Olympics and Chinese Cake

In honor of the Olympics, I decided to try my hand at Chinese cake as my weekend project. I tracked down the recipe in the "Secret Koyama/Gee Family Recipe Book." This was a high protein snack; one recipe called for 8-9 eggs! I enlisted my trusty KitchenAid hand-held mixer for the project, which required a grand total of about 1/2 an hour of active whipping of eggs and the batter.

Although the recipe called for baking the cake, I recalled that this cake could also be steamed, so I divided the batter among two round cake pans and baked one and steamed the other. The baked cake (on the left) came out toasty golden brown with a nice crust. The steamed one (on the right), made up for its lack in color with fluffiness.

I brought the cakes as a special treat for my ballet class. After a hard hour and forty-five minute class, I brought out the cake, and no one hesitated to pounce on it. I encouraged everyone try try both kinds. The results? About half and half. Some preferred the baked cake for its golden, slightly carmelized flavor. Others loved the tenderness of the steamed cake. Amazing that one ballet class can eat two cakes in about 10 minutes flat!

Kentucky Hot Browns and Massages

Jasmine and I planned a "Sisters Day" with Heather in Louisville the day before Heather's engagement party in Evansville, Indiana. We had such a great time! Jasmine and I flew into Louisville on Thursday night, and we both arrived very late after flight delays. Heather ended up going to sleep soon after she picked up Jasmine from the airport because she was working a half day the next day, but Jasmine and I ended up staying awake until almost 3:00 am watching the finale of So You Think You Can Dance! It was fun analyzing and discussing the dancing. I still think Katee was cheated.

The next day Jasmine and I lazed around the apartment until lunchtime, when Heather picked us up and we went to the Brown Hotel in downtown Louisville for its famous Hot Brown sandwich. The Hot Brown was developed at the Brown Hotel in 1926, and is a Hot Brown is an open-faced sandwich using thick cut bread, hand carved turkey and bacon covered in Mornay sauce and baked until the bread is crisp and a delicious, cheesy crust is formed on top. Served with grilled tomatoes on the side, it is absolutely decadent and delicious. Jasmine and I first saw this sandwich on the Food Network's Throwdown with Bobby Flay. Bobby Flay had a throwdown with the Castro Brothers, the official Hot Brown Chefs at the Brown Hotel, to see who could make the best Hot Brown. Of course, the Castro Brothers won, and they are now official spokespersons for General Electric, Heather's employer.

After stuffing ourselves full of turkey, cheese and bacon, we headed to the Z Salon for massages. What a treat! Each massage starts off with a foot wash/massage, followed by a 45 minute massage with the scented oils of your choice. Heather said she fell asleep and started snoring-- I think I did too. After our massages, we relaxed in the sauna and the waterfall shower. Jasmine loved the waterfall, but I thought it was too forceful. It can't be relaxing if you're being pounded in the back and ears with a huge rush of water!

We headed to the Zappos outlet to see if we could find any shoe bargains. The Zappos outlet is the best part of Louisville! Sadly, no fantastic treasures, although I was able to find a pair of sandals to wear the next night at the engagement party. We picked up some pies from a local pie store for dessert later in the evening, and settled in for the night to watch the opening ceremonies of the Olympics with Heather's fiancee, Robert, and the two "boys" Herbie and Freddie.

What a perfect day.

Devils on Horseback

Devils on Horseback are the easiest, most delicious hors d'oeuvres I've ever made. And quite a miracle in and of themselves, since normally I hate dates. Nothing makes me shudder more than dry, slightly grainy/mushy/ tough dried dates. But stuff them with goat cheese, wrap with bacon, and voila! Instant deliciousness. Just be careful to let them cool down after they come out of the oven -- otherwise these little molten lava balls of goodness will burn your tongue. *ahem*

This is a picture of the little guys before they went into the oven. I was so preoccupied with drooling that I forgot to take a picture when they came out of the oven all crispy and brown.

Homemade Pop Tarts

Homemade poptarts-- easy to make, and completely delicious. Will never go back to the store kind. From upper left, clockwise: blueberry, Nutella, raspberry, cherry. The tangy raspberry was the best. However, these were monster-sized (bigger than my hand). Next time I will try to get them a little bigger than a deck of cards so that I won't have a stomach ache after eating an entire one.

Black and Whites

"Black and whites" are a New York City speciality. It is an unusual cookie because the cookie part is more cake-like than cookie-like-- almost a very dense yellow cake with a light lemon flavor. The distinctive frosting is half vanilla/lemon, half chocolate.

A couple of weeks ago I had a craving for these treats and dug up a Martha Stewart recipe. I stopped by Sur La Table to pick up a small ice cream scoop, which is necessary to get the perfectly round shape. The saleswoman warned me that the frosting on black and whites was tricky. The batter was easy enough to put together, but needed an hour to sit undisturbed in the fridge while the flour absorbed the liquid. Bad news because I started making the cookies at 9:00pm!

I was very happy when the cookies finally came out of the oven. Perfectly round, smooth, and a golden yellow color. The frosting itself was not too difficult, but just took a little care and patience to let one half dry before starting the next half. I could hardly wait until they were dry enough to eat one!

Once the cookies were dry, I took one and eagerly took a bite. Blech! The lemon extract in the cookie batter and vanilla frosting gave the cookies a somewhat alcoholic, astringent flavor. I was somewhat discouraged, but decided to let the cookies rest overnight in the time-honored Koyama baked goods storage center-- the microwave (door closed, of course).

The next morning I decided to try the cookies again. After eating a healthy (ha!) breakfast of cherries and Triscuits, I did another taste test. I was happy to note that the lemon flavor had mellowed, and the cookies no longer had the unpleasant taste of pure alcohol. The chocolate side was yummy-- very chocolately. However, I was disappointed in the cookie part. I didn't think it had enough flavor, and was not enough to stand up to the strongly flavored icing, which was right on. I will have to research other recipes to see if I can improve the cookie. Martha let me down

Summer Breeze

Thanks to my good friend Dalmau, I no longer have a big empty space on the wall above my dining room table. We (well, he-- I just watched) applied my new Blik decal today. Getting all the little details to unstick from the transfer paper was a little bit tricky and involved no small effort on Dalmau's part. I think the effort was worth it-- it looks great, doesn't it?

Marshmallows!

I had never thought about making marshmallows before. Actually, I had never put much thought into them at all. But after reading a recipe online, I really wanted to try my hand at making them.

The directions were easy enough: make a sugar syrup, whip air into it using a mixer, and then gently stir in whipped egg whites.

I made the sugar syrup and then starting beating it with a hand mixer. I was suspicious because the sugar syrup looked kinda gray and thin. Hmmm.. this doesn't look like anything that would turn into marshmallows. But after about 10 minutes of hard work with the hand mixer, POOF! It was like magic-- suddenly the mixture turned bright white and fluffy. Hurrah!

I let the marshmallows set, and then used small cookie cutters to cut them out. I made 3 shapes: squares, circles and stars. I think next time I'll stick with just squares and circles, since the soft texture doesn't hold the star points very well. To be extra fancy I drizzled half with some chocolate. I think they turned out pretty good! These might be good Christmas presents this year. The marshmallows made a sweet treat each day (in the morning AND when I came home from work) for about a week until I had my fill of them.