The Eleusinian Mysteries and Another Cake Recipe

Spring had no personality when I was younger.  It drew shallow breaths and sounded like a boot stuck in mud.  I didn't appreciate the beauty of the countryside, the grey light and sounds of trees waking up.  They stretched tired boughs and I just blinked and kept my head tilted to my feet.  Never looking up, self-conscious of my walk, my voice, my interests.

I grew up at the foot of a mountain, a dam broke once and 2,000 drowned.  There's a museum dedicated to it.  It happened in late Spring, when the water rushes fast and your heart can stop at any moment.  The rain leaked into my room, in a small, thin fracture where a bird cracked its skull on the glass.  Our basement floods every year, or so my dad tells the tax collector.  All this happened in the months that remind me of my mother.  

Now I live on fertile ground, staying at arm's length from rainfall and commitments.  It's officially Spring here, deep in the heart of Texas.  Thin crickets sing the temperature in vibrato, fat cats lounge in the morning light that dances from gossamer white to distortions of grey.   The dew on my car window is streaked from the wipers, and I don't need as much coffee or as many tender moments to survive the day.  

Spring holds no commitment, just promises cycles.  Of thaw and bloom and the shy forgetfulness of the harsh winters and the humid summers to come.  We are in the threshold of a blossom, Persephone has not looked back from the underworld.  And I am thrilled for the chance to see it all blossom around me.

A Floral, Herbal, and Citrus Cake

This cake couldn't be described very easily.  My usual descriptions of saying what's in it and calling it a day couldn't suffice.  It's an olive oil and almond cake, with blood orange curd in the middle, iced in American buttercream, and topped with candied roses.  Whew!

1. For the rose petals:

Ingredients:

  • Petals from three roses, organic, rinsed, dried, and with white tip removed
  • 1/3 cup sugar
  • 1 egg white, mixed with one TB water

Directions:

  1. Prepare roses as described above
  2. On parchment paper, lay out petals so none are overlapping
  3. Dip finger or watercolor brush into egg wash and lightly wet petals with mixture
  4. Once all petals are wetted on either side, generously sprinkle with sugar.  Do not forget to do both sides of petals
  5. Allow to dry overnight

2. For the blood orange curd (Adapted from The Beekman 1802 Heirloom Dessert Cookbook's Lemon Curd)

Ingredients:

  • 3 eggs
  • 3 egg yolks (preferably large, farm ones)
  • 1/2 cup fresh blood orange juice
  • 1/2 cup sugar
  • 1 stick unsalted butter

Directions:

  1. Prepare a fine-mesh sieve over a bowl to strain curd mixture
  2. In a double-boiler or a large bowl over simmering water, mix all ingredients over low heat for 5 minutes, stirring constantly
  3. When mixture is the consistency of honey, remove from heat and strain into bowl
  4. Place plastic wrap on curd and allow to cool to room temperature

 

3. For the cake (Adapted from Giada de Laurentiis' Almond Citrus Oil Cake): Makes 2 8-inch cakes

Ingredients:

  • 3 cups flour
  • 4 teaspoon baking powder
  • 1 teaspoon salt
  • 2 cup sugar
  • 6 eggs
  • 3 teaspoon almond extract
  • 1 1/2 tablespoon vanilla extract
  • 1 1/2 heaping tablespoon blood orange zest
  • 1/2 cup buttermilk (or whole milk, if you prefer)
  • 1 1/2 cup extra-virgin olive oil

Directions:

  1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees Fahrenheit and prepare two 8-inch cake pans with butter and parchment paper

  2. Sift flour, baking powder, and salt together in a medium bowl
  3. In a stand mixer (or with a hand mixer in a large bowl), beat eggs, sugar, extracts, and zest until light, pale, and fluffy.
  4. Add mix and beat until combined
  5. With mixer on, gradually add oil until well combined
  6. In sixths, add dry ingredients to mixer.  Mix each batch well before adding the next until all is incorporated
  7. Evenly distribute  between two cake pans
  8. Bake for 35 minutes and allow to cool completely before assemblage. 

