Throw Back: More Quacky Historical Cakes

Even I'm starting to get a little bored of cake, heaven forbid....

As suggested by the last few blog posts, my ~leap~ into baking was really a small, tepid, toe-poke into baking, masked gratuitously by colors and extravagant decorations. This is no different. Albeit slightly more organized. Hence, we have here a funfetti birthday cake with rice krispy ducks, probably cream cheese frosting water, chocolate cake dirt, peanut mms eggs, and a starburst pink blanket (which I think is adorable, but others seemed to find it gross as I recall). A team of three, one high school graduate and two upper classmen, was required for the attention to detail required for those ducks and that perfectly sprinkled layer of dirt to the right.

There was a lot of free time in the summer after high school before college where I tried to squeeze in some last memories that embodied the ~peace, luv, happyness~ glow of teenage-hood. In more modern terms, I'm referring to things like justgirlythings and other mildly pathetic life aspirations written in curly script over a sunset silhouette of your standard photostock white, young couple wearing hipster clothes. Seriously. I went biking on a cruiser in the middle of the night with a camera. If that doesn't scream stereotypes, I don't know what does. 

Perfectly sliced watermelon lit up by the afternoon sun filtering through the kitchen window perhaps? It's funny that I haven't made a colorful cake in eons. At some point I started rejecting the notion of heavily decorated desserts because often they're a lie hiding the subpar taste underneath. Like, what is the point of a perfectly-piped rose if it tastes like the most subpar Costco buttercream? But, I don't know, looking at this cake, I'm interested in reviving the-decorating-for-5-year-old trend in my early cakes. But no seriously, this cake was inspired by a picture book about a baby duck and its cozy blanket. Oh look, that was basically the title.

This cake has a surprising number of cute details, especially given the fact that I found multiple pictures of my dog and faux-artsy shots of a lamp in the same album that I assume were taken while waiting for cake to cool amongst other tasks. Well, maybe all the distractions and breaks only helped to further enrich our creativity.

Then again, clearly some of these decorations were not well thought out. Like, the concept of gravity and density seems to have been forgotten in this instance. Unless that egg is magically empty (which would be legit traumatic for the duck), that green shelled-egg should be at the bottom of the pond of a cake. And if anyone is thinking "whatever! its cake! it's not supposed to be scientifically accurate! I mean look at your ducks and multi colored egg shells!" I raise you these cakes.

Throw Back: Teacher Appreciation via Cupcake Appreciation

This edition of old food photos brought to you by June 2010 and high school graduation. 

You know how people talk about how hindsight is always 20/20? Or how things always look better through rose tinted glasses (pretty sure I've used that cliche before on this blog)? Well, I have a serious case of that. Anyways, there's been a lot of reflecting and skepticism going on in my life right now, made more complicated by the fact that I know that my opinions will probably 100% change in the next 5 years. 

I mean just look at high school. I was by no means a cheerleader or a cool kid in high school (#stereotypes), but if you asked me today about high school, I would probably say that high school was a pretty good time for me. God forbid that I am part of the cliche though and I've already hit my peak (but seriously, it's a worrying thought when you're currently near your low). Yet, if you went back 4 years ago and asked me about high school, I would have probably cited the aimless wandering at lunchtime to find a place or friends to eat with and the already growing distance between my two closest friends who started having relationships with boys as reasons I couldn't wait to get out of high school. This sentiment hit quite a peak around prom/graduation where dateless me had to leave prom crying after 5 minutes of just standing there feeling ridiculous even if though I brought along my close junior friend as my "date." Then I had to spend "grad nite" at Disneyland hardcore 3rd wheeling the entire night, essentially being babysat by one of my friends + her respective boyfriend. So yea, I would have easily said high school was terrible back then. But today? I would have easily cited the high quality public school education I received and the many formative social and leadership skills I learned while running cross country as reasons why high school was great.

