. Beat eggs until light and fluffy. Add sugar gradually, beating until thick. Add vanilla. Sift flour with cornstarch, baking powder, and salt and fold carefully into egg mixture. Pour into prepared pan and back for 30 minutes. Cool and remove from pan. Split into three layers. *This is an angel-food cake.
Mix mashed strawberries with sugar. Whip the cream and sweeten to taste. Place the first layer of cake on a serving plate. Spread 1/3 of strawberries on layer. Spread about ¼ of the whipped cream on top of the berries. Repeat with the second layer. Spread the rest of the strawberries on the third layer, then frost the whole cake with the rest of the whipped cream. Chill until serving. Refrigerate any leftovers. Serves 12.
Bridal shower guests – so much fun to hang out with great women & celebrate the wedding of this beautiful young lady! This picture came out better than I hoped!!!
These young women said, “What you really need is a picture of someone shoving cake in their mouth!” And then Jacqueline was willing to pose.
June 23rd, 2009
Outside my window... it is dark.
I am thinking... about how I wish the kids would put themselves to bed, about how I am done with baseball, and about how I want to go watch Texas v. LSU (crazy, huh?). I am hoping that Chris is continuing to have fun at EFY.
I am thankful for... air conditioning in the South.
From the kitchen... nothing except baked potatoes & quesadillas today.
I am wearing... sweaty red T-shirt & capris.
I am creating... I am not really creating these days, just stirring piles. I want to work on my 365-scrapbook.
I am going... to try to get dizzy at the gym tomorrow.
I am reading... the Rules of Normal Eating and Oxygen magazine.
I am hoping... that the baseball commissioner will be kind but not holding my breath based on another team member’s past experiences.
I am hearing... the Texas v. LSU game.
Around the house... there are small messes everywhere.
One of my favorite things... Sonic ice.
A few plans for the rest of the week... watch baseball practice, make cakes for the bridal shower, clean up all the small piles, vacuum & scrub, and maybe swim. Also, continue slowly & methodically cleaning through my office. (It’s been 2.5 years so it’s pretty messy.)
Today at practice, one of the assistant coaches came & asked me again if Ryan would play in the tournament on Sunday. I explained (again) that we believe that Sunday is the Sabbath & that Ryan would not play ball on Sunday. I guess that there is a rule in the books that states that every player has to be at every game after the first one or the head coach doesn’t get to be at that same game. In other words, if Ryan doesn’t play in the game, Rick can’t be there to coach the kids on to victory. (When we signed up for the all-star tournament, we let them know that he wouldn't be playing the Sunday games.)
There are a few alternatives: the league commissioner can make an exception for Ryan, the coach can decide to not let Ryan play at all, and finally, the coach may not be there for the game(s). On a happier note, the coaches call Ryan “Willie Mays” because of his ability to cover the entire outfield & backup the infield as well.
We are praying that the league commissioner will decide to let Ryan play. Depending on his experience with other LDS kids & their willingness to play (or not play) on Sunday maybe we’ll be in the tournament next weekend.
Jared & his friend Palmer got into a funny exchange for a few months when we would go to piano lessons. They would say “food storage~!” over & over & over again. It was funny (but only the first ten thousand times).
Last Saturday night at the ward party there was an emphasis on food storage. Now, everyone was supposed to bring food made with their food storage. We were kinda late & let’s just say that in the event we have to live off our cupboards, we will all be very skinny. I was a bit discouraged so I got online & found some great sites & resources. My favorite is everydayfoodstorage.net – she has videos, recipes, how-tos, good tips, and practical advice on how to use & store the stuff. Today we made “Blender Cheesecake”. Now, a certain northwestern friend of mine will definitely not think of this as true cheesecake – it resembled the Jell-O kind but it was pretty quick & very tasty – even with dated milk. (I snitched a little taste of the cheesecake & it tasted kinda iffy before it chilled but great once done.)
