Heavenly Hash

I first heard about this cake from a coworker, and it sounded so good that I decided to make it to bring in to the office. I work for the census, and last Friday was the last day for a lot people, though not for me, and I wanted to do something special for it.

There were things to consider however. As described, the cake was a full sheet cake, and other cake eating instances in the office had shown me that cutting and serving cake could be difficult. In an office without a proper kitchen, the lack of real knives was definitely an obstacle. There was also the plate and fork issue. It seemed simplest to adapt the recipe to cupcakes, which would solve all of these problems in their single serving nature.

And so, I made cake. Heavenly Hash is chocolate cake, a layer of marshmallow, and a layer of dense frosting. While you can cheat and use cake mix for the cake, you can't cheat on the frosting. Canned frosting is only vaguely related to the real thing, and the real thing makes all the difference.

Ingredients:
1 box chocolate cake mix
1 1/3 cup coffee
1/2 cup oil
3 eggs
48 jumbo marshmallows
4 oz unsweetened chocolate
3 cups powdered sugar
1 stick butter
milk

Directions:
Preheat oven to 350 and line muffin tin with cupcake liners. Mix together the cake mix, coffee, oil, and eggs and beat until smooth. Put 1 to 2 tablespoons batter into the cupcake wells, or until they look about a third full. You want to leave room for the marshmallow and the frosting. Bake the cupcakes for 15-20 minutes. It's ok if they're a little underdone.

Remove the cupcakes from the oven, place marshmallow on each one, and put the tin back in the oven for 2 minutes. Remove again, and with a spoon, squish your marshmallows until they cover the cupcakes completely.

Mix up your frosting. Melt the chocolate and the butter together, then beat in the sugar, adding the milk as needed to smooth out the consistency. Top the cupcakes with the frosting, covering them as much as possible.


Note: Sorry about the blurry picture. My camera isn't that great and I'm thinking of getting a new one. Suggestions?

Pickles!

Pickles are a polarizing food. Lucky for me every eater currently in my life hates them. I love pickles unabashedly. I always have, ever since I was little. This is something that I share with my dad. I remember him making this sharp smelling concoction of white vinegar, onions, and radishes. He still makes it, though not as often as he did when I was little. I never ate it, since radishes frightened me. I still don't like them. But cucumber pickles, those I loved, in all their forms. Kosher, dill, bread and butter, spears, whole, chips, it doesn't matter. I will eat them.




Another pickle memory: my mom made my lunch for nearly all of my school years, and my lunch usually contained a double bagged dill spear. In high school I played volleyball, and I would come home from practice craving pickles. I'd eat a whole jar in a matter of minutes.

My ex-boyfriend's mother taught me how to make pickles one Easter season. The memory is vague, but I recall us using whole cucumbers packed into large mason jars. We boiled the vinegar, water, salt, and spices, including alum, then poured it over the cucumbers and popped on the jar tops. I don't remember processing them in any way; we just left them on the counter. It was a fun thing to do together. She also taught me how to drive a standard transmission, taking the ex and me out on the Arkansas back roads in an old Jeep Wrangler. I didn't stall out once.

It's a hazy web of memories and feelings, all brought on by pickles. I guess people get this way about things like cake, or cookies, or their grandmother's pot roast. And I love all those things too. But really good pickles make me feel like I'm small again sharing some with my dad.

This recipe makes two batches of pickles, each with its own flavor. The first is a white vinegar base, with a traditional dill seasoning. The second uses cider vinegar and sate seasoning because I was curious.

Ingredients:

2 English cucumbers, sliced and divided
5 whole cloves garlic
1 large shallot, sliced
2 fresh jalapenos, sliced
fresh dill
5 whole cloves garlic

Brine 1:
2 cups white vinegar
2 cups water
1 Tbs kosher salt, divided
1 Tbs pickle seasoning
1 Tbs dill seed

Brine 2:
2 cups apple cider vinegar
2 cups water
1 Tbs kosher salt
1 Tbs sate seasoning

Directions:

In a large saucepan, bring  white vinegar, cups water, and  salt to boil. Add pickling spices and dill.

Arrange the slices of one cucumber, 1 jalapeno, and 1 shallot in a glass bowl or your final container. Pour the boiling brine over the cucumber mix and let cool for one hour.


Repeat recipe with cider vinegar,  water, salt, and sate seasoning. Pour over the other cucumber slices. I added jalapeno to this batch too, removing the seeds to tame the heat a bit.

Taste your brine after it's cooled. If it's too salty, add cold water. The pickles will last about 10 days in the fridge.

Where I've Been, Part 2

When we last were recounting the events of last month, your heroines were in the pretty part of New Jersey. Alas, the Garden State was merely a way station, and on Saturday we left for the DC area. Elli and Dan graciously agreed to host us for the evening. I have done this drive many times. It's 3.5 to 4 hours. But not on Saturday. No, on Saturday Katie and I got to experience the aggravation of stupid Jersey drivers. After crawling along the Turnpike from exit 9 to 7, we discovered that the source of the backup was a lane shutdown. But only one lane, and only for 30 feet. 30 less feet of lane equals a 20 mile backup in New Jersey. By which point, we needed breaks, and rest. So the drive took more like 6 hours.

