the vacation diary: day seven

Day 7 stats:

Wake-up time:  9:00/9:19 a.m. Method:  slightly ineffective alarm and jolting awake nineteen minutes later terrified that I had slept much longer.  General mood:  Relieved that I had only wasted nineteen minutes of my jam-packed ultra-productive day.

Agenda:  I had various plans for the day that included taking loads of groceries to Shane's to make some cake magic happen, but I ended up getting started at home because I also needed to do a load of laundry before I packed for my weekend.  I started the clothes, got my recipes in order, cranked up some music, and approached love and cooking with reckless abandon. At one point I went into the living room where I knew Jess was awake and found her watching Lost season 1 on her laptop wearing headphones.  That's when I realized just how cranked my music was, so I forced her to unplug.  She then tried to convince me that her laptop sound was so bad, she needed the headphones.  So I gestured to the fairly large tv sitting nearby and suggested that she could use it.  I scrounged for my mp3 player (which still has some Christmas music on it--but other stuff too), and went back to work.

Every year my moma requests a strawberry cake for her birthday, but since Aunt Donna made one the last time she was down here three weeks ago, she chose something different this year:  a chocolate sheet cake.  I was happy to oblige her since there's much less pressure associated with it, but the more I considered it, the more I realized that family expectation demanded a strawberry cake as well, so I decided to make both--additionally I hadn't made a birthday cake for Shane, and I usually do at some point, so I could consider the strawberry cake his.  It has to be completely cooled before you ice it, so  I started with strawberry.  Once it was baking, I chopped all the pecans I was going to need for the day, which was considerable.  I also made a pineapple cream cheese dip for us to snack on at some point in the weekend.  I would have done some snacking on it right then, but it really doesn't taste good until it's hung out in the fridge all mixed up for a while.

Next up was the chocolate sheet cake.  My moma has made these for years, but I've only ever made a couple in my life.  Recently I compared my moma's recipe with Pioneer Woman's, which she claims is the best chocolate sheet cake ever.  They're almost identical, but P-Dub uses a bit more cocoa and a bit more butter--anyone familiar with her cooking style will not be shocked by this.  I decided to use PW's recipe since more cocoa can only mean good things.

By this point, I had dirtied quite a few dishes in addition to the dishes I'd been avoiding from all week, so I set in to scrubbing.  When we moved into this dishwasher-less house, I was going to have the personality change where I didn't let dishes pile up in the sink, but since I'm keeping it real this week, I'll go ahead and tell you that I'm terrible at it, and Jess is only marginally better.  But there was a brief, shiny moment on Friday when all the dishes not currently in use were clean.  It was a nice, if short-lived, feeling.

I still had one more cake to make, but since it was a dump cake and the world's easiest recipe to construct and since it's better--I think--when it's warm, I decided to wait and do it at an aunt's house closer to supper time.  I also had to gather up a ton of groceries to go to Shane's house for the breakfast I was planning for Saturday morning.  By this point, I was running behind schedule, so I hopped in the shower, threw together an outfit that wouldn't disappoint my mother, packed all my belongings for the weekend, realized I hadn't made the strawberry cake icing and that I'd rather do it at my house at this point, whipped it up, missed a call from my moma giving their ETA, iced the cake and got it travel-ready, and started packing and gathering and loading all my cooking stuff, birthday gifts, clothing, toiletries, and entertainment devices for the weekend.

I headed to Shane's to drop stuff off and pick him up so we could head to the Beeb to reunite with the clan.  On the way, I realized that it was now nearly 3 p.m., and I hadn't eaten breakfast or lunch, so even though we were going to be having supper in a few short hours, I needed food now.  Since I'd been thinking fondly of the punch at Mexico Chiquito for a couple of days, I stopped there for the Friday drive-through special.  I got to Shane's and unloaded what I could and shoved him in the car to hold my chips and salsa, one of the worst-ever driving foods.

We got to the Beeb just after the Kentucky caravan consisting of my moma, the Popster, lovely siblings and one of the lovely siblings-in-law, and the Handful of fun.  We originally met up with them at Aunt Donna's, where they had gone to see Grams since everyone else was still at work/school, but the party moved to MacMac's for grilled hot dogs, dump cake, and a loud, good time.