Blender Cheesecake
(multi-step process but easy-breezy-mac-n-cheesy)
Crust:
1-1/2 cups (one package) graham crackers, crushed finely (rolling pin in a big ziploc bag)
6 tablespoons butter, melted
3 tablespoons sugar
Mix crust together & press into bottom & up sides of 9” cake pan.
Sweetened condensed milk:
1 cup powdered milk
1/2 cup hot water
1 cup sugar
1 tablespoon butter
Mix together in a blender until very well blended.
Cheesecake:
To ingredients in blender, add
1/3 cup lemon juice
1 package cream cheese (1/3 less fat okay)
1 teaspoon vanilla.
Pour into prepared crust, top with a can of cherry pie filling & chill for two hours. I will try to add a picture tomorrow!
There! We get credit for rotating our food storage & yummies for our tummies to boot. And how often have I not made a recipe because I needed sweetened condensed milk or cream of chicken soup. Easy & economical.
How do you incorporate food storage into your daily diet?
Okay, so maybe I’ve been a little photo happy the last few days & I don’t really see any end in sight since I’m not scrapbooking much lately. Hopefully blogging will help me remember what I’m not remembering. Anyways, I am totally in love with Windows Live Writer. I haven’t fully investigated the functionality but it definitely makes it possible to add & rearrange pictures easily and to write in an environment like MS Word.
Yesterday was the 12th so I took A LOT of pictures all day long. Here are twelve that sum up the day. Picasa will not let me arrange the pictures into a specific order & I’m too lazy to play around with Photoshop today but you get the idea of a lot that went on.
I realized that I have been taking 12-on-the-12th pictures for about fourteen months now. I wish that I would have taken ten minutes every time to take notes rather than just pictures; I can see what a difference the journaling makes to the story. Someday I will make a book with years of pictures of the 12th of each month. Don’t hold your breath though!
One of the things that we’ve liked here in Greenville – and I hope I am not jinxing us by saying it – is the lack of major natural disasters. Yesterday, I took the boys to the batting cages & on the way home, the sky started falling! The trees & the leaves were swirling, huge thunder & lightning claps, torrential downpour of rain, & just scary all around. The grey picture below is the storm from yesterday. The clouds were eerie. It was probably as close to tornado weather as I have ever come.
Because of that storm, I have been waiting for the other shoe to drop today. They’ve predicted more storms but so far the sky is too nice and blue. I have been fascinated by the big storm clouds the last few days. My kids are SO sick of me taking pictures but it’s really pretty cool. The grey & blue pictures were taken at the same time of day one day apart.
Of course, after yesterday’s storm there’s a contractor on my roof fixing the roof cap/vent thing & the neighbor’s tree cracked in half, but other than that, it’s a pretty great place to live.
For the last two years we have been privileged to work with the Young Single Adults (YSA’s) for church. It is a great program that gives activity & fellowship to young people aged 19 to 30.99. Almost every Sunday night we have home evening with a short lesson, a treat, & a game. Monthly, there’s a dance and a fireside; there’s also a bimonthly temple trip. The dances are fun & we actually really enjoy the music & hanging out. I do have to take a nap on that Friday because I definitely can’t stay awake that late & keep smiling without one. :)
Very few callings involve serving together so this has been extra fun! Scott has high council responsibilities which include the YSA & institute; I am the YSA advisor for the ward & teach a gospel doctrine class on Sunday & host home evening. It has been fun to watch young men prepare to go on missions – the same young men whom Scott taught & led in the Young Men’s organization. A few weeks ago we had a record-breaking number of YSA’s for home evening. We had all the great regulars & then extras from Simpsonville 1st, Greenville 2nd, & a the USC YSA ward. Soon we will be losing several to missions & marriage but these are happy graduations. We have had three new convert baptisms & Brad & Conner are due to come home in the next six months. It has definitely been the FUNNEST calling I’ve ever served in.
There are approximately 70 YSA’s on our rolls & sadly I do not know many of them (probably 30-40). I am always delighted when I can accidentally run into someone when I’m out in the community. It is EXHAUSTING & rewarding all wrapped up into one big overwhelming package. I hope we get to stay for a long time!
