remedial eating

there when you need them

 

Note to self: This week, it happened.

 

 

Just when you thought Spring was set in its ways, all bright skies and temps stuck in onward and upward, it interrupted itself.  Paused.  Retrenched.  Brought spluttery days of gorgeous gray.  Dove-soft skies and drippy windows.  Bought time.  Reprieve.  Calm before the summer storm.

Remember that. 

 

 

Think back to when May marched on, right on track, fruit trees trading their pink, and pomp, for purposeful workhorse green.  Predictably.  Systematically.  Conspiratorially.  (We're always sorry to see them go, the bees and me.)  

But then?  The rains came, and chilly ones, too.  And with them, excuses to stay indoors.  

 

 

Play cards. 

Build stories.  

 

 

And cubes.

And shuffling muscles.  

 

 

Shake butter.   

Make buttter.  

Eat butter.  

Repeat.  

 

 

Light candles.   

In May.  

Imagine.

 

 

Play moved outside, and with it, toys, as play and toys do, when daylight attenuates.  (There's an 18" triceratops stuck in the crabapple, as I type.)  And it was not a forced march, but a pleasure.  Simple, unnoticed, invisible; unmodified by bugs, steam, blistering scorch.   Remarkable for being unremarked upon.  

I thought we were past that.  We weren't.  (Don't forget.)

 

 

Tiny ordinaries—book-reading, snack-eating, book-writing, mindless-weeding, lollygagging, nothing-doing—migrated easily, seamlessly outdoors.  Eclipsed the membrane between indoors and out.  Because out was as lovely (nay, more) than in.  

 Before the hot hullabaloo of summer?  There was this.  

 

 

Shorts traveled up from the basement; mittens, down.  Flip-flops were installed.  Snow boots, archived.  Tank tops, worn, washed, worn again.  And then, we were reaching again for coats.  Long sleeves.  Pants.  Pants?  Whence the pants?  

Three months from now, mind:  Shorts come and go.  Pants happen. Hallelujah.  

 

 

Tomatoes took hold, and pride, alongside.  Me, smug for having gotten around to getting them in.  May, turning coat, flirting with freezing.  Me, recalling what pride goeth before.

Oops.  And oh well.  Runt tomatoes later are a small price to pay for gunmetal, sponge-minded skies, today.   

 

 

And for all that?  It was an ordinary week, with ups and downs abundant as any. Washing machines on strike.  Sick tummies, fevered heads.  Apocolyptic homework.  The usual.  

When early August arrives, ghastly, icky-sticky?  Recall: Weather's but one factor.  Diaphonous skies are no silver bullet.  Pussywillow light, no cure-all. Also?  Recall you can pull a grizzly, hibernate in the basement, eat ice cream for dinner.  And pull up these picutres, these days, this reality.  They'll be there when you need them.  Like slam-dunk chocolate cupcakes. 

 

 

Look, I know we just spoke chocolate last week, and Nigella, also, and both, again, a few months prior.  But, you know how I am.  Besides, everyone, or everyone with kids, anyway, or cupcake needs, or chocolate hankerings, or tastebuds, needs a fine, fast, foolproof chocolate cupcake.  

Here you go.

 

 

I'm a faithless and fickle chocolate cake baker, eye always roaming, oven always auditioning.  Last week alone, I baked two different chocolate cakes. Four, if you count the doubling of batches.  The first one had merit, was rich, dense, intense, the way I always think I take my chocolate cake.  It made up for a Monday, and was shared with friends, but had I it to do over, I'd have shared these, instead.  The other had lumps, and odd pockets, and difficulties.  This had none.  It never does.  It always works.  And delights.  And supports epic quantities of buttercream.  

Win-win-win.  

 

 

Which is why, when our weekend occassioned cupcakes, I returned to this decade-old favorite.  It's nothing more than a basic sour cream chocolate cake, and though I've baked it a hundred times, I can't explain it.  The technique is weird.  The chocolate footprint, minimal.  The effort, even less.  The end result, exquisite.  Every.  Single.  Time.

You might argue I'm biased toward any recipe that allows me, the earth's most inept cupcake baker, to turn out something edible.  Fair enough.  But I'd argue back that foolproof has it's merits.  As does an impeccably tender crumb.  And the lilt that cultured dairy lends to cocoa.  And the way these bear regal beehives of salty-sweet buttercream. 

 

 

A word about that buttercream.  Rough instructions are below; wild enthusiasms, right here.  After years of tweaking and tinkering with buttercream—the fast and dirty sort, powdered sugar plus butter, which I far prefer to the oil-slicky, egg-enriched version—I finally asked my friend Allison to show me the light.  She makes what I modestly think of as The World's Hands-Down Absolute Best Buttercream.  Mine always wilted, or wept, or bored, or more often, all of the above.  Hers is ethereal, and lofty, and lovely, and left me speechless and crumb-covered more than once.  She shared.  And she said I could, too.  

Hallelujah, Round Two.

