belated birthdays and how to

A little bit way behind with this one because Natasha's birthday was in January.

On the one hand, this was a birthday gift.

On the other hand, this was a birthday gift brought about by the fact that winter break was ending and I needed to use up some perishable ingredients (namely, whipping cream, mascorpone, and sour cream) while luckily having an event to bake for.

How to Clean Out my Kitchen... for Dummies

My kitchen is always stocked with the basics: sugar, flour, eggs*, butter, some for of milk (cow, soy, rice), salt, baking soda/powder.

Take any basic recipe and modify it to fit ingredient availability.

In this case, I used a simple cake recipe, folded in sour cream for moistness, and threw in chopped white chocolate chips and craisins.  I feel like I also melted in some blackberry jam, hence the bruised color, but I don't remember for sure.  The cream filling is basically just sugar, lemon juice, whipping cream, and mascarpone whisked until fluffy and rich.  I dyed a portion of it blue to serve as the lettering.

Mistake: never wrote it down.

*On one particular occasion there were no eggs to be found anywhere in the house, which, if you knew me, would know that the world may just as well have ended.  All other ingredients for cream cheese brownies were available though.  I decided it'd be find to substitute whipping cream for eggs.  The thought process was that the brownies would be lighter if I whip the cream first before folding it in.  It more or less worked... until it was time to take it out of the oven.  Absent-minded as I am, I grabbed one handle with the one make-shift oven mitt available to me, and I thought I could lift it up to the stove vertically.  Nope.  The brownie folded over itself and crumbled out of the pan and onto the oven door in one giant brown and white mess.  Yummy.

"Fuck me.  This is my life."

I scooped it back into the pan and through it in the freezer to solidify, and luckily... all was well the next day.  Delicious.  Heavier than I thought.  But delicious.  Looked like salt and pepper rather than marbled.  Wish I had my camera to take a picture.

Love experimenting.