use real butter

Recipe: chinese stir-fried rice cakes

Congratulations to Jenny Williams! She won the raffle prize I offered for the Menu for Hope fundraiser. Jenny, I’ll be emailing you shortly to find out which photo you’d like. The entire effort raised over $62,000. A big thanks to all who participated.

This week, I baked a birthday cake for someone’s surprise 50th birthday party. The original plan was to bring a bunch of macarons, but the day before the party, I thought I should ask her husband if he had arranged for a cake. I normally wouldn’t volunteer during such a busy time, but I have a soft spot for guys who are so sweet on their partners. He was cooking dinner for 30 people, so I said I could handle the cake. I doubled this chocolate espresso fudge cake with beautiful results. Probably the most nerve-wracking part was driving it down Boulder Canyon, but the structural integrity of this cake is rock solid. Love that Marcel Desaulniers.

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Recipe: almond blancmange

Just a few observations and tidbits tonight and then I’m going to send you all off to Tartelette’s place, okay?

So Bridget had asked me about the difference between tempered chocolate and untempered chocolate and if I could show a picture. Why yes indeedy, I can – because I had a lot of out-of-temper chocolates from yesterday’s post.

Recipe: chocolate caramels

First off: that puppy is not mine. She belongs to my friend’s new beau. Her name is Sonora (I like dogs named after geological provinces or features) and she is 100% mutt.

Second: My shoulder and neck issues are more or less under control now, thanks! I gave up on the marathon coding sessions and now take breaks every couple of hours – which is great because I have resumed my 1-2 hours of cardio and that makes me uber happy. In addition, it is a great excuse to get back to some baking and cooking. Oh, and I ice my shoulder a couple of times a day and that reduces the inflammation. Heat always seems to aggravate the pain.

To the topic at hand: Fellow food bloggers have often wondered aloud (or on their posts) why they bother spending hours writing up entries if people don’t bother reading them? How do they know that some folks don’t read the entry? It’s pretty obvious from the content of certain comments. I am not all that concerned with whether or not people read my posts in their entirety or at all for that matter. It’s cool. I understand that some folks just like to browse the pictures (and if you’re a Daring Baker, who the hell has the time to read over 1000 entries describing the SAME recipe?) If someone wants to comment without having read the post, then that’s fine, although I might get a tad snarky in my reply if I’m running low on patience.

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