 

 

The secret, turns out, is to add a lot of powdered sugar.  A lot a lot.  Like, to two cubes of butter, 2 1/2 pounds of powdered sugar.  Maybe three.  (She doesn't measure.  Me, neither.  She's a keeper.)  Also, buttermilk, instead of sweet, to loosen it slightly and lend a faint tang.  Me, being me, add two teaspoons of salt.  Yes, salt.  Yes, two teaspoons.  It is riveting.  The end result is a sweet creamy pouf, but with edge, sass, a salty sly wink.  Hepburn, with a twinge of Winehouse.  I'd hand you one through the screen, if I could.  

Maybe you also have end-of-year celebrations coming soon.  Maybe you don't. Never mind.  These hold well.  These cupcakes, this buttercream, this week, they're going on file.  They'll be there when you need them.  You and me, both.

 

Sour Cream Chocolate Cupcakes (with Salty-Sweet Buttercream)*
adapted from Nigella Lawson, How to Be a Domestic Goddess
yield: 24-28 cupcakes, or 2-8" or 9" layer cakes 

Set the butter out two hours before mixing, as it goes directly into the flour, and should be squishy-soft.  I've used both Dutch and natural cocoa here, to good effect, but the quality of the cocoa shines, so choose well (Valrhona, Penzey's, and Ghiradelli offer lovely ones).  Cupcake yield is based on low- or high-rise cupcakes.  I tend to go low, as they travel better, and allow for more buttercream.  Your choice.  In addition to extra cocoa, coffee, and salt, this reflects a doubling of Nigella's original, as I see no point in twelve cupcakes. That said, it halves easily, if you've the need.  It also makes a stellar double layer cake.

for the cupcakes/cakes:
2 2/3 cups all-purpose, unbleached flour
1 1/2 cups granulated sugar
1 1/2 teaspoons baking powder
1/2 teaspoon baking soda
1 1/2 teaspoons kosher salt
1 3/4 cups salted, very soft butter
1 1/4 cup sour cream, at room temp
1/2 cup best cocoa
4 large eggs, at room temp
1 tablespoon granulated instant espresso or coffee
1 tablespoon pure vanilla extract

Preheat oven to 350°.  If making cupcakes, line 24 tins with liners.  If cakes, butter bottoms and sides, and line bottoms with parchment circles; set aside.

Combine flour, sugar, baking powder, baking soda, and salt in the bowl of a standing mixer, fitted with the paddle attachment.  Add softened butter, and beat on low for 1-2 minutes, until generally combined. In a wide-mouth measuring cup, whisk sour cream, cocoa, eggs, vanilla, and instant espresso, until thoroughly combined.  Slowly add cocoa mixture to the flour mixture, beating on low, until thoroughly combined.  

Scoop batter into prepared muffin tins, just below level for a low-rise cupcake (yield: 28), to the tin level for a fuller, rounder cupcake (yield: 24). Alternatively, divide batter evenly between prepared cake tins, and smooth surfaces.  Bake cupcakes for 20-22 minutes, or until a knife inserted in the center yields damp crumbs.  Let sit in tins 10 minutes to cool, then invert onto a cooling rack to cool completely.  (Cakes take around 30 minutes.  Remove papers from cake bottoms, after removing from tins).  Once cupcakes/cakes are completely cool, 2-3 hours, pile high with your favorite buttercream.

*Sweet and Salty Vanilla Buttercream
Yields enough to frost 24-28 cupcakes, or 1 double-layer cake

When I asked after sharing this recipe, my friend Allison not only agreed, but replied: " I think of my buttercream like the polio vaccine... It's for the people. It is my gift to man kind."  I could not agree more.  This is a loose, rough way with buttercream, depending on taste, touch and sight.  Do not be shy with the beating.  Taste often, and mindfully.  Be fearless with sugar, and a lush with the buttermilk.  Any shortcomings in end results are mine, entirely.  Any successes, all Allison.  (Thanks, friend!)

1 cup (8 oz.) salted butter, 30 minutes from the fridge
2 1/2 - 3 pounds powdered sugar
2 teaspoons kosher salt (or 1 1/2 teaspoons, table salt)
2-3 teaspoons pure vanilla extract, to taste
1/2 cup buttermilk, well-shaken, preferably full-fat, plus more as needed

In the bowl of a stand mixer, fitted with a paddle attachment, beat the 2 cubes of softened butter until creamy, 1 minute.  Gradually, add powdered sugar, 1/2# at a time, alternating with splashes of buttermilk.  Add, also, the salt and vanilla.  Beat a minute or so between each addition, scraping down sides occasionally, continuing until you've added two pounds of sugar, adding buttermilk as necessary to thin.  Switch to the whisk attachment, and whip several mi

Publish

nutes, to work in air and loft.  Taste as you go, for vanilla, sugar, and texture, continuing to add sugar by the spill and buttermilk by the splash, until frosting is lofty, airy, and holds a respectable peak.  Lick beater.  Rejoice.