Likewise, I'm at that point in my college education where reflecting back also brings up many of the unpleasant memories in addition to the formative ones. The thoughts of having to go through commencement being told over and over again that these were the best times of your life, how this college, this class is unique and how the everlasting ties of college friendship will stand the test of time makes me want to puke. This probably is highly disconcerting, depressing, even insulting to many of you, and I apologize if it is because I by no means want everyone to think college was a terrible time. But if high school was any indication, I am positive that in a few years I will fondly look back over these experiences. That's the wonderful thing about the faultiness that is human memory. Overtime I'll eventually filter out the small things that annoy me now and end up with a coherent memory of college that doesn't cause the conflicting, dissonant thoughts currently making this post nonsense. Or, you know, tuition will continue skyrocketing to a healthy 100k a year as classes continue to increase with fewer faculty hirings so that geez, 50k was a real bargain and maybe I should be grateful that my hardworking, generous parents only had to spend a small house to educate me.

I suppose the overall point I am trying to boil down is that being forced to be grateful (and forced to be grateful in a highly specific, mass-mongering way) only leads to more bitter resentment, even if it's resentment that may be unfair in the long run. Given time, the gratitude that I'm sure all fine institutions of learning probably deserve in helping people understand things like, creationism is a hoax or that the earth revolves around the sun, will be given. Though, evidently, they did not teach me how to control my run on sentences. And as another general note, I'm just tired of the cult-atmosphere that seems to engender any positive experience made at college.

Plus, when gratitude means something, it's certainly worth much more. Such as these fancy little cupcakes that I stayed up till 2 AM on the last day of classes to finish for my 12th grade era teachers. Sure, cupcakes can't fund a pizza study break, or some highly contrived, unnecessarily expensive key system (dude, getting rid of your mouse problem >>>>> important than helping students who forget their keys. one is a health hazard and the other is not), but I like to think that when it comes to showing gratitude, it's the sentiment behind the donor's action that matters, not the participation percentage or monetary sum.

Throw Back: The First Cake Bake

I've hit the inevitable point in the semester where I no longer have any baking projects from winter break or enough of a social life to have done any blog worthy fine dining. Well, I had some beer themed cupcakes, but maybe I'll talk about that later. But, brace yourselves for some faux throw back friday (?) posts and if you're extra lucky, guest posts from friends (friends who may/may not actually read this, wink wink nudge nudge). 

The fact that I spend a lot of my time thinking about food and looking at food, and now documenting food would suggest that I might actually have some sort of talent or taste for fine dessert and dining. But thats a big 'ol lie. Just like those food photos I discussed last week. A lot of other "foodies" (ugh that word) have sepia-toned memories of cooking in the kitchen with their moms or dads. There were those classic family recipes passed from generations downward, or maybe a favorite pie a certain uncle always brought to holiday dinners. As they got older, their parents started letting them help out in the kitchen, teaching them the little tricks and hints not written on the recipe cards. Before long, whelp, there's a highly accomplished 18 year old baker who can make some serious macarons while I scratch my head about why the hell its so important to have 35 folds versus 36 (true story).

The point is, I did not grow up in a household where food or baking or whatever was an essential part of the family culture. Sure, my mom did do some fancy baking here and there as she rotated through experimenting with each classic housewife hobby. The only family tradition we may have had food-wise was probably dumplings, which as a highly Americanized kid, I did not particularly start enjoying until college. Seriously, I hated the slimy texture of dumplings. 

So it came as a mild surprise when I was in high school when it was thing for people to bake treats to give to their friends at school for their birthdays. It was equally a symbol of popularity for the recipient and the gift giver. For the recipient, you truly had the best of friends if not only your treats were homemade, but were in such an abundant quantity that you needed your friends to trail you all day to help carry all your treats from class to class. For the gift giver, you were truly the kindest, most talented of friends if you made a beautiful cake with meticulously placed toothpicks on top to hold up that perfectly folded saran wrap and keep it from touching the frosting.

