Month: January 2020

Cake and Books

~ nancyruth ~ 5 Comments

On this MLK, Jr. Day let us take a moment to remember all those who have lost their lives due to racial inequality. Let us also pause to remember those past and present who have worked and are working to eliminate racial inequality in our world.

Part A

So I broke down and baked a cake! It was a choice between a chocolate Coca-Cola cake or a cream cheese pound cake. Hubby likes pound cake and I did give him the choice. This particular recipe calls for clementine zest. I have not thought of zesting clementines. I zest oranges and lemons and limes. Now that I think of it I waste a lot of zest left on un-zested pieces of fruit. Think of all that zest one could stash in the freezer for later use. I wonder what use there would be for grapefruit zest.

I have a cream cheese pound cake recipe somewhere in my magazine clippings. This particular recipe is from a cookbook I got from the library. This is one published by a southern bakery apparently: Back in the Day Bakery, Made with Love by Cheryl Day and Griffith Day.

  • 1 ½ cups cake flour
  • ½ teaspoon baking powder
  • ¼ teaspoon baking soda
  • ½ teaspoon fine sea salt
  • 1 tablespoon grated clementine zest (2-3 pieces of fruit)
  • 12 tablespoons butter, at room temperature
  • 5 ounces cream cheese, at room temperature
  • 3 large eggs, at room temperature
  • 1 teaspoon vanilla

I was able to let the various ingredients come to room temperature because my daughter called and we got busy planning a camping weekend this summer. They plan to get a large tent. We will be going to a campground where I used to take her and her brother “back in the day”.

Directions for the cake: sift the dry ingredients in a medium bowl and set aside. Mix the zest with the sugar in a small bowl and set aside. In the stand mixer cream the butter and cream cheese on medium speed for 2-3 minutes. Gradually add the sugar mixture and beat until very light and fluffy for 4-5 minutes. Add eggs one at a time, mixing well after each. Add the vanilla and mix to combine. On low speed add the flour mixture in thirds just until incorporated. Finish this by hand.

Pour batter into prepared pan. Oh yeah, a 9 x 5 loaf pan sprayed with cooking spray and lined with parchment paper. And the oven is to be 350 degrees F. Bake for 50-60 minutes. Mine took only 50 minutes. Cool in pan for 20 minutes then remove from pan and parchment paper and cool on rack until completely cool.

Frost with a chocolate ganache or glaze as you would like. The honey chocolate glaze from the cookbook is very rich. I changed it somewhat so here is what I made.

  • ½ cup evaporated milk
  • 2 tablespoons honey
  • ¾ cup dark chocolate chips
  • 1 teaspoon vanilla

Bring the milk to gentle boil in small sauce pan. Put the honey in a small bowl. Pour hot milk onto honey and add chocolate. Stir until melted. Add vanilla. Let cool to thicken slightly. Pour over cake.

Cake has no place in an eating for health and weight loss plan, but needs must! Cake has zeroed out any beginnings of weight loss this week. But at least I did not gain anything! Yay. And truth be told I started out this year 3 pounds less than the beginning of last year.

Part B

Library books! I went to the library after many months of not. I usually download library books onto my Kindle from my library using my computer. No need to step foot into our wonderful town library. But my library card had expired. Ahhh! Luckily the library was still open so off I go. It takes probably 10-15 minutes to get there but I always think of it as 5 minutes away.

There are books everywhere. Next to camping the library may be my second happy place. Well, being outdoors near the river or in the woods might take second place. It is the closest we have here in Connecticut as “the wilderness”.

Back to the library. They have reorganized the lobby so I wander around looking at titles of books, reading book jackets, and breathing in the atmosphere of paper and ink. I pick a few of the offerings in the lobby and head to the stacks. I’m in search of books about food and cooking. I just can’t stay away. I find a book on bread and a bakery cookbook which is the one mentioned in Part A.

I am on my way down the steps of the stacks and think “What about a book on sewing?” I have recently had my sewing machine repaired after gumming it up sewing an applique quilt with my daughter’s childhood through college t-shirts.