Somehow after arrival, there was the suggestion of going swimming in the apartment complex's pool. This was an excellent idea. We made a delicious stir fry (ok, Dan and Elli made it) and the Henz attended. Which was perfect, because I was able to unfurl MysteryProject, which shall hereafter by known as the Apron of Ridiculosity! It's awesome enough to get its own post. But not awesome enough for the overworked Henz to notice it. I laid it out on a chair which he was showering (the man was quite sweaty), and he spent a good 15 minutes ignoring it, much to mine and Dan's amusement.

The next day began the epic drive portion of the trip. The original plan was to drive to Cincinnati, where one of Katie's best friends lives. It was going to be an 8 hour trip. We set out, and I was reminded that Western Maryland is very pretty. Having never been to West Virginia before, I wasn't sure what to expect. Katie saw a road sign for a winery, and that was it. We got off the highway and drove the winding local roads to a vineyard on the slopes of a green and rolling valley. The parking was well below the winery itself, and there was some debate as to whether the fully loaded Mini could make it back up the steep incline. I'm glad we risked it. The Forks of Cheat Winery had an impressive selection of wines, all created on site. We tasted many, and talked to the general manager about their process. Katie bought 6 bottles, I bought one. Mine was pomegranate, and I'm extremely excited about it. The wine was sweet, a desert wine really, and honestly fruity. Apparently, it's one of the few pomegranate wines produced on the east coast, which convinced me to buy it. I have plans for the wine, and they involve some boiling into syrup.

Much driving later, we arrived in Cincinnati, only to discover that our host was delayed in another state. So we drove further to Katie's parent's house in Kentucky. The gps did not know of their street. Neither did Google, which is saying quite a lot considering Google knows all. It was 12:30 am, and we were close to our destination, when the gps decided that what we really needed was more horror in our lives. It suggested we turn left on a residential road. We did so, and the road quickly turned to gravel. In itself, that's not suggestive. Lots of rural places have gravel roads. Another block, and the road began to narrow. Then it curved off to the right, narrowing all the while. The grass and weeds grew higher, reaching over the poor Mini. As we rounded the next curve, we saw grass growing through the gravel shining in the headlights. I know we were both thinking it, but Katie was the first to say that the gps might be leading us into a horror movie. A three point turn and a phone call later, we were back on the non zombie apocalypse path.

And on the next day, there was bourbon. Four Roses, Heaven Hill, Maker's Mark. The tour at Maker's was my favorite. We tasted both the regular and their Mint Julep product (a bit too sweet). Four Roses was interesting, though their bourbon was much more sharp. They had three we could taste. The oldest was by far the smoothest, though still not my favorite. Heaven Hill was kind of a wash. We missed the short tour, the long tour was too long, and the trolley tour, which we took, wasn't very exciting.

After dinner at the Eastland Cafe in Nashville, I flew home to New Orleans to begin phase two of my time off: moving into a new house. Which isn't the least bit interesting, so I'll just say that it got done without too much drama.

I have not died.

You may be wondering where I've been. Or maybe not, my posting here has been pretty…irregular. The truth is that I haven't written because I haven't really made anything in the past month. Which isn't to say that I didn't do anything. The first, and perhaps most interesting thing I've done recently is that I went on a short roadtrip! But I didn't take my camera, so no photos for you!

My college roommate needed to drive from Boston to San Antonio, and definitely didn't want to do it herself. Her husband moved there in January for a job, and she was finally able to sell their place and join him. So I tagged along as entertainment. I could only take a week off of work, so my end point was Kentucky. She drives the cutest mini cooper!  And while I can drive a manual transmission, I'm certainly not good enough at it to even suggest driving her car. So my job was to navigate.

I arrived in Boston last Thursday morning and promptly took the bus to Framingham.  Katie had some last minute things to finish up with at work, so I walked to a bar across from the bus station and got a beer and watched some World Cup. It was pretty nice, I'm not going to lie. Katie arrived, and we left immediately for WEBS.

For the non-crafty types, WEBS is a yarn store. But not just any yarn store. It has among the widest selection I've ever seen! In addition to the major brands, they had a lot of smaller labels, spinning and weaving supplies, and a great atmosphere. But what really stands out is the warehouse. Behind the store, there is a medium size warehouse full of yarn. Full of it, all in bags! They provide shopping carts! You can just wander the aisles and rip the bags open when something strikes you. I admit, I was a little overwhelmed by all the choice, but I walked away with a skein of sock yarn.

The next day, we set out for New Jersey. First, we stopped at Down Cellar, where I worked for a year. They recently moved to an excellent location. They have a cute little house just up the street from the old shop. It has a lot more room, and the storage is fantastic. They even offer sewing instruction now! My craft senses were tingling. Tingling I tell you! It was great to see Kathy, Lureen, and Keri again. I miss the store and everyone there a lot. It's sad, but I haven't found that kind of craft community here in New Orleans yet. We spent the night with a friend of mine from grad school and had drinks with the Rutgers Art History crowd. The weather was nice, and it was a good night for beer.