Gus in the Car, Day Three

 We decided to push it to Albuquerque on day two in order to have a shorter final day. Only seven hours of driving and at least two seemed to be spent sitting in traffic from road work just outside of Albuquerque. Gus was very excited to get into the car in the morning. Maybe he’s a car dog now? Before we got started though, he had his first encounter with a cactus-a prickly pear. I spotted it in time and steered him well clear, much to his annoyance.

It’s nearly hidden off to the right of the picture.

We pulled into Gallup to switch drivers and got to drive a few miles on Historic Route 66 in order to find some grub and give Gus the chance to stretch his legs.

More snow in Northern Arizona and New Mexico than in Illinois!

Lots of windy roads over mountains rounded out the end of the day before we rolled into the Phoenix valley. I’m sure the view was outstanding but I have a thing with heights from a car, which is odd because I’m totally fine with heights in every in other circumstance.

Gus took a little while to settle in at my in-laws but not too long. 

Gus in the Car, Day Two

Gus is recovering from an injury and Gus LOVES to lick his injuries until they become infected and take twice as long to heal. Cones of Shame don't work on greyhounds because their heads are smaller than their necks. In order to allow his injury to heal (an infected toe) we have to put a modified muzzle on him (which is just a basket muzzle with duct tape around the bottom so he can't lick through it). It's not super comfortable. He has to wear it all the time while in the back of the car because we can't monitor him. Day Two was the longest so we decided to put him in the backseat and move all the luggage to the very back. He was vastly happier to be 1) without the muzzle and 2) close to his people.

Gus's head is well placed for scritches.

Twelve hours of driving. Twelve whole-assed hours. We tried to combine all of our stops—fuel and dog walks and grab a couple of snacks. On a whim we popped off to grab lunch at a gas station Subway (eating in the car because COVID) and it turned out we were on Historic Route 66 (origin point is downtown Chicago). So now Gus can say he’s done that.

You can see the Route 66 sign if you squint. No? Okay here:

We rolled into Albuquerque around 7:30 pm, which was enough time to unload and order a grilled cheese with Hatch green chile (me) and a bacon cheese Hatch green chile burger (hubs) from a local diner to eat in our hotel room (again, COVID) before collapsing. 

A word on traveling during a pandemic. We’re in the middle of surge in Delta cases and Omicron is spreading rapidly across country. The further we got from Chicago, the fewer people we saw with masks. Until we got to Albuquerque. Everyone is masked up here, similar to Chicago. They have digital signs on freeways approaching Albuquerque that say: “Omicron is here. Get a booster. Mask up. Thank you for caring about others.” And that last line is really what it’s about. I don’t wear a mask for my own protection (though it does provide me with some), I wear it because I don’t want to spread it in case I do have it. I wear it for other people. When I see someone NOT wearing a mask it tells me they care more about themselves than others.

Anyways, New Mexico is lovely. Highly recommend.

Gus in the Car, Day One

We had a lot to do the morning of our first driving day (home renovation related) so we cut the distance by about 100 miles.

Gus gets the whole back to himself

The St. Louis Arch at night was kind of nifty.

Gus has never enjoyed hotel rooms and becomes a very picky eater when he travels. Here he's looking thoroughly unimpressed with everything.

Gus and His Incredible Westward Adventure

This is Gus. He is a Greyhound. He is handsome and klutzy and...not exactly the brightest bulb in the box. He has never been further west than Kansas City and he is about to embark on a huge adventure.

This is what the majority of our house looks like right now. (No, we're not Dexter.) We are doing a major home renovation that requires us to move out...for six months. It's a long story, but the result is that we're going to be out for 3 months longer than we thought. We will be spending that time in Arizona and California so we can be close to family members that we haven't seen much in the past two years (get vaxxed, wear a mask, maintain social distancing or we're never getting through this, folx). Also, its warmer there.

Gus has never seen the desert. He doesn't know what a cactus is. Jackrabbits are significantly bigger than the bunnies he chases around here. We think its going to be grand adventure.

That's It, I Fold!

No, I'm not quitting the blog! I'm here to talk about the very delicious, but practically lost art of a sponge cake. A sponge cake, or "Genoise" cake is any cake that is leavened solely through air--specifically, through the act of whipping eggs until they are extremely light and fluffy.