MacMac rented this giant, blow-up water slide for the weekend, but it didn't get delivered until nearly dark, so the kiddos played on the various bikes and scooters and vehicles in the driveway, and I was on duty ensuring that no one drove the little electric jeep thing into one of the parked vehicles.  I was quite impressed with Pinkie's backing up ability, demonstrating an innate understanding of which way to cut the wheels to go in the desired direction that I can remember finding baffling when I first started to drive.  I also took a ride or two on Pointer's Razor scooter, which was faster and more disturbing than I was strictly prepared for.  When the slide arrived and they started blowing it up, loads of folks came out to the patio to watch, but my dedicated drivers and I kept our posts in the driveway.  Shortly after the slide was positioned and fully functional, we had to head back to North Little Rock for bedtime.

I got to upgrade passengers on the way back to Shane's, trading Shane for Michelle, which handily split up the house-keys into different vehicles, double-handy since I had to stop for gas, and Shane could be there to let them in and do the big reveal on his newly-painted bathroom.  We got the Handful settled into their pallets, and I started prepping for breakfast, browning the sausage and putting together most of the breakfast casseroles.  The adult crew stayed in the more uncomfortable dining room chairs rather than the living room so that I could be part of the conversation, and I assume, so they could complain about the smell of cooking sausage.  I also wrapped presents at some point in there.  The cooking was finished and the presents wrapped long before we tired of each other, and in our first-night-reunion giddiness, we lacked the willpower to go to bed at a sensible hour.  But eventually we did that too.

Food consumed:  I licked a few spoons in the cake-making process, but as previously reported, I didn't eat enough of anything to count until the chicken chimi, chips and salsa, and the famous Mexico Chiquito punch on the way to Shane's.  We had grilled hot dogs (mine covered in mustard and grilled onions), chips and cheese dip, and other such delights.  I really can't remember more specifically than that because I was playing waitress to seven or eight kiddos during most of the meal.  I skipped the dump cake in favor of the dishpan cookies that my moma brought, which were much more portable for the Handful chasing.  After we got back to Shane's, I had some of the pineapple cheese dip and a brownie. 

Bright spot:  Too hard to choose a single, specific moment, but being in the bosom of my family covers it.

Bedtime:  I remember seeing 1:44 on the clock, and I think we were really on our way to bed by then, so let's call it that.

a first (and last) attempt at food blogging

When folks in our department have birthdays, we tend to use the occasion as an excuse to eat.  We typically have a lunchtime potluck and the birthday honoree gets to choose a theme.  Because of my love for all things baking--and the dozens of delightful dessert recipes I've collected from my moma and her sisters--I'm almost always in charge of cake.  This also works out nicely for me in that I don't necessarily have to conform to the theme. 

(Let me just mention as backstory here that I am great at following a recipe, and I have lots of success with those I've collected from the great cooks in my life--but I follow recipes.  I'm not one of those creative geniuses who experiments and creates new delights.  I'm rarely even the kind of girl who finds herself missing some key ingredient and improvises a delicious solution.  When I have a situation like that, I book to the store for the missing ingredient.  And because of my rather by-the-book cooking style, I also don't venture into new territory very often, recipe-wise.  I like to know what something's going to look or taste like in the end.  It's just the kind of hairpin I am.)

But in my role as resident dessert maker in our department, I haven't often had to branch out.  My strawberry cake (originating with my great-grandmother) is an oft-requested hit with the work folks as well as orange juice cake and Heath bar cake with a Butterfinger variation, depending on the preference of the birthday girl or boy.  Back in March, Ellie requested the most chocolate cake I could make.  It was a culinary adventure, to be sure.  I ended up making a dark chocolate version of Pioneer Woman's chocolate sheet cake in round layers.  I used a chocolate cream cheese buttercream icing (recipe from PW's Tasty Kitchen recipe site) as the filling between the layers.  Then I iced the whole shooting match with chocolate ganache (a million recipes out there, but I used this one I found on Tasty Kitchen) and then piped on some decorations with some whipped ganache.  It was a feat, a thing of beauty, and though I was blogging and sort of living and breathing other people's food blogging, I couldn't be bothered to take any pictures or write about it. 

In June we celebrated a couple more birthdays with a joint potluck, the theme of which was "exotic" foods.  And though I rarely feel compelled to make the dessert fit the theme, I did this time.  I chose to make pavlova, a meringue covered in fruit and whipped cream that I first encountered in Australia (though the internet is full of debate about whether pavlova is actually from New Zealand).  But I was also quite afraid that my first attempt ever at making meringue would be an epic fail, so as a back-up, I made Tres Leche cake (thanks again, P-Dub).  Both turned out pretty decent, I'm pleased to report. 