4. For the American Buttercream icing (This is the recipe my mother used for my brother's wedding cake)

Ingredients:

  • 1/2 cup vegetable shortening
  • 1 stick butter, softened to room temperature
  • 2 teaspoon vanilla extract
  • 1/4 teaspoon almond extract
  • 4 cups confectioner's sugar, sifted
  • 2 tablespoons milk

Directions:

  1. In an the bowl of an electric mixer, beat shortening and butter until light and fluffy
  2. Add extracts and beat until incorporated
  3. With mixer running, gradually add confectioner's sugar in batches until incorporated.  The consistency will appear dry
  4. Add milk and continue to beat for another 15 seconds until icing has come together

Assembly:

Once all ingredients have been prepared, place one cake on a plate.  Spoon and spread curd onto top of cake layer (don't be shy with it!).  Place next cake layer on top and make sure it is firmly in place.  With a rubber spatula, ice cake in spoonfuls of buttercream, making sure to get tops and all sides.  Run a wet butterknife along sides and top to smooth out irregularities and to avoid clumping on spatula.  When finished with icing, top with preserved rose petals.  

A cake, a wall, and some dark magic.

Necromancy.  Dead magic.  The prophecy of the exhumed body.  Every time I bake, it feels like I'm communing with my past, a wayward child that's running too fast for his own feet.  Simple simmering, trying to remember the last time I just sat or ate something healthy.  Gentle boiling, trying to remember if my grandmother's name was Norma or Lily.  Patiently waiting, trying to remember when the last time I hugged someone.

This week it felt like a dark moon hung over San Antonio.  I felt a sort of reverse-gravity in the pit of my stomach.  The air was thinner, the sunlight hit asphalt in garish hues of motor oil that looked like blood.  Tasted it in my mouth.  I bit my lip too hard.  I bit my tongue more than once.  It made me feel shaky and I couldn't fall asleep, I kept hearing car alarms and wailing trains in the distance.  It used to be coyotes.

Necromancy.  When an ex-boyfriend comes back into your life and he isn't so much a ghost as he is a warm body.  A warm body that feels rotten and you can't quite place his presence anywhere.  Uncomfortable, the same sense of nausea you felt when you overheard at your grandmother's funeral, "The mortician did a good job with the make-up."  (Her name was Ruth).  He shouldn't be here in the new life.  

Necromancy.  The tangy smell of jam on burnt toast.  How easily we remember things through smell.  How some flowers smell like carrion and it attracts insects with hummingbird wings.  It all looks so perfect until you start to breathe.  I remember three smells from my childhood:  my mother's Dr. Pepper chapstick, the foam on the top of the Diet Cokes I'd pour for my dad, and hot cast iron with its burn crisps of old corn bread stuck on the edges.

This week I kicked the wall in my bathroom because I ran out of things to say.  I wasn't sorry for it.  I went to Home Depot and spend $17.  It's a large splotch of grey where my foot caved in.  I couldn't find the words to describe all the anger I had, built up over five years.  I broke a wall with my foot and there's still bits of plaster stuck to the sole of my shoe.  Every step is a little dustier, small motes of my anger trail after me onto the tile at work.  They settle into the hardwood floor of my apartment, into scratches where we pushed the couch on its side and it left long marks a half inch deep.  A nail that stuck out of the leg, bent at an angle. "It could have poked your eye out."

This week I brought memories back to life, a form of magic through baking.  The shamanism of sense memory and mixing bowls.  The smell of old fruit, blackberries I picked from bramble on my uncle's farm.  Burnt cornbread on the stovetop to cool.  A large glass of Diet Coke that hisses as the carbonation dies.  I used to shuck the corn for dinner, put the silk in a Wal-mart plastic bag for the chickens.  I made a cake with these kind of memories, this brand of necromancy.

Cornmeal Cake with Sweet Corn Topping and Quick Berry Jam

Ingredients for the Cake:

  • 1 1/4 cups all-purpose flour 
  • 1/2 cup yellow cornmeal 
  • 2 teaspoons baking powder 
  • 1 teaspoon salt 
  • 1 cup plus 2 tablespoons sugar, and 1/4 cup for sprinkling 
  • 1/2 cup buttermilk 
  • 2 large eggs 
  • 7 tablespoons unsalted butter, melted, plus some to grease skillet

Ingredients for the Sweet Corn Topping:

  • 2 cups heavy cream
  • 2 ears of corn, kernels cut and cobs whole
  • 1/4 cup confectioner's sugar
  • 2 teaspoon vanilla

Ingredients for the Quick Berry Jam

  • 1 pint blackberries
  • 1 pint raspberries
  • 1 cup sugar
  • 2 tablespoons clover honey
  • 1 lemon, zested and juiced
  • 1/4 teaspoon dried lavender
  • Sachet of gelatin 
  • pinch of salt

Directions:

