2

Currently sitting in the Odegaard library, waiting to be "scooped up" (S.'s favorite term) and taken home, after an exhausting day of being a nervous, vomit-y wreck before my quiz in class.

This week we will be entertaining my friend K. at S.'s apartment. This will be the first time I've ever had a friend over for dinner, let alone having S. hang out with any of my truly close friends. How has this not happened in the two years we've spent together? I've found myself rather secluded from friends up until this point, partially due to living constraints, different lifestyles, and just being in different places at different moments in life. K. is one of those friends that I've had for a severely long time, the kinds that love you unconditionally, probably because they went to sixth grade camp with you and have seen you be a nervous mess, the kind of friend you've cried in front of and had your life fall apart in front of. I think that is, partially, the only type of friendship I can sustain. The kind that is unconditional, yet very far away.

In any case, I'm treating this as an opportunity to try some new recipe. I've only cooked for a handful of people, mainly because I want to spend most of my nights curled up on the sofa rather than in a kitchen. Not to mention my family's overly fastidious diets, where sugar and salt and fat and carbohydrates and flavor and basically just food needs to be restricted from whatever I was thinking of cooking.

K.'s only dietary restriction is that she's vegetarian, so I'm opening my recipe options to all sorts of things: artichoke ravioli, spinach pasta, crispy potato roasts, and tomato galettes. I had never realized how summer-y vegetarian recipes can seem.

I have yet to decide whether or not I will be including a dessert for that night. As far as cooking or baking goes, I might like baking just a smidge more. Baking can be extremely finicky, with precise measurements and sometimes even requiring scientific minds to exact perfect results, whereas cooking is often more relaxing and requires less "magic" (or science, if you prefer that term) to get results. I find cooking more relaxing and less stressful than baking, but I suppose my sweet tooth just makes me look forward to desserts more than whatever I'm making for dinner.

Supposedly S. should be here at any moment, so I will try to keep my eye out for him. Tonight he is making me spaghetti.

raspberry buttermilk cake

Since we're still getting to know each other, I'll clue you in now: I love putting fresh fruit in just about everything. Every chocolate cake is topped off with fresh berries and a berry sauce or glaze. Every cake or bread or bar and even some cookies end up full of fruit.

A large part of this is because of my mother's garden. She grows fresh fruits, vegetables and herbs, and every summer she brings home bounties of fresh mangoes and nectarines from the markets at Chinatown. My sister and I grew up with plums as desserts rather than popsicles or cakes.

I'm also a huge fan of non-fussy cake recipes. Tiramisu and dobos torte may very well be exciting recipes, especially in the interest of new challenges, but a simple berry cake with a delicious lid of sliced almonds and carmelized brown sugar that can be whipped together and baked with the minimal amount of stress is my favorite thing to bake. Especially when there's no annoying cake layers or frosting to fret over.

(Yes, that's Smiley Fork in the background!)

Raspberry Buttermilk Cake
adapted from smitten kitchen, originally adapted from Gourmet, June 2009

I chose to double this recipe, since I knew I was going to be baking in a much larger pan. Technically, my cake is actually a combination of raspberry and cranberries, but since the raspberries were fresh and the cranberries frozen, the fresh berries sang through much better than the red puddles the cranberries turned into. Although two cups were just lovely, it's my very strong opinion that at least 3 cups of fruit would do this recipe a favor.

As is my wont to do, I ended up "fiddling" with the recipe, and I failed to write down any notes or even bothered to measure. I used a bit of cinnamon, nutmeg and brown sugar in the recipe itself, which is why it came out considerably darker and browner than the original. I also had leftover ingredients from whatever thing I made last weekend, and so those items also found their way into my cake. The recipe that follows, therefore, is my best estimation.


2 cup all-purpose flour
1 teaspoon baking powder
1 teaspoon baking soda
1/2 teaspoon salt
1/2 teaspoon cinnamon
1/4 teaspoon nutmeg

1 stick of butter
1 cup granulated sugar
1/3 cup brown sugar
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
1 teaspoon finely grated lemon zest (optional)
2 large eggs

1 cup well shaken buttermilk
1/4 cup mascarpone cheese (optional, though recommended!)
2 cups fresh raspberries

1/2 cup sliced almonds
1/4 cup brown sugar
1/2 teaspoon cinnamon

Preheat oven to 375 degrees. Butter and flour a 9x13 baking pan.

