First off, please take a moment to consider donating to The Red Cross fund for Japan. As Ruth Reichl pointed out in responding to a Twitter attack accusing her of being oblivious for tweeting about food not tragedy, as long we we’re mindful of our privilege, food can be very life-affirming.
This custard tart is particularly spirited: it had its origins in a bourbon buttermilk pie I made a while ago from Out of Kentucky Kitchens (1949).
Some of my lady friends and I decided to have a Crafternoon this past weekend – well, to be truthful, it actually wasn’t originally all-female: our hostess’s husband was going to make cocktails as his “craft,” but he got scared off by the stitching & bitching.
Anyway, I went nuts all week trying to figure out which half-abandoned sewing/knitting project to resurrect for this occasion (I have a drawerful). Then it hit me: why not play to my strong suit and stick with cake? I had a birthday to go to bake for evening, and I needed an occasion to practice working with fondant, so…Modern Art Cupcakes! Can you guess the artists? Answers after the jump…
One day not too long ago, I was poking around my cookbook collection, when I decided I had too many Anglo/French-focused books. Determined to be more multicultural, I hit up my favorite book store in the city: Bonnie Slotnick Cookbooks. Every time I go to Bonnie’s I lose a large chunk of time browsing her amazing collection; on my last visit, after a lot of wandering around, I settled on a 1966 reprint of Berta Cabanillas’ 1956 classic Puerto Rican Dishes. I haven’t shared anything yet from this book, so when this rice dish caught my eye recently I decided to go for it.
I was wandering around this week contemplating brunch and cupcakes at the same time, and these Kir Royale Cupcakes (champagne cake topped with creme de cassis whipped cream) were the result.
I know I promised more South African food Tuesday when I posted my biltong, so here you go. First, we have a delicious curried beef casserole called bobotie (pronounced “buhbootee”).
Happy Hump Day! Have some milk & cookies to get you through…
So, you might remember that I set some biltong (South African beef jerky) up to cure a couple of weeks ago. And now we have the finished product. I somehow got “It’s Biltong Time” – to the tune of Flight of the Conchords’ “It’s Business Time” – stuck in my head during this process.