The quilt was far from perfect. My daughter had started it years ago with my advice on using heat and bond to attach the cut out designs to a large sheet. Then it languished at her house for years and years. Then I took it from her to fix and complete. It languished in my house for years and years and I finished it for her this Christmas. So now I need some sewing projects. I find a book on improvisational sewing and making simple patterns using a t-shirt. Interesting.

I come home with a tote bag full of books, real books!  I have one biography, one memoir, one mystery, one on sewing, and two on baking. I love books!

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A New Start

~ nancyruth ~ 13 Comments

Hello readers. When I started this blog a few years ago I had never meant it to be all about recipes. Yet somehow it became a recipe blog and I appreciate all of you who follow and read. I sometimes do try out new recipes. I often try out your recipes. And I cook and bake the same things over and over again.

This is a new year and I want to make a new beginning. I titled my blog my kitchen/my thoughts because I like to sit in my kitchen and think. I don’t always think about food but I do a lot. I would like to do my essays in two parts, one is on food and one about thoughts of life. I’m going out on a limb here because I now have to come up with witty, profound, insightful, smart, sharp, keen, knowing, penetrative, and savvy essays. (See how I used a thesaurus there?) And are you all interested in reading these? I personally like to read books that are the memoirs of the author. They usually have a theme and are not a “stream of consciousness” rambling on and on. I am afraid that my thoughts may fall to the latter. We’ll see how it goes, shall we?

Part A: food, and drink, sort of

So I am doing “Dry January” out of curiosity and to jump start a bit of weight loss by eliminating the empty calories in booze. So far, so good. Only one Friday evening after a stress filled work week did I think it would be nice to have a glass of wine. But I refrained. I did read an article about how some folks are not abstaining completely for the month and are still feeling good about their choices. Hubby said to me “You’re an adult; you can have a glass of wine if you want.” This is true but I want to stick to my commitment to myself. I will be breaking this fast on the last day of the month as I have an after work gathering with friends. With that in mind I think I can hold out. The challenge will be if some work colleagues go drinking after work this week to celebrate/mourn the departure of one to another agency.

For a mocktail I was pouring myself a diet ginger ale in a rocks glass. Hubby suggested adding a splash of bitters for a grown-up taste. That worked out well. My new go-to mocktail. I wonder if the bartender will make that for me if I go out to Trivia night this week.

I have ginger beer and club soda in the fridge. I forgot the lemons and limes for the twist. I need to remember some of the drinks I was looking at on the internet. Diet coke with a lemon twist is also a staple.

Part B: on losing weight

In the new year I want to lose weight and get fit. Fit in my mind means exercise more and feel stronger than now. To do that I am counting calories using an app on my phone called Lose-it. I use the basic free app as it is enough for my purposes. I am feeling accountable by using this. Thus far I have gone over my calorie allotment only once this last week.

I was contemplating taking you lovely readers on this weight loss journey with me, checking in with you about how it is going. And then I thought about listing my beginning weight and got hesitant. Why is that? Do men have as much hesitancy to talk about the actual numbers?

I have always weighed heavier than other people guess me to be. I don’t really have “big bones” but I remember weighing 102 pounds in junior high with other girls my same size weighing 10 pounds less. Years ago I had joined TOPS as my mother had before me. At the weigh in there were older women obviously thicker and shorter than I and their weight was less than mine. Hmmm?

It is the same with clothing sizes. I have never worn a size 0 or 3 or 6 and barely an 8. The patterns I bought when sewing my own clothes in junior high were size 8 and then size 10. I was a standard size 12 (in sewing patterns) through high school, college, and up until I had my first child. Now standard patterns do not fit my body shape. The body morphs in lots of places as one ages. I have had adult friends who also wear smaller sizes and I thought I appeared trimmer than they. Sizes have changed over the years. My Cadette Girl Scout skirt back in the day was a size 10. It looks like a child size 6-7 when I look at it today! I know that pattern sizes run bigger in number than off the rack clothing but I’m not even going to tell you that number!

So I have measured my waist and weighed myself. I most likely will not share the exact numbers with you unless I make a significant change. Wish me luck!

Have a blessed and happy 2020!