To my friends in high school, it was a surprise that I had never baked a cake. Surely a sophomore, about to get her permit, would have turned on the family oven at some point? So in a secret ploy to force people on my cross country team to be my friends, I told them that they had to show me how to make a cake. And thus, some high school friendships and my obsession with cake was born. Not from a fine, time honored tradition of making ~memories~ in the kitchen, but rather from a teenage plan to become cool.

As you can tell, we started out with the basics. A yellow box cake mix (not even funfetti!), and what looks like the distinctive goopiness that is the oh-so-delicious cream creese frosting amplified with lots of food dye. Now this cake + those cupcakes were baked oh, like 5 years ago? Back when I was getting ready to hit the peak and prime of my glorified high school running career. So the fact that there's a stick figure running on a cake is moderately less insane given those circumstances. Not sure if my decorating skillz have really improved since then. They've certainly gotten much more boring though.

Green Tea Cupcakes: A Reminder For Scales

Photography is a pretty duplicitous medium. Or rather, all images are duplications of an already existing reality or a fragment of the imagination brought to reality by a new medium.

Most notably, we discuss the distorted reality images present in the context of body photoshopping in celebrity magazine covers and spreads. You know, the extra brushing Scarlett Johansson for being The Black Widow even if she's already hotter than 99% of the general population and badass to boot (well, as the black widow). And J Law with all her photo brushing because she's apparently "fat by hollywood standards (her quote)." But anyways, I think food photography is another nice reminder (HA that transition was terrible) that the physical appearance of something or someone does not reflect on other sensory details that define a person/something. You just have to think back to your 3rd grade cliches like "Looks can be deceiving" or "Never judge a book by its cover." 

 Likewise, food isn't just the color, the shape or apparent texture of a picture. Food is more importantly defined by its actual tastes and textures and how certain combinations excite different sensory paths. I mean, photoshopping people is one thing, but the lengths food photography goes to in order to create the image of ~fresh~ or ~steaming~ or ~crispy~ or ~fluffy~ ect is mind boggling. There are stabilizers injected into meat to keep it from limping, blow torches to achieve maximal burnt colors, meticulously placed sesame seeds for the most visually appeal spread of seeds:bun ratio. All before you even make it to the freaking computer and boot up photoshop CS10000.
While for advertising, food presentation is obviously paramount, I do think food blogging can chill a little with the picture perfect food. Visual presentation is certainly important for food (hence plating!), but I think its silly when it comes at the cost of producing something that actually tastes good. I speak from semi-personal experience that 1) pretty pictures do not mean that X blogger's recipe was actually that good, and 2) these pictures that I post are a lie that involve an embarrassing number of awkward repositioning for "optimal natural light" and "clean backgrounds" ect.

 I mean, these pictures actually aren't that good, but sometimes you'll catch a behind the scene post from a food-blogger and there is literally a mini-photo studio by some random window, or on some random rustic looking box that ISN'T EVEN IN THE KITCHEN. I guess I'm more of a fan of the in-the-moment pictures, the ones you take at the scene of the crime with sticky wisps of powdered sugar lingering on the counter, bowls with scraped out batter lingering on the sides. I don't know, I try to be as sterile as possible when I bake, but sometimes things just get complicated and you end up with some batter on the counter. Pristine pictures give the false impression that I am a far better baker than I actually am, which gives unrealistic expectations when I attempt random-ass baking projects. Like these green tea cupcakes for example. I mean you can already semi-tell that these cupcakes were a bit overcooked by the dark-brown green tint. And to top it all off, you can kinda see that these cupcakes were on the dense side, mostly likely due to a combination of overbaking, using too much flour, and/or mixing too much. Common issues I need to resolve in my cupcake baking game still.

The basic TL;DR is: food pictures can be pretty, but looks are deceiving. These cupcakes were too dense so use yo scale and don't overmix.
Cupcake recipe from Cupcake Project (she also has a red bean frosting I want to try one day!) and cream cheese frosting from Oishii Treats.