No one makes sponge cakes anymore. In fact, that particular joke from the Amelia Bedelia books was completely lost on me as a child. (When instructed to make a sponge cake by her employer, she cuts up a sponge and puts it in a cake. Until a few years ago, that's what I would have done.)

The other day we found ourselves with a plethora of eggs thanks to the CSA egg share we bought this summer. As a baker, there are several things you can do to use up eggs like pastry cream and lemon curd. But if you're baking something and you don't feel like claufouti (it's like a sweet quiche), cake is best way to go and no cake uses quite as many eggs as sponge cake.

We recently had a dessert at The Girl and the Goat restaurant in Chicago--one of the most popular restaurants in the city--and it was so delicious I proposed to the pastry chef. (The pastry chef was a woman, so I guess it would be a civil union. They're finally legal here in Illinois--YAY!) It consisted of spongecake, lime curd, whipped cream, strawberries and a flash-fried basil leaf. Why not try and remake this fabulous dessert? Well, not entirely. The season for strawberries is over, but cherries are in season and cherries and limes go well together.

So let's make sponge cake--sponges not included. I'm using the Moist Sponge Cake recipe from James Peterson's Baking.

Butter and flour for the round cake pan (or not)
1 tsp. vanilla extract
1/4 cup milk or heavy cream
3 tblsp butter
3 whole eggs, warmed*
3 egg yolks, warmed*
3/4 cup plus 2 tblsp white sugar
3/4 cup cake flour (yes, cake flour)

*Eggs froth up better if they're warm. If you're making this sponge cake in the winter or in a cool house, place the eggs in a bowl of warm (not hot) water for about 5 minutes. You can stick the egg yolks in a small covered container and do the same. It's summer here and our 8th day of 90+ temps, so I just left them out in our kitchen for a couple of hours.


Remember eggs are best separated when they're cold, though.

If you're making a sheet cake, preheat the oven to 400 degrees and line a 13"x17" sheet pan with parchment paper. I'm making a 9" round cake, so preheat the oven to 350 degrees. The instruction in the recipe is to butter and flour the round cake pan. I prefer to spray the pan with EverBake, place a round piece of parchment paper in the bottom and spray the top of that. Who wants a film of flour on their cake? Ick. You can pick up EverBake online at the King Arthur Flour website. Why buy this instead of PAM that's cheaper and you can pick up in a local grocery store? First of all, it works better when it comes to release. I've tried PAM with a variety of cakes and it's hit or miss. Sometimes the cake releases okay and sometimes it doesn't. It's scorchless, so it won't turn your pans dark--this is a big deal to me since I buy commercial-grade pans (the shiny kind) since they brown the cakes more evenly. Also, it lasts way longer than anything I've ever bought.




Combine the vanilla, milk and butter in a small saucepan, bring to a simmer, and cook just long enough to melt the butter. Remove from the heat and set aside. Normally, when I'm baking, I bust out my All-Clad copper core, but this is a tiny job. My little Faberware non-stick will work just fine.



Place the warmed eggs, egg yolks and sugar into the bowl of your stand mixer, snap in your whisk attachment and mix on high speed for about 4-5 minutes or until the batter hits the "ribbon" stage. (more on that in a minute) I hope you've got a stand mixer. It takes about 12 minutes if you're whisking constantly by hand (but you'd better have the biggest biceps known to man), and about 20 minutes with an electric hand mixer. Why so long with the hand mixer? Good question. Probably because most hand mixers don't have a whisk attachment and the whisk is what incorporates all that air into the eggs to make them light and fluffy.

The "ribbon" stage is when the beater is pulled up and the batter pours slowly from the beater into a figure 8 that stays on the top of the batter for several seconds. Also, the mixture looks kind of like this:



Once you're at the ribbon stage, carefully transfer the egg mixture into a large wide bowl. This helps when it comes to incorporating the flour. Pour the milk/vanilla/butter mixture that you melted down the side of the bowl and carefully fold it into the egg mixture.

Folding... There is no way I can describe to you what this is. I recommend doing an internet search for videos that show the process. If I had a videographer, I could have taped myself doing it, but folding isn't really something I can do one-handed and I'm not Zaphod Beeblebrox. (That's a nerdy Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy reference...he had three arms.) Basically, it's gentler way of stirring to make sure that we don't deflate our eggs too much.