Whisk (or sift) together flour, baking powder, baking soda, and salt, then set aside.

In a large bowl, beat butter and sugar until it is pale and fluffy, then beat in vanilla and zest. Add eggs and beat very well. Mix in mascarpone cheese.

Mix flour and buttermilk in three batches, beginning and ending with the flour. On the third batch of flour, add the fruit so that they can be covered in the flour mixture (this helps them stay put in the cake, instead of drifting to the bottom). Mix until it is just combined, then pour batter into your prepared pan.

Mix together sliced almonds, sugar and cinnamon, then cover the top of the cake in an even layer.

Bake until the cake is golden or until a toothpick inserted into the center comes out clean, roughly 40 to 45 minutes. Cool in pan, then move to a rack and cool until warm (or, if you're impatient like me, eat immediately after coming out of the oven, served with vanilla ice cream).

Notes:
- This cake is baked slower and at a lower temperature than the original recipe calls for. If you're in a crunch for time, preheat oven to 400 degrees and bake for 20 to 25 minutes.
- I did not use buttermilk, instead opting to make my own using regular milk and a tablespoon of vinegar or lemon juice. Let it sit until it begins to clot.

1

Somehow this summer feels hotter than the last one. That statement probably isn't even true, but I can't seem to step outside without immediately regretting every piece of clothing I'm wearing, my choice in shoes, and even my choices to go outside.

By the end of this summer, S. will be leaving to study in the Netherlands for a quarter. And I'll be here, studying at the University of Washington. Three months is supposed to be only a short period of time, but no one mentions that knowing three months in advance that your life is about to be completely disrupted just leaves you living every day in dread and anxiety.

Instead, I suggested to S. that I finally start this blog. I've never been a particularly confident person in the kitchen. If anything, I have always been a certifiable disaster -- the first time I baked on my own I ended up with numerous burns on my arms and fingers and a ban from ever baking unsupervised again. The first dish my parents ever taught me was to make ramen noodles, and somehow I ended up with the noodles on the counter and boiling water all over my toes and the floor.

A part of me firmly believes, however, that baking and cooking is like a muscle that needs to be exercised, and does not necessarily need to be a natural talent. A large part of success when using recipes and when improvising is understanding the ingredients and the actual processes at work when you make food. Most of what I've learned is based on information read in cookbooks as well as the comments section of food blogs. My favorite go-to resource is smitten kitchen, mainly because Deb Perelman can be downright obsessive in her recipes, and her constant tweaking process leaves her recipes extremely detailed with enough information on what to expect to leave any person at least a little bit confident in the kitchen. I also chose to buy Baking Illustrated, a copy of Mastering the Art of French Cooking, and even a cookbook devoted solely to cakes (whose name is escaping me right now).

The rest of my knowledge of baking and cooking comes only from experience. My mom was the person that taught me first how to cook, but she was never much for recipes (everything being "just a bit" of this and "this much" of that). I took the initiative to bake the pastries for the cafe I worked for last year, and I am currently a baker at the cafe I work now (Cafe Habits and Cederberg Tea House, respectively).

So I don't exactly have any true authority here. I am currently working towards educating myself in small business and eventually culinary arts so that I might open my own cafe and restaurant in the future, but as of this moment in time, I am just as uncertain in the kitchen as you might be. I don't necessarily write recipes, although I will often choose to improvise rather than follow a recipe to the letter (and trust me, this leads to mixed results. I'll come up with a stellar cake and then the next thing I make is just a mess), and I don't necessarily cook or bake every single night.

I also wish to apologize in advance for the state of the photography for this blog. The majority of the time S. and I are so impatient to start eating we often forget to take a photo. We also happen to be the type of people that end up cooking dinner after 11 o'clock and baking at 2 AM, so the lighting is often whatever is around.

Whether or not this blog will be updated once or twice a week or every single day has yet to be decided. Summer is a wonderful time of year to begin a food blog, particularly at my house, which is full of fruits and vegetables my mother grows, but due to the fact that I have work and school and I split my time between being in Bellevue and being in Seattle, it's not always guaranteed that I can find the time to attempt any recipes. In any case, I've wanted to start a food blog for many years, and am extremely excited to finally begin.