 

in Just-

 

in Just-

spring          when the world is mud-

luscious the little

lame balloonman

whistles          far          and wee

and eddieandbill come

running from marbles and

piracies and it's

spring

when the world is puddle-wonderful

 

 

the queer

old balloonman whistles

far          and             wee

and bettyandisbel come dancing

from hop-scotch and jump-rope and

it's

spring

and

         the

                  goat-footed

balloonMan          whistles

far

and

wee

 

—e.e. cummings

 

 

plant Magic dust

 expect hope doubt
    (wonder mistrust)
       despair

                   and right 
        where soulless our
   (with all their minds)
 eyes blindly stare

life herSelf stands

— e.e. cummings

 

 

Sarah threw Spring is like a perhaps hand up, a few weeks back, and I was stunned.  How had I missed an e.e. Cummings?  I pretty much marinated in his words, his playful grammar, his soaring syntax, his jesting and jousting and exquisite off-kilter, for the better part of college.  Which, in my case, was the better part of six years.  I thought I knew them all.  I was wrong.  I am thrilled.

 

(I also thought, for the first time, and pitiably, of the anonymous someone whose job it was to copy-edit his poems.  Do they award post-humous Pulitzers to copy editors?  I've a nomination.  It's a slam-dunk.) 

 

 

Tripping over it like that got me thinking about chance encounters, about the way they shape our days, outlooks, lives.  About the abundant unwelcome ones, errant cars and anonymous dents and mis-behaving body parts.  About all the others, the small serendipities, casual conversations, stories, words, friends, faces, that winkle their way into a day and twist the lens, let in light.  I had a hundred examples in mind.  Which is precisely where they'll stay.  Spring's no time for screen-staring.  

Today, I'll just perpetuate the goodness that is Cummings, and bittersweet, slightly salty, chocolate peanut butter bars.  

 

 

These bars are like buckeyes, only better.  By like buckeyes, I mean both are confections, pure, unencumbered by flour or distraction.  That both involve chocolate and that blissful situation known as fortified peanut butter. (Fortified, here, meaning not twelve vitamins and minerals, but emboldened by butter, salt and vanilla, and ample sugar, both brown and powdered.) 

By better, I mean vastly simpler, and quick enough to pose a near-danger. Simpler because this is a bar, built in a pan, in one fell bulk swoop.  No scooping, no rolling, no dipping, no drying.  Just dump, noodge, drizzle, impatiently waaaaaaaiiit.  The chilling hour is interminable.  But it does save a person from total ruin.   

 

 

Better also because said format allows for ratios ever-so-slightly more majestic.  A peanut butter ball can only hold so much chocolate, before the excess runs right of.  Veneer's the best one can hope for.  A 9x9" pan, on the other hand, understands the existential nature and moral imperative of proper peanut butter:chocolate proportions.  Also, it contains wretched excess nicely.

Which may sound untoward for a season when we're to live, I think, on asparagus and air.  But have you looked up lately?  Excess, excess, everywhere. Besides, mud-luscious makes quite the mess.  And messes demand something stronger than salad.   

 

Chocolate Peanut Butter Bars, Bittersweet + Salty
adapted from Nigella Lawson, How to Be a Domestic Goddess

I've tweaked the proportions and technique, converted the original milk chocolate to bittersweet, and added salt (naturally) to ping-pong with the sugar.  That said, the transformation of classic peanut butter cup to bar is pure genius, and pure Nigella.  Do mind the chilling/cutting notes, below.  Shattered bars (see above) are delicious as anything, but pure heartbreak if you plan to give or share.

for the base:
1/4 cup dark brown sugar
1 1/3 cups confectioners' sugar
1 1/2 teaspoons kosher salt
1 teaspoon pure vanilla
1/4 cup salted butter, melted
1 scant cup salted, creamy peanut butter

for the topping:
11 oz. dark chocolate (72% or bittersweet), chopped
1 tablespoon salted butter

Line a 9x9" pan with parchment paper or foil, both directions, leaving "tabs" as handles on all four sides. 

Melt butter in a one-cup glass measure, and pour into the bowl of a stand mixer.  Measure peanut butter into the same cup, and add to bowl.  (This saves dirtying a second measuring cup and, better, ensures the sticky peanut butter releases easily).  Add remaining base ingredeints to the bowl, fit mixer with the paddle attachment, and mix on low-medium until fully combined, 30 seconds.  (Alternatively, mix by hand, with wooden spoon or strong spatula.) Scrape mixture into lined pan, and pat into a roughly even layer.  If you'd like a more polished look, fold the extra lining over the peanut butter, and press the back of a clean measuring cup onto the surface, to even it.

Melt chocolate and butter in the microwave, in 30-second increments, stirring well after each session, for a total of 60-75 seconds, depending on your microwave's strength.  Alternatively, melt in a double-boiler.  

Pour chocolate-butter mixture over the pressed peanut butter, and spread with a silicone spatula, to smooth.  Chill in the refrigerator until the chocolate sets, around one hour (or, wrapped, overnight).  When ready to slice, remove pan from fridge, and let sit 10-15 minutes at room temperature, before cutting. Attempting to slice directly from the fridge will result in cracked bars.  (I've learned the hard way.  Repeatedly.)  After the chill is off, use paper "ears" to remove entire bar from pan, peel paper from sides, and slice into 1 x 2" squares.  

Store in the refrigerator for up to 7 hours days. 

a small burst of sun

Hey!  It's eighty-two and sunny here!  

You?  There?

 

 

Excellent.  Glad we got that taken care of.  That's all on the topic of weather, today.  We already beat that horse, this month, and to do so again would be tedious and redundant.  

And who wants tedious and redundant and snow when we could talk lemon cake?  