And in other news, I have a tumblr (awkwardplatters.tumblr.com) dedicated to food pictures ya'll can follow if you want to look at actually nice pictures of food.

Butterbeer Ice Cream: Some Book Magic Turned Edible

My obsession with making ice cream continues with a slight turn towards my other favorite fan girl-ing interest--fantasy and sci-fi. I'm proud to say that I'm part of that group of kiddos that had the special privilege of growing up with Harry Potter. I take it as an assumption that anyone I meet that is my age has read Harry Potter. And if they haven't, I will happily give them either my paperback set, or my Chinese set if they read Chinese (unlike me LOL). If they want to read the British version of the first book, I have that as well. The hardcovers I can't loan out for two reasons. One, the third book's spine is broken after being read a few too many times out of love (there could be some excellent, albeit somewhat weird book reading and love comparisons going on here, but I'll just leave this song from Stars instead). The second reason I can't loan them out is the typical sentiment reason. I have certain memories relate to the purchase/reading of each of them that I will list below because its my food blog and if I want to have a list about my Harry Potter memories on it, I can. 

1. Sorcerer's Stone: Thank goodness for Scholastic Book orders or it might have taken me a lot longer to find these books.
2. Chamber of Secrets: Birthday present from my mother. She hid it at the top of our kitchen cabinet (ha! a food connection!) and gave it to me during my very special sleepover birthday with my (I think) three closest friends at the time. I still talk to two of them (if I'm remembering the right people).
3. Prisoner of Azkaban: Well, as I noted above, I destroyed the spine of this one. Probably my favorite out of the series.
4. Goblet of Fire: I read this once while sitting on the ledge near my family's dining table while my parents were having a dinner party. I think I wanted attention. The chapter "Padfoot Returns" smelled really bad for some reason.
5.  Order of the Phoenix: Remember when these books would come out and you'd just see a giant stack of them in Costco on a wood flatbed? Those were amazing times that solidified my love for Costco.
6. Half Blood Prince: Another one I bought at Costco and started reading while in Costco.
7. Deathly Hallows: Couldn't wait to go to Costco to buy it so I preordered on Amazon. Had to volunteer the day it was release and forced my sister to finish reading it during the day so that I could read it when I got back. Finished around 2 or 3 in the morning I think. 

Now that I have some of the theoretical readers of this blog in a fantasy book-induced nostalgia, let's talk ice cream. Or rather, foods inspired by fictional works first. It's somewhat amusing to think that a magical food/drink such as butterbeer has an "official recipe" or "real taste" in the real world. A fictional drink item can't possibly have an official or real taste if its taste, textures, smells are described by a few well-chosen words filled in with rich imagination that differs from one reader to the next. The closest you could possibly get to "real" is the author's interpretation of the food. JK Rowling can taste the butterbeer at the Warner Brother's Studio Tour or at Universal Studios Orlando and say yes, this is the warm butterbeer that Harry would wrap his hands around while sitting amongst friends in Madame Rosmerta's or yes, this is the drink that created a lifelong addiction problem for Winky the house-elf. But, like any interpretation of a book, be it the themes associated with its imagery and diction or the relationships between characters, do readers have to accept that as the canon version of butterbeer? If people can actively and maybe even justly ship JohnLock, whose to say you can't have your own non-canon version of butterbeer that can get Winky drunk just as effectively? 

 

I pose that somewhat gratuitous question because I'm actually not a huge fan of the "real" butterbeer that I tried at both the Warner Brother's Studio Tour and in Orlando. It was really quite sweet and did not taste like the happy memories of a snowy Hogsmeade that I tend to associated it with. Plus, in the real world, I've never been a huge fan of butterscotch. However, I was a huge fan of 1) the pumpkin juice (duh), and 2) the frozen butterbeer. Frozen butterbeer at the Harry Potter theme park is more like a slushy with cream than something actually frozen. But since slushy butterbeer tasted better than chilled liquid butterbeer, the logical conclusion is that the colder the butterbeer, the better it is (based on a total of two data points of course). Hence, butterbeer ice cream.