  1. The night before, heat cream and corn kernels and cob in a saucepan.  Allow to simmer for four minutes.  Let steep overnight.
  2. Further, make the jam by macerating berries in sugar and honey and allowing to stand in a saucepan for ten minutes.  
  3. Bring mixture to a simmer, berries will break and slowly release their juices.  Allow to simmer for 12 minutes.
  4. Add lemon juice and zest and lavender.  Stir gentle and continue to simmer. 
  5. In a small bowl, pour in gelatin.  Add 2 tablespoons of water to gelatin and allow to bloom for six minutes.  Once stiffened, spoon into jam and stir gently to break down the bloom.  
  6. Take off heat and allow to rest for several minutes (it will start to thicken).  When a little cooled, place in a heatproof container and refrigerate overnight.   
  7. When ready to bake, preheat oven to 375 degrees.  Butter a 10-inch cast iron skillet and set aside. 
  8. In a large bowl, whisk together flour, cornmeal, baking powder, salt, and 1 cup plus 2 tablespoons sugar.
  9. In another bowl, whisk together buttermilk, eggs, and melted butter. 
  10. Pour over flour mixture, whisking to combine.

  11. Pour batter into skillet and bake 45 minutes on middle rack

  12. While cake bakes, strain cream mixture into the bowl of a stand mixer.  Discard corn remnants.  Whip cream on medium-high until peaks form.  Add remaining topping ingredients.  Set aside.

  13. Allow cake to cool and then invert. 

  14. Assemble cake by adding a layer of jam, and top with the whipped cream mixture.

  15. Think about home while eating it and enjoy.

I want to finally give a shout-out to Kristyn over at Laite Atelier for no other reason than she has been a wonderful, interesting, and talented person I met this week.  

    A New Project and A New Website

    Two different people.  I used to be this kid who wore black, that wore my grades as a mark of honor, who would smoke a cigarette and hold in my cough until no one was looking.  I used to live in a world of dichotomies, I took one direction, judging those who took the other.  Bitter and self-centered, I hated everything that wasn't within arm's reach, anything I had to work for.  I was this lazy with all the best relationships I've ever held onto--from Nolan to my mother.   I was like this in law school, in California.  I left this person there, too.

    In the last two months of living in Texas, living alone for the first time, I've grown into a new person.  Soft and muted blues, greens, greys--I don't hide behind a layer of black, a 4.0, or in a puff of smoke, indiscernible from the fog that hung over Pittsburgh most mornings.  I appreciate beauty and tones, floral and minimalism.  I respect the curated life, the plant you buy for decoration and how it differs from the one you buy for herbs.  I work with my hands now.  I feel a vernal change in my bones to produce, to craft, to create.  I have callouses that have softened over from when I would hold a pencil too long, back in the day when I held a pencil to write at all. My working hands are toiling again.  I'm creating candy bars, confectionaries, memories.  Someone's breakfast, someone's "cheat day".  

    I appreciate a good cup of coffee above most things, and that's something that hasn't changed between the old and the new life I have.  That is why I went to Press Coffee with a simple idea:  I want to sell candy.  A simple stand, a couple dollars a bar, for an hour or two to get my name out there and have some fun doing it.  Press was, to me, the perfect venue.  From its wonderfully curated decor to its light-dappled cafe tables, Press understands appreciating the small, everyday victories of the perfect cup of coffee, the first bite of a crisp pastry, finding the just-right leather chair to sit in and enjoy the morning for what it is:  an opportunity to create, relax, not take life too hard or seriously.   I would have never thought of the generosity that would come of Natalie offering to give me liberty on stocking them as often as I could produce them.  

    I am dropping off my second order this morning.  Twenty-seven bars of Matcha, Cookies and Cream, and Peanut Butter.  They're delicate and snap when you break them.  They're wrapped in the same designs I used for Nolan's Valentine's Day present, florals for spring*.  They're one of the simple pleasures we allow ourselves to spend money on, and maybe one of my customers will share his with someone he loves today.  I hope, whoever buys one, they'll recognize the attention each bar got from me.  From cutting the wrappers to measuring the foil, to getting the perfect process of tempering and cooling, each bar was made from my hands, hands that once held pencils too tightly, cigarettes too loosely, and another boy's hand too recklessly. 

    If you're located in the San Antonio-area, stop by Press Coffee at 606 W French Place 78212, and maybe I'll see you there, too! (Usually for only, like, five minutes in the morning before work, though).

    What my work desk usually looks like

    Matcha is probably my personal favorite.  Beau and I are hockin' these like it's 2012

    (they're not $2, btw)

     

    *groundbreaking

    And finally, a special thanks to Samuel Nuñez  for creating such an amazing logo, that inspired so much of my work this last month--from the candy bars to actually making this website a thing.  Go check him out, too!