Once the milk/vanilla/butter mixture is incorporated, sift the cake flour over the entire surface of the batter IN THIRDS (this is why the wide bowl). Fold the flour in until it's fully incorporated before adding more. Did you hear me? Fully incorporated! This is not a cake mix. This is not a muffin. Lumps of flour will NOT bake out. They will stick in your cake and mock you. At the same time, try to not deflate the eggs! It really is a delicate balancing act. And no, I’m sorry, I don’t have any pictures of this process. Not having a third arm really cuts into my ability to take pictures and bake at the same time.

Once all the flour is incorporated, pop it into your pan and, if you're doing the 9", toss it in the oven for 25 minutes. If you're doing the sheet pan, pour it into the pan, then take your clean finger and make a moat around the sides so that the cake doesn't stick to the sides of the pan as it bakes. The sheet pan only bakes for about 12 minutes.

The cake is done after it feels firm to the touch. It doesn’t really spring back like you’re used to, but it should hold up against a light touch.



And here’s the finished product! It's delicious, moist and fluffy soft. This is cake you'll just want to eat plain. You have been warned!

Baking in the Extreme Heat

Too hot to bake!?! Bah! We live in a brick bungalow, which means three things: we don't have central air (gas-forced air wasn't around in the 1920s when this house was built), there are a TON of windows and after a couple of days of high heat, it kind of feels like you're being baked in a brick oven. Our window units just can't keep up! But that doesn't mean I still don't bake. Perish the thought!

Temps here in Chicago have been in the upper 80s, low 90s for about a week now and while I've modified my baking schedule a little, I'm still firing up the oven! As I was staring at a rash on my right arm, trying to decide if it was a heat rash or whether I've developed a late-in-life allergy to peanut butter, I realized there are some tips that you should heed if you step into the kitchen during the hot summer months.

1) If you're working with yeast, expect it to rise FAST. Sometimes, twice as fast as it does during colder months. Try to have it rise in a cooler room in the house (not too cold, mind) to slow the process. Bread that rises too fast tends to not hold its structure as well.

2) Bake early in the morning or later in the evening, especially if your kitchen gets a lot of sun. Baking when the sun isn't at its peak makes a difference.

3) Keep it short. Sure, I love getting everything done at once, but if it's hot out, maybe you shouldn't piggy-back your bread baking with your dog-treat baking. Staying in a hot kitchen for 3 hours is just no fun when it's 90 degrees outside. (This is what I did on Friday when that mysterious rash appeared.) If you do have to bake something a while, try and have it be something that you can put in the oven and walk away from (like the cherry crisp I made last night).

4) If you do have to be in the kitchen while the oven is on, drink lots of water, wear light clothing (but for heaven's sake, don't bake naked because...ew!) and take breaks as often as you can.

So, get out there and bake! Unless you live in Arizona. Then get out to the nearest bakery...but only after the sun goes down.

Exorcising the Caramel Demons

Back in February when I attended the Baking Boot Camp, we put together a cake that included a caramel ganache. Rick LOVED this cake and requested that I make it for him for his birthday. It's not every year that your husband turns 40, so of course I agreed.

A few weeks ago, I tried to replicate the caramel ganache using the recipe given to us at the Baking Boot Camp. It was an utter failure. We blazed through so many recipes during Baking Boot Camp that the caramel ganache process was a complete blur, except for the admonition by our instructor that we AVOID CRYSTALIZATION AT ALL COSTS. Because if your mixture crystalizes the caramel is ruined and also, it might cause the moon to crash into the Earth. (I wasn't entirely sure on this part.) My mixture did not crystalize, but pretty much everything else that could go wrong did. I'm still not clear where my missteps occurred. Rick's birthday is on Wednesday and I was determined to get the ganache right today. No recipe owns me. I was going to exorcise the caramel ganache demons!

So first thing's first: "I need an old priest and a young priest!" Oh, wait. I'm not trying to get rid of those kinds of demons. Well, it wouldn't hurt to start off with a little heavenly grace on your side.

WHIPPED CARAMEL GANACHE
1 3/4 c. sugar
1/2 c. light corn syrup
1/4 c. water
3 cups heavy cream
1/8 tsp. salt
5 oz. bittersweet chocolate (you can do semi-sweet, but I think it would make the ganache way too sweet)
1/2 c. (that's one stick) unsalted butter, cut into pieces

Heavy cream vs. whipping cream
Will regular whipping cream work? Perhaps. USDA regs state that heavy cream must be at least 36% butterfat and whipping cream just needs to be 30% butterfat. Not a huge difference, but it might be enough to skew your results. And let me just say, I used whipping cream, not heavy cream in my fist go-round which may have contributed to the disaster. I decided to make sure it was heavy cream this time around.

As always, the first step in baking is always to make sure all of your ingredients are at room temperature. This is especially important for this recipe. Pull the heavy cream and butter out of the fridge a couple of hours before you plan on trying the recipe. Or, if it's the summer and you have a hot enclosed porch, put 'em out there for 20 minutes or so. (Baking during the summer months does have its advantages.)

Second, grab a very clean pastry brush and a bowl of water. I like setting them out early so the sugar/water/corn syrup mixture sees it as it's going into the pan. Almost like a warning not to crystalize...or ELSE!

Place the water, corn syrup and sugar in a good-sized saucepan. How good-sized? I make mine in my 2 qt. All-Clad, but I think a 3 qt. would be a little better size for this recipe. At least, the carmelization would go faster. Gently stir the mixture with a spatula to combine. See those clumps on the sides of the pan? Those are sugar crystals. Get 'em off the side and into the liquid or you'll be sorry! The best way to do this? Dunk the pastry brush in the water, and brush it against the sides of the pan just above the crystals. All gone! Make sure you've cleaned the insides of the pan of all crystals before you...

Place the saucepan over medium-high heat. The recipe called for medium heat, but that takes FOREVER to carmelize. When I looked up other caramel sauce recipes online, most recommended medium-high. (Maybe if I was making this in a larger saucepan, I'd go with medium.)

Cook WITHOUT STIRRING until the sugar has dissolved. It's going to be a little hairy here as the mixture will froth up like mad as the sugar dissolves and you need to be prepared with the pastry brush to keep any crystals off the insides of the pan. N'inquiete pas, mes amis! Once the sugar has dissolved and the mixture has turned a nice golden color (kind of a pale yellow), it's safe to stir, but do so VERY carefully to prevent a flare up of crystals on the sides of the pan.

Why am I harping so much about preventing crystals? It's chemistry, folks, and we all know how I feel about science (bleh). Basically, once the sugar/water mixture crystalizes, you can't salvage it. It's a gritty mess and it's going to stay a gritty mess no matter what you do.

Turn the heat down to medium to medium-low. Now, the trick is to watch and wait for the mixture to turn a deep amber color. This could take anywhere from 5 to 10 minutes. Keep an eye on it as once it starts turning darker, it goes very quickly.

Once it has turned nice rich amber color (the darker the color, the more flavor you'll get, but too dark and it's burned), take it off the heat and add carefully and slowly add in the heavy cream while stirring the whole time. Careful, it's going to steam like the dickens. Return it to the heat. The recipe says to use a whisk to stir in the cream and I did this time around, but I think a spatula is a better bet. The caramel cools as soon as the room temp heavy cream hits it and it gets stuck in the whisk tines. Just use a spatula and keep stirring and it should be okay.

Keep stirring until the caramel is smooth again. This will take a few minutes. Add in the butter, chocolate and salt. Stir again until the mixture is smooth. Again, this will take a few minutes and the chocolate won't entirely combine in with the caramel. You'll still see little flecks of it in the mixture.

Take it off the heat and pour the mixture into a large, shallow dish or a large bowl and let it cool to room temperature. It will take at least 30 minutes, but maybe more. I set mine atop a couple of ice packs covered with a towel and left it for almost an hour and a half.

When you're ready to use it, transfer it to a bowl--unless it's already in one--and using a handheld electric mixer, whip it until it's lightened in color and it's creamy in texture--kind of like whipped cream, though a little denser.

I then toss mine in the fridge for a bit to really set it up. I use this ganache to layer a cake and it needs to stand up to the 3 layers. A soft whipped ganache just won't do.

I just checked and the ganache is perfect! Hope it makes it through the night because I'm not putting this baby together until tomorrow!