So the point I've been rambling towards is that lately I've been trying more new recipes with positive results, and that, imaginary readers, brings us to our most recent birthday potluck.  The theme this time was all things spicy, but the birthday boy (Cory the page to his many fans) had requested a cake iced with that chocolate cream cheese buttercream I first made back in March, so I thought I'd be doing somewhat of a repeat recipe, which was fine by me--that icing is a snap to throw together.  But Sunday I decided that I wanted to make something spicy in addition to the cake, so I went exploring.  By now you've realized that PW is my go-to for new recipes, so that's where I started, and that's where I found Pastor Ryan's Mexican Lasagna.  I was drawn to a few things about the recipe, but I knew it wasn't exactly what I wanted.  So I headed over to the fine folks at Tasty Kitchen and found ten more varieties of Mexican Lasagna, none of which were exactly what I wanted.  And in that moment, I became that person I am not--the inventive, off-the-cuff, thrower together of new recipes.  And since I was being a brand-new kind of cook, I grabbed the camera and became a food blogger too.  Or at least I will be in a minute.

Stay tuned for the next post where I'll actually get around to the recipe.

a break

Apparently some of my more discerning readers are ready for something besides Christmas music.  Never let it be said that I don't listen to my adoring public.  (Though I will be back to the Christmas series next post--so don't fear, faithful fans)

So now I have to talk about other things . . . hmmm.

Let's talk about tv shows for just a second.  The season finale of So You Think You Can Dance was tonight, but I haven't watched it yet.  I'm going to be decently happy with any outcome, as I pretty much like all the remaining dancers.  My prediction is Russell, which might be the choice of my heart.  But you won't hear me crying if Ellenore, Jakob, or Kathryn win.  I think it would be weird if either Ryan or Ashleigh won, and I think they're definitely not the strongest dancers, but it won't break my heart either.

We'll see how that shakes out, but at the moment, I'm watching tonight's episode of The Sing-off, hosted ever-so-uncomfortably by Nick Lachey.  This show is hardcore lame, and I love it.  I'm pretty sad that Noteworthy went home last night, but I think Nota is my favorite.  If Maxx Factor doesn't go home tonight, I'll probably hurt someone.  Also the purple argyle sweater that Boyz II Men Shawn is wearing is perfection.  I love him, I mean, it.
And while I'm thinking about tv, if I ever meet the inventor of the DVR, I will probably kiss him (or her) fiercely.  DVR is brilliant.  Just sayin'.

I think I made Jess uncomfortable in Kroger tonight.  I was on a hunt for Flipz chocolate-covered pretzels.  They've been on the sale 10 for $10 for the past couple of weeks, and I may or may not have consumed several bags so far.  Anyway, I was looking for them in hopes that they were still on sale, and I was filling the silence by talking about how much I love them, and I said, "I want to have little chocolate-covered pretzel babies."  Apparently that was taking things just a bit too far.  Sorry.

I've been running the dishwasher up a storm this week.  I did all that Christmas baking (Jess's sampling pictured at right) over the weekend, and by the time I got finished with all the batches of whatever late Saturday night, I didn't have it in my heart to do dishes.  So it's been a gradual process tackling the mess.  Plus I made soup for ornament exchange on Sunday and actually cooked dinner for myself last night, and Jess eats and dirties dishes on a fairly regular basis herself.  Yes, I'm trying to justify why it's taken me days to clean up the mess.  But why not waste several sentences on something I could have summed up in a word:  lazy with a capital Z.

I think I was supposed to cover current events somewhere in the break blog, but reality tv is going to have to be good enough.  I've got tv to watch and that amazing cream cheese thing to make for work Susan's birthday.  I have this overwhelming need to bust out the camera and do a Pioneer-Woman-style cooking post about it, but then people might see the background mess of my kitchen and never eat anything I make ever again. Plus I'd also have to find the cable for my camera, and that's as lost as my address book.

Did I tell you that one?  I went on a lengthy hunt for my address book so I could work on my Christmas cards.  And though I'm practically famous for not being able to find my butt with both hands, I did a thorough but fruitless job of looking.  But thanks to the miracle of internet stalking, I was able to get almost all the addresses I needed.  No, your information isn't safe.  Just thought you should know.