use real butter

Recipe: triple layer lemon cake

I like spring. I do. I do. Love the sound of birds singing in the early morning. Love seeing the foxes traipse through our yard at dusk. The light is different outside and in the house. The sun is bright and high, but not yet oppressive as it will be in summer. This alternates with chilly, overcast, drizzly days that hover around freezing. The air is just cool enough that you need a jacket, but warm enough that you take the jacket off after hiking for an hour. Yesterday: sunny and warm (70°F, which borders on hot for me). Kaweah engaged in her seasonal brain-baking on the deck and then staggered into the office to cool down. Friday will be rainy/snowy and cold again – and Kaweah will stand at the deck door, making little grunting sounds, asking to be let out… because she thinks it’s always nice and sunny on the deck.

where could we take this?

No one fruit represents sunshine to me more than the lemon. It’s not just the vibrant yellow, but the liveliness of the juice and the scent of the freshly grated zest. It wakes me up, keeps me interested. I was recently asked to post a couple of links back to the website of a certain national magazine. But you know, I can’t endorse something I haven’t tried and to be honest, I have never tried any of their recipes before. I agreed to test-drive one of their desserts. [UPDATE: 5/28/09] Because those brilliant people can’t hold up their end of a simple agreement, I’ve removed the links. Food bloggers – I recommend not having anything to do with Better Homes and Gardens.

grating some lemon zest

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Recipe: cheesecake

We prepped a late dinner Sunday evening. As Jeremy opened the door to the deck to get the grill going, we noticed a nice little layer of snow everywhere. [I realize I talk about the weather a lot. It’s not because I’m trying to be polite, it’s because I am a bit of a weather dork.] Just a few hours earlier we were in Boulder, enjoying these:

tulips on pearl street

April is like that around here. Can’t make up its mind about the seasons. That’s sort of how I felt about this month’s Daring Bakers challenge… I couldn’t make up my mind about the flavor – so I did both.

daring bakers, baybeee – we knead to bake!

The official line: The April 2009 challenge is hosted by Jenny from Jenny Bakes. She has chosen Abbey’s Infamous Cheesecake as the challenge. The unofficial line is that Jenny rocks it along with our Superstahhh founders, Lis of La Mia Cucina and Ivonne of Cream Puffs in Venice. I heart them all.

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Recipe: fried shrimp wontons

I’ve been hearing/reading about the broiler weekend everyone has been having on the East coast. Something to be said for the ridge-trough-ridge systems that march through. Our mild and sunny days in the mountains this week gave way to a thick fog this morning followed by drizzle and then… snow. I know some of you will grimace at the mention of snow as we’re almost into May, but if I didn’t like snow, I’d be (even more of) an idiot to live here, don’t you think? I like my snow and drizzle and frizzle and grauple and hail and t-storms and rain and sun. I love the weather. Makes me feel alive. Okay wait, I am not a fan of the winds here. THAT I could easily do without and since our wind season is over, it’s time to sand and oil the patio furniture again!

I must plug a new site that Chuck [of SND, of foodgawker, of many talents] has recently launched. It’s beautiful! It’s craftgawker! Go check it out – nice craft porn.

Speaking of crafts… I had a little gathering of my betties for another stitch-n-bitch, but this time only one knitter. Everyone else – well, we all worked on different projects: bee keeping, drawing, beading, and sewing. Here’s what came of my distracted efforts (there was a visiting puppy running around that needed to be played with, you know):

bright and little

handy wallet

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