oh! it’s a kaaayyyyke!

 

So I had to make this cake for my secret interwebs baking club, the Cake Slice Bakers. Remember last month? This month was more traditional cake-y, rather than coffee cake-y, which was a nice change up.

Except that I am apparently completely inept.

I take that back. The cake turned out just fine. The frosting turned out just fine. Apparently struggle mode didn’t start until I had to put the two together.

Let me back up. I had big plans for this cake. I was going to bake it two weeks ago, when I had a free weekend, and then I…didn’t. I’m not exactly sure why. I may have gotten distracted by lolling about. Or a shiny object. Hard to say. But it worked out for the best because I ended up making it last Sunday to bring to a Family dinner at Scalzo’s new place up in Baltimore.

Now. Full disclosure: I’m not the hugest cake fan. I like it okay, but I like it in small doses. Sometimes I get a craving for cake