Since we're talking about official/canon/real, it doesn't seem that the "official" recipe used by Universal or Warner Brother's is actually available online. There are dozens of different homemade versions of various difficulties and taste, so clearly lots of noncanon butterbeers are out there. I mean, we're talking butterbeer ice cream here, a treat that was definitely not mentioned in the novels, so I'm not even sure why I'm still amusing myself by trying to describe fiction-inspired food under canon/non-canon labels. Maybe its food commentary on the heated debates fandoms sometimes get into over the merits of maintaining canon in fanwork.

  

Recipe from Sweet Silly Chic. The butterscotch/butterbeer sauce used in her recipe is from a separate butterbeer recipe originally from The Huffington Post. This is by far one of the more complicated recipes for butterbeer I've seen, so I wouldn't necessarily suggest that this is the best recipe if you want a quick easy version of just the drink for parties. The butterscotch sauce did work very nicely for the ice cream though. I will note that the rum extract might be important for getting the full butterbeer taste. I didn't have any rum extract or dark rum, so I added in some tennessee honey whiskey, which I don't think *actually* did anything. The ice cream tasted more buttery than I would have liked in my butterbeer, but other people in my family seemed to enjoy it. Even my hard to satisfy mother.

Green Tea Ice Cream

This post is coming at the most seasonally inappropriate time ever. The high for the next week is 37, an outlier compared to the average 20 degrees on most days here. I have to wear leggings under my pants. I have to wear god-forbid-boots. I get to slip on frozen over slush and compact snow. It's all quite wonderful. 

While I do think snow is beautiful, I am not a fan of trekking in the cold or of weather that makes cold delicious things like ice cream and salads not ok to eat. I mean, usually I ignore those conventions anyways and still eat the ice cream, but I don't think I've been this cold since Freshmen year. THREE YEARS AGO.

I pine for the days when I will be able to eat ice cream again without completely freezing. Maybe when its 50 degrees again. Although since this is green tea ice cream, you could argue that since tea is sometimes consumed warm, that offsets the cold?

Anyways, this green tea ice cream was heavy on the green tea. This was my first non-egg custard style ice cream and while I was worried at first that might result in ice cream that was less creamy or more icy, it turned out to be just as silky as the other ice creams I've made. While I found the intense flavor to be enjoyable, I can easily understand why others may not enjoy the bitter taste. I'll probably only use 2 or 1.5 tablespoons if I use this recipe next time. And, it'll save me some money on green tea powder. Because, man, that stuff is pretty expensive. But delicious!

Recipe from Just One Cookbook, originally posted by Sweets by Sillianah, adapted from The Perfect Scoop by David Lebovitz and Live Love Pasta

Browned Butter Snickerdoodles: Flat or Puffy?

So its the middle of January. 2014. And I am STILL posting about Thanksgiving 2013. Woohoo!

But don't worry, this is the last Thanksgiving 2013 baking post I will have.

Snickerdoodles are usually a hit in my household due to their pillowly puffiness. I remember making browned butter snickerdoodles back in 2012 that turned out really great, though mildly burnt on top. So it was a little disappointing when these came out so flat. Some quick googling seems to suggest that snickerdoodles are more often flat rather than puffy. But wikipedia doesn't suggest any information about the texture of a traditional snickerdoodle.

Regardless, I think these may have been so flat because there was too much butter, or the butter was too soft. maybe I didn't let it cool enough before incorporating after I browned it? They did taste slightly on the buttery side. I'm pretty sure I let the dough chill for a sufficient amount of time, but I suppose I'll experiment the next time I make snickerdoodles, of whatever variety.

Being the type of person who hates wasting food and would rather risk losing friends by forcing them to consume baked goods than toss things out, these cookies ended up in quite a few desserts. Ice cream sandwiches, speculoos ice cream toppings, ect.

Recipe from Ambitious Kitchen. Ambitious indeed.