Smith Family Weblog

We had the pleasure of hosting Doug and Karyl over the weekend, and on Sunday, Karyl’s Kansas cousins joined us for brunch. I took the opportunity to make Barefoot Contessa’s Sour Cream Coffee Cake—with a tremendous amount of help from Ava.

I love Ina Garten recipes because of the simple yet transformational tweaks. Here, for instance, she makes the glaze not with water or milk, but maple syrup. It’s amazing!

Some of the best recipes I’ve tried in the last few years have come from the Williams-Sonoma catalog. This recipe for black pepper and mustard braised short ribs is no exception.

It’s a slow cooker recipe, which always draws my eye—I love coming home to prepared dinner, and unless I decide to bring on a stay at home mom, the Crock-Pot is really my only option. My 10 year old model leaves a bit to be desired, though, with its two settings (hot and hotter) and lack of a timer. So, most recipes need to be started at noon, not at 8 am when I leave the house. So much for convenience…

This recipe, with bourbon, mustard and honey, made me decide to try braising ribs the traditional way—in the oven. I baked the ribs for two hours at 325, and they were quite tender. The pureed sauce tastes very rich, but is in fact relatively light and full of vegetables.

Give it a try!

Thanks to the holiday yesterday, Ava, Olivia and I had some free time to spend with my friend Dawn and her kids. Dawn brought the ingredients for blueberry jam, a perfect project for the afternoon. As she noted, I have no idea where they are growing blueberries this time of year, but they are gorgeous. I promise to buy local come summer…

When the December issue of Bon Appétit arrived (my Conde Nast-provided replacement for Gourmet), I said to Bryan of the cover dessert, “I HAVE to make this.”

I ended up making Peppermint Meringue Cake with Chocolate Buttercream three times.

The first time, it felt like it took days—and it did. I spread the work over four days, in preparation for my friend Jen’s surprise 40th birthday party. Next time, I doubled the recipes for the cake, buttercream, meringue and peppermint syrup and made both cakes at the same time.

The best part was that the cake can be held for two days before serving. Perfect if your holiday celebrations are a bit delayed…

I had been thinking about doing a “Christmas by the numbers” post—you know, something like this:

6 – Number of family gatherings this holiday

706 – Miles to travel roundtrip

But, as I thought about it a bit more, I knew I’d have to add:

12,450 – Calories likely consumed between Christmas and New Year’s

And, for honesty’s sake, I couldn’t really leave out:

1 – Number of meltdowns at 1:30 am as I finished….

75 – Cups of caramel corn to place into…

24 – Tins for coworkers, friends and neighbors.

And really, the last two lines are all I needed to share. So, I scrapped that idea and just decided to post this great recipe for butter-crunch popcorn. I made a couple of edits—one inadvertent (I forgot to add the baking soda…twice) and one calculated—I substituted peanuts for macadamia nuts, so  I didn’t have to note:

87 – number of dollars paid for 16 cups of macadamia nuts.

Last Friday, I wrapped up a very high-maintenance relationship with my Amish Friendship Bread. Over the course of the 10 days prior, Bryan monitored the process like he might tend an experiment, noting on day six that the mix was fermenting. Oddly, this made him a bit more comfortable with the whole process, but I thought it was strange to have to “burp” the bag.

On the last day, I added sugar, flour and milk, and then divided the mixture into four additional bags to share. Then, to my own batter, I added eggs, flour, sugar, chocolate pudding and mini chocolate chips. I think there’s only about 1/4 cup of the original batter in the entire recipe.

Instead of baking the bread in two loaf pans, I took a cue from Nicky, who noted on my earlier posts that the bread was really more like cake. This lead me to  select a Bundt pan for baking (and generally view the project much more favorably).

I took the bread to work for my coworkers, and I actually had requests for the the new batches batter. I sent one to Dawn, too–maybe she’ll report back as well!

The day before Thanksgiving, Ava helped me make this Malted Milk Chocolate Cheesecake.

Well, not this one, per se, but the first one of two.

The first one–fresh out of the oven–slid off it’s perch in the back of the Pilot as we drove out of the driveway that afternoon. It was sandwiched sideways between the luggage and the lift gate.

I tried to catch it with one hand as I opened the lift gate with the other, but only managed to burn my hands as it sloshed out of the pan and down the bumper of the car, landing in the driveway in a big chocolate puddle.

Bryan, who hates packing, traveling and especially traveling with things that are poorly packed, sighed heavily and headed back to the house to gather the things we’d need to clean up this giant mess.

He returned with a trash can, paper towels and a spoon.

With the positive results of Bryan’s taste test, I picked up the ingredients on the way out of town, and I made it again once we arrived.

This time, it stayed intact until it was served. It was only then I realized I added just half the sugar the recipe required.

Third time’s a charm, right?

I am the lucky recipient of this bag of….well, I am not exactly sure what it is, but the directions that accompany it tell me I can make it into bread—eventually. I can’t refrigerate it, and I must not—under any circumstances—stir it with a metal spoon.

On day four and five, I am to “mush” the bag. On day six, I need to add flour, sugar and milk. I “mush” again on days seven, eight and nine, and then finally on day 10, I can bake it, but only after I split the batter into four bags and pass it along to people who promise not to approach the bag with anything resembling a metal utensil. (The four friends I have in this zip code are cringing with anticipation, I just know it.)

I’ll keep you posted.

I made these barnyard cupcakes for Olivia’s birthday. This was the first time I’ve attempted a project like this, and it was definitely a good learning experience. I used a product called gum paste, which I found to be a bit difficult because it dries very quickly and can crack easily. If I do something like this again, I might try marzipan or fondant.

I drew inspiration from a number of sources, including Blue Cupcake in California, and my mom, who was sitting across the table from me during the nearly five hours it took to complete the cupcakes.

I found edible markers at Michael’s—they worked well for the signs and animal eyes.

Ava and I piped the fences with white chocolate.

I made the grass using a special frosting tip, which might just be my new favorite tool.

When I ran out of steam, my mom suggested I add little tufts of grass to “mud” cupcakes. I topped them with two heart-shaped sprinkles to form butterflies.

Doug snapped these close-ups for me. Thanks, Doug!

I think this rooster is my favorite, but it could just be my fondness for it’s helpful and sweet creator…

Thank goodness I had her help–I actually ended up baking two batches of cupcakes.

For the first, I used this recipe, despite the fact it NEVER works for me. I assume at some magical point in time, I will somehow successfully incorporate stiff egg whites into cake batter, resulting in gorgeously puffed white cupcakes.

Until then, the Quik Shop opens at 6 am on Saturday, and they sell cake mixes.