 

 

Lemon cake, after all, is a proven distractor, and potentially highly tasty, to boot.  Particularly if it's an Alpha and Omega Lemon Cake.  I don't say this as a challenge, or to raise hackles, because I don't have a competitive bone in my body.  If I did, I might balk at the fact that although Ohio had snow one day into Spring, Seattle got snow two days in.  And then, five and six days after Spring sprung, when we got more?  I might say ha HA! and so there and pffbbbtt!   

But I wouldn't.  Because I'm not.  Competitive, that is.  I am merely a pilgrim, traveling the long road in search of the ultimate lemon cake.  

 

 

But wait.  Didn't we already find it?  That gold and white number, thick with curd and petticoats of cream?   

Why yes, yes we did.  That was, and is, our acme Lemon Layer Cake.  But it has recently come to my attention that cake and layer cake are two different species, entirely.  The latter, the layer, is a special occasion confection, towering, indulgent, the high heels of crumbs.  It's what you whip out for full transits around the planet, parties of people, polished shoes and posh frocks. Or at least lots and lots of moustaches.  

 

 

Cake, on the other hand, unmodified cake, unadorned-by-adjectives-or-buttercream cake, is—get this—nothing special.  Ordinary eating.  Everyday fare.  Wedge-with-coffee, sliver-with-milk, dessert-on-any-old-Tuesday material.   

Blimey.  The memos I miss.

 

 

It's not like no one tried to tell me.  Everyday cakes have been everywhere, for a while now.  But for me, cakes and kids went hand in hand, my baking of one the direct result of my baking of the other.  And when your first cakes are birthday cakes, to celebrate first years, first footsteps, first words, all those age-appropriate f-words, well, frosting and frippery just can't be helped.

I'm making up for lost time.  Forgive me.  I did bring you cake.  And if your outdoors look anything like ours, if you're peering desperately out windows, in search of sun... 

 

 

Oops.  Off-script.  Alpha and Omega Lemon Cake.  I've been searching for such a cake for years (decades?), diligently, unflaggingly, unsuccessfully.  Shackelton came to mind more than once, as I tried and failed, tried and failed to escape yet another bleak outcome.  Dry cakes. Tough cakes.  Pallid, tepid, mild, faint cakes.  Sodden cakes.  Gooey cakes.  All of the above cakes.  

Lemon cake should be none of the above.  Despair fairly well summed up my state of mind.   

 

 

Okay, alright, I didn't survive on seal meat for a year.  And no, I didn't bake by blubber-light.  And, strictly speaking, I lost only sleep, never men, on my quest. Still.   

I did endure many a mediocre lemon cake, which was trying, and which, it has always seemed to me, should not only be illegal but also, an oxymoron.  How, I ask you, can lemon cake stand to be in the same sentence as mediocre?  Lemon cake, by definition, should be fraught with tension, heady and sharp and fantastically vivid.  As tart as tart can possibly be, threatening (but not making good) on true sour.  And I don't mean a thin tart veneer, along the top.  And I don't mean a girdle of pucker around the edge.  Because we both know how those stories end, with fought-after edges nibbled carefully away, while the vast interior bland wastelands are left for the crows, sad as snow-bound daffodils.  

 

 

Thing is, lemon's a tough customer, especially when baked into a cake.  Like chocolate, its flavor tends to fade when bolstered by flour and blasted with heat.  Layer cake solves the problem nicely, by smuggling in those pillows of curd.  But what for a cake with no contraband?  

Here's what: make Matt Lewis' lemon bundt cake.  Do not pass go.  Let me know what you think.  I think it's the cat's pajamas.  Also, I've officially ended my search.

 

 

Lewis is co-founder of the famed Red Hook bakery, Baked, and, it seems, a lemon whisperer.  Lewis works every angle in the lemon book to amplify the fruit's bling and zing.  Then, he writes a few new chapters.  The zest in the batter—ten(!) lemons' worth—is rubbed into the sugar, before either are beaten in.  The sugar becomes midwife to the lemon, delivering its essential oils throughout the batter.  Clever.  Also, he calls for two tablespoons of pure lemon extract.  I didn't know pure lemon extract existed, in December.  I'm now halfway through my second bottle.

There are other funny bits to the batter, funny enough they first gave me pause.  Confectioner's sugar?  Eggs and yolks?  Unbleached and cake flour? Butter and oil and heavy cream?  Really?    

 

 

Really.  As really as the wonky technique, which defies all science and logic. Where's the all-important creaming of butter and sugar?  The individual addition of eggs, for lift?  What's with this dump and stir?  Whence its loft? How will the darn thing ever rise?  Is he What is he thinking? 

Except apparently I'm illiterate in the ways of lemon cake, at least of the Be All, End All variety.  Because this cake bakes up so high that it buckles, with a crumb gold and fine as any I've eaten.  And yet—and this is deeply important—strong enough to withstand a downpour. 

 

 

Like all the best lemon cakes, this one involves a syrup of lemon juice, cut with sugar.  This syrup is brushed over the bundt's just-baked curves, which instantly dials the volume to high.

Well, originally, to medium.  

I don't really do medium.  

So I took, early on, to doubling the syrup, and doubling the drizzle, and inundating the cake.  I perforate the thing like a soaker hose—a #2 knitting needle is ideal, though a thin skewer makes a fine substitute—first on the still-hot exposed underside, later over the peaks and valleys.  I douse each surface as it becomes available, applying layer after layer (after layer) of syrup.  The pinholes work like volcanic conduits, in reverse, funneling the goods right down to the core.  That's the theory, anyway.  I've done this before with many a cake, and usually, the results are sad.  Soggy.  Sodden.  Sometimes dreadful. Not this time.  The cake held.  

 

 

The cake held, and drank every double drop, saturating each cranny with bright citric kick.   The edges are sharpest; the center, still pointed; the whole, like a lemon, masquerading as cake.  The glaze (there's glaze) is unnecessary, and excellent.  The texture, somehow, still textbook tender.  It works.  

It's not much to look at, especially sliced, where even its curves end up looking like squat.  It pinch-hits for birthdays, if you add candles, and undemanding guests of honor inclined toward supernatural childcare feats.  But bundts are, at heart, everyday things, for slivering and whittling over a week.  And this bundt, this smug humble bomb of a bundt, might just be a week's finest moment.  If nothing else, it guarantees a small burst of sun, no matter what the weather week brings.

 

Holy Grail Lemon Cake
adapted from Matt Lewis, via Food and Wine, December 2012  
equipment: 10" bundt pan 

My only adaptations to Lewis' genius formula were to use salted butter, double the lemon syrup, and tweak the glaze slightly, for added lemon and less drip. The initial blitzing of sugar and zest releases the lemon's essential oils into the sugar, and eliminates all trace of peel.  I like the effect of both, and find a quick rinse cleans the bowl, but feel free to skip, if rushed.  (Lewis' original called for rubbing the two together with fingers, a fine alternative.)  I use this lemon extract.  Artificial extract is completely different, and not a good substitute.  If you wish to leave out the rum, which adds a nice edge, simply substitute additional lemon juice, in both cake and syrup.  

Don't let the length of this recipe fool you.  It comes together quickly, and the extra elements (syrup, glaze) can be made in minutes while the cake's baking.  

Cake
1 1/2 cups all-purpose, unbleached flour
1 1/2 cups cake flour
1 tablespoon baking powder
1 teaspoon salt
2 3/4 cups confectioners' sugar
1/3 cup lightly packed, finely grated lemon zest (from 10 organic lemons)
1/2 cup canola oil
3 large eggs
3 large egg yolks
2 sticks salted butter, melted and cooled
3 tablespoons dark rum
2 tablespoons pure lemon extract
3/4 cup heavy cream

Lemon Syrup
1/2 cup granulated sugar
1/2 cup freshly squeezed lemon juice (from zested lemons)
2 tablespoons dark rum

Glaze
1 - 1 1/2 cups confectioners' sugar
1 tablespoons freshly squeezed lemon juice (from zested lemons)
1-2 teaspoons pure lemon extract
1 teaspoon pure almond extract 

Make the cake:   
Preheat oven to 350°.  Generously coat the interior of a 10-inch bundt pan with butter (or baking spray), and flour, tapping to release excess.  Place oven rack in middle position.

In a medium bowl, whisk together all-purpose flour, cake flour, baking powder and salt.  Place confectioners' sugar and lemon zest in the bowl of a food processor, and pulse 15-10 times, to pulverize zest and incorporate its oils into the sugar.  In the bowl of a standing mixer fitted with the paddle attachment, add sugar, lemon zest, canola oil and cooled, melted butter, and mix at medium speed until well combined, 1 minute.  Beat in whole eggs, egg yolks, rum, and lemon extract, until just incorporated, 1 minute.  Reduce speed to low and beat, in 3 alternating batches of dry and wet, the flour mixture and the heavy cream, mixing until just barely incorporated.  Scrape down sides, and finish any final mixing by hand.  

Scrape batter into prepared bundt pan, and smooth surface slightly.  Bake on the middle rack for about 1 hour, checking at 50 minutes.  Cake is finished when a toothpick inserted at the deepest point emerges with a clean, damp crumb.  Other clues: cake will begin to pull away from sides, will have risen dramatically and buckled, and the cracked center will no longer be shiny.  Also, you will nearly faint from the scent.  Remove cake from oven and let cool on a rack for a few minutes, while you make the syrup...   

Make the Lemon Syrup:
In a small saucepan, combine sugar, lemon juice and rum and bring just to a low boil.  Turn heat down slightly to maintain a strong simmer, and stir until sugar dissolves, 3-4 minutes.  Let cool slightly.  

Douse the Cake:  
10 minutes after the cake emerges from the oven, while still in the pan, poke cake all over the exposed surface, deep enough to nearly but not quite hit the bottom.  A clean #2 knitting needles works beautifully, as does a long, thin wooden skewer.  50 pokes is none too few.  Slowly, with a tablespoon or pastry brush, drizzle syrup over the exposed surface, as well as down the sides of the tin, waiting for the syrup to soak in before adding more. Repeat a few times, leaving a few minutes between applications, until cake becomes less thirsty, and slows its soaking speed.  You will use 1/2 - 2/3 of the syrup in this fashion. Wait 15 minutes, then carefully invert cake onto a cooling rack.  With your needle or skewer, perforate the cake from the newly exposed surface, top and sides.  Slowly, in small patient batches, brush remaining glaze over top and sides of cake.  Set aside to dry and cool completely, about 2 hours.

Make and Apply Glaze:
In a medium bowl, whisk together 1 cup of the powdered sugar, lemon juice, almond extract, and 1 teaspoon of the lemon extract, until thoroughly combined and lump-free.  Taste, and add additional lemon extract, if you wish.  Texture should be very thick, like corn syrup or pancake batter.  A too-thin glaze will slide right off the cake.  Add some or all of of the remaining 1/2 cup of sugar, as needed, and whisk to combine.  Slowly and evenly, pour glaze over the completely cooled cake. There may be extra; save to serve on the side.  Let glaze set, 15-20 minutes, then slice into wedges and serve.

Cake keeps beautifully, covered or well-wrapped, for 4-5 days.  Good luck with that.    

just go with it

Last Friday, we woke up to ice.  It was our second ice storm in our four years here, and not half as dramatic as the first.  But it was slick enough to merit a 6 a.m. robo-call, announcing that school would begin two hours late. 

And slick enough to get a second call, ten minutes later, announcing, actually, school was cancelled. 

Our collective first instinct was to hoot and holler, as we've not had so much as a schedule rumple since 2011.  Snow's common here.  Snow days, not so much.

My second instinct, naturally, was to Make Something of The Day.  After all, it was a school day, and it seemed a shame to skip learning entirely.  Also, I had planned to scale a small mountain of To Do's by mid-morning.  Teachable moment!  Here we are!  Let's get to work!  Master multiplication!  Practice skip counting!  Osmose gummy bears!  Refresh our laundry skills!  Rah!  Rah! Ra...thud.

 

(Yes, I really am as fun as all that.  I was a rain cloud in a former life.  Parade duty.  Permanent station.)  

To be fair, their second instincts were to play Minecraft all day!  In their pajamas!  Perhaps breaking for lunch!  Perhaps not!  

 

 

Thud.  Thud.  

Two for two.  

Hmn.  

 

 

(To be clear, there was also no snow on this snow day.  No powder to jump in, or stir into cream, or pack into igloos, or burn off steam.  Just ice, a thin slickery glaze, all over everything.  And strict orders to stay indoors.

Heal one leg before breaking another, I say!)     

 

So we did what one does in such situations.  Fumbled.  Angled.  Lobbied. Stumbled.  Grumbled.  Made concessions.  Compromises.  Came around. Dumped every last Playmobil on the floor, to provide a little order to our plastic, and our morning.  Mostly, we (me) got over ourselves (myself), and decided to just go with it, the crazy groove of a windfall day.   

You know how this story ends, of course.  

They played Minecraft for hours.

Okay, an hour and a half.    

And homework was completed.  And science experiments, commenced.  And Cautionary Tales read, in honor of Edward Gorey's 88th.  And Flexahexagons attempted, after watching (and re-watching) the inimitable Vi Hart.  We never did (haven't yet) mastered the clever reversible hexagon.  We once again found ourselves poking each other out of the way to watch.  (Sigh.  How I heart Khan Academy.  Screen time none of us can get enough of.)

Obsolete words were looked up, to fill a minute, and written up on the blackboard, to see what stuck.  Five year olds were later overheard telling their brothers to "Stop that blattering!".  (Next up: Bossy.)  Animals were arranged according to habitat, grasslands versus dessert versus North American prairies. Then re-arranged, according to whim, seals in the Serrengheti, elephants on the plains.  A new food chain was identified, one which begins with alligator-eating hippos, and ends with fish who devour kangaroos. 

We remembered to laugh.  

We remembered to eat chocolate.

We even remembered to fold towels.

Correlation, causation, you decide.  

Chocolate, of course, doesn't depend on snow days, nor does it guarantee good results.  Although, if it's this chocolate, it at least guarantees good spirits, and that is at least half way there.  

This homely slab may be a hard sell.  I realize this.  It's dull, drab, brown.  It has all the curb appeal of an old sock.  An old sock that rarely lasts forty-eight hours, around here.   

This particular old sock is the Dense Chocolate Loaf Cake from my dog-eared, batter-splattered How to Be a Domestic Goddess.  It's a real curiosity of a cake. It contains almost twice as much sugar as flour, and yet has a mellow, understated sweet.  Every crumb positively pulses with chocolate, and yet there are only four ounces of the stuff.  The batter is unlike any I've made, thin, sloshy, the weight of light cream.  This would be because it includes a cup and change of water.  Water.  Who adds water to cake?  (All the smart people, actually.  Jess does it.  Joy does it.  David Lebovitz does it, too.  After all, it was his gingered triumph that first taught me to love a good water-logged cake.)  The finished loaf sinks miserably, minutes after leaving the oven, more pothole than pageant winner.  

But man, what a pothole.    

Despite (or due to) its odd ratios and ingredients, this bakes up into one wickedly addictive loaf.  Partial credit goes to that pile of dark brown sugar, one of chocolate's best, least recognized sidekicks.  Brown sugar ups chocolate's game every time, expanding its range, amplifying its tone, transforming its soprano off-the-shelf sweet deep into baritone territory.  I don't know how that works.  Only that it does.  Molasses makes chocolate man up, somehow.    

The soft sugar also girds against dry, that dreaded fate of so many loaf cakes. The cup-plus of boiling water?  Catapults this cake into a world where ... dry?  What dry?  Indeed, it's the texture of this thing that astounds.  Damp and airy and rich and light, it behaves unlike any other cake I've eaten.  It is heavy, literally, heavy in the hand, with a weight that is real, and palpable.  But it isn't dense, or fudgey, or squidgy, or even particularly rich.  It's heavy, but not heavy.  Understand?

Custardy.  It is custardy.  Chocolate custard, convinced to play cake.

Two last things.  Friday, after lunch of apples and peanut butter, we acted on impulse and added a schmear.  No butter, no sugar, no frosting pretensions, just salted creamy, straight from the jar.  HOLY (as my friend Kate would say) SMOKERS.  It was either my worst or best idea, ever.  Check back in December, see how many slabs I've pounded.  (Don't say I didn't warn you.)

Also, we call it Brownie Bread.  You bake it in a loaf pan, after all.  Plus, we first baked it years ago, after sampling something so named in a shop, and wanting to make it again at home.  This bread isn't really like that bread; it's infinitely better, and what stuck around.  Dense Chocolate Loaf Cake is accurate enough, but doesn't sound half as reasonable.  You, of course, can call it what you choose.  But for my money, I rather like being able to offer up a snack of milk and "bread".  I suggest you just go with it.

Brownie Bread
adapted from How to Be a Domestic Goddess, by Nigella Lawson

edited 5/17/13 to add: my loaf pans are slightly oversized, with an 8-cup capacity, which is ideal for this loaf.  If yours are smaller (6- or 7- cup capacity; measure by filling with water, to the very top), you may wish to divert some of the batter into a custard cup, muffin pan, etc., to prevent spill-over.  

1 cup salted butter, at room temperature
1 2/3 cup dark brown sugar
2 large eggs, beaten
1 tablespoon vanilla extract
2 teaspoons instant espresso or coffee granules
1/2 teaspoon kosher salt
4 ounces good, bittersweet chocolate, melted
1 1/3 cups unbleached, all-purpose flour
1 teaspoon baking soda
1 cup plus 2 tablespoons boiling water

Preheat oven to 375° F.  Line a baking sheet with parchment or foil to catch drips.  Butter or spray a 9x5" loaf tin, and line the width with a strip of parchment, overhanging the long sides by a few inches on each side (handles, for easy removal later).  Measure vanilla, salt and coffee granules into a small bowl, and stir to dissolve.  Set aside. 

In the bowl of a stand mixer, cream the butter and brown sugar.  Scrape down sides, add one egg, beat well, then add the other, scraping and mixing again, to combine.  Add vanilla mixture, and mix to combine.  Scrape sides, and fold in melted, slightly cooled chocolate, just to combine.  Add flour and baking soda, and mix, just to combine.  Add boiling water carefully, slowly, scraping sides a few times, until incorporated.  The batter will be very, very loose, thinner than pancake batter, closer to light cream.  This is right.  Place lined tin on the lined baking sheet, pour batter into tin, and carefully place in preheated oven.  Bake for 30 minutes, then turn heat down to 325° F, and continue to cook another 15-25 minutes.  It is done when the center is no longer shiny, loose and wobbly, but instead matte, just set, and smelling wonderful.  A knife in the center will not return the standard dry crumb, but neither do you want a long streak of batter—very damp crumbs are ideal.

Remove tin to a rack, and leave to cool completely, or at least one hour.  The center will cave.  This also is right.  Remove from tin, either by inverting, or gently removing with parchment "handles".  Peel away parchment, slice into thick tiles, and apply peanut butter only at your own risk.

Brownie bread keeps brilliantly for 4-5 days.   

 

a real deficit

You probably noticed, long before I did.  How gracious of you to keep mum.

Me, I didn't realize the gravity of the situation until late Monday morning, around 11:58 a.m.  Monday is our quick-turn day, when we come home for lunch, only to turn around again.  We don't do this often, probably because slow-turns are much more my speed.  But Mondays, it makes sense, it's worth it, so we do it.  Even if, sometimes, we need a little help.  Last Monday would be one of those sometimes.

Which is why, just before noon, I was rummaging fiercely, poking about the chocolate cupboard.  And why I worked my way through three squares of a seriously mediocre bar.  And one hefty chonk of weak-kneed candy.  And half a bag of Reeses Pieces.  A King sized bag, dug from the recesses, still haunting our kitchen from last Halloween.

I don't even like Reeses Pieces.  

I don't even like chocolate all that much.  At least not as much as would be required to inhale such quantities of such lackluster junk.   

Which is when I realized what you no doubt noticed a while back: there's been a real deficit in the chocolate department, around here.  Nuts and seeds are nice, of course, and soups and salads, my mainstay, but still.  Seriously?  What gave?

Specifics, mostly.  We've been awash in sweets, birthday cakes and because cakes and ice cream pies.  There were pots of rice pudding.  Éclairs. Cupcakes. Two batches of chocolate chip cookies.  Maybe three.  Nothing, in other words, that fit the bill.

The bill, in this case, being the need for grab-and-go, jar-friendly, chocolate-pocked somethings.  After all, drop cookies are fair-weather friends, really only worth eating on day one.  (And rarely, anyway, surviving to day two).  Layer cake eaten out of hand's a disaster.  Éclairs on the road: awkward, at best.  Ice cream pie?  Rice pudding?  So not pocket-friendly.  

Ergo, desperate rummage.  Ergo, salted blondies.    

There is, after all, only one way to right the wrong of consuming so very much very, very bad chocolate.  Namely, make a batch of much better chocolate, in order to avert such disasters in future.  Anyway, we had a full fifteen minutes. Plenty of time to do blondies up right.

Blondies can be many things, most of them, not right at all.  Anemic brownies. Sawdusty pucks.  Treats that do sweet with the subtlety of a sledgehammer. Fortunately, there's a well-established formula for good blondies, which has for some time been my starting line: one cube butter, one cup brown sugar, one egg, one cup flour, flavorings.  Haiku simple, guaranteed good.  It is syllables fifteen, sixteen and seventeen—flav•or•ings—which, I've found, separate good from grand.  

Blondies are butterscotch bars, first and foremost, which means we must take their sugared soul seriously.  It's our responsibility to keep them honest, to honor their dark side, to uphold their edge.  To this end, I've taken to doubling the vanilla, which rounds out the sweet and helps it glow.  One convex teaspoon of powdered espresso—not enough to scream coffee, not even to whisper—neatly plays up brown sugar's swarthy shadows.  And salt, twice, thrice what is often called for, is the tension all blondies need.  

Salt is the seat of a blondie's power, the backbone, the necessary conflict in the plot.  Under-salted blondies have all the draw of underwhelming stories, dull, tedious, flat.  I want blondies that eat the way Laura Ingalls Wilder reads: taut, warm, compelling, enveloping, inviting, heart-thumping, page-turning, wonder-filled.  Thrilling in small, merry, meaningful ways, grounded by just enough gravitas.  These, for me, are all that.

I mention for me, because I should add that I like my blondies bordering on fudge.  I bake them in an especially low oven, rap them mid-bake to quell uppity ambitions, then chill them to seal the dense deal.  All of this results in a bar that sits on the cusp between cookie and confection.  There is little crumb to speak of, the loft giving way to a rich, just-set squidge.  If you favor a more traditional texture, a bit of lift, the odd crumble, bake your bars at a more moderate 350°, let cool to room temp, and call it a day.  

Either way, they fill a cookie jar nicely, keeping their wits about them for days. Good to grab on a late Monday morning, or Wednesday post-supper, or Friday, before bed.  Right around Sunday afternoon, however, you may notice a real deficit in your jar, empty again save longing and crumbs.  At least the fix is clear.     

Butterscotch Blondies, Salted and Loaded
adapted from Mark Bittman, How to Cook Everything and Deb Perlman, SmittenKitchen
Yield: approximately 75 approximately 1 x 1 1/2" bars 

1-2 cups toasted walnuts or pecans are excellent here, though I've yet to convince my constituency.  If using ordinary table salt (vs. kosher), reduce quantity to 1 teaspoon.  We use a mix of chips, ordinarily one heaping cup of semisweet chocolate, plus half cups each of Guittard butterscotch and white chocolate.  Lacking Guittard, I use semisweet, only.  

For a bar with more loft and crumb, bake at 350° for 20-25 minutes.  This recipe halves neatly; simply divide by two and bake in an 8x8" pan, checking for doneness 1-2 minutes sooner.

1 cup (2 sticks) salted butter, melted and cooled slightly
2 cups light brown sugar
2 eggs
1 tablespoon + 1 teaspoon vanilla
1 generous teaspoon instant espresso powder or coffee granules
1 1/2 teaspoons kosher salt
2 cups unbleached, all-purpose flour
2 cups semisweet chocolate, butterscotch, and/or good white chocolate chips  

Preheat oven to 325°, and place rack in middle position.  Line a 9x13" baking pan with parchment, length and breadth, allowing enough to overhang edges an inch on all sides.  These handles will allow you to release the entire bar easily, once baked.  

In a medium bowl, mix melted butter and brown sugar, stirring well with a whisk to dissolve sugar.  Add eggs, one at a time, mixing well between additions, to combine.  Add vanilla, espresso powder and salt, and mix well, to combine.  Add flour, and stir gently, just to combine.  Add chips, stir with a rubber spatula to disperse, then scrape mixture into prepared pan.  Smooth surface.

Bake blondies 25-28 minutes.  If you prefer a dense, fudgey blondie, remove pan after 15 minutes, give it a few sharp raps on the side of the stove, and return it to the oven to finish baking.  Blondies are done when the center is set, and the surface is a pale shade of butterscotch, matte, crackled, and beginning to pull away from the batter below.  The standard knife test won't work here; you'll get sticky results.  Visual cues are best.  Remove pan from oven, and cool completely, 1-2 hours.  For an especially dense blondie, cool in the refrigerator for a few hours, before cutting.  

Blondies keep beautifully, airtight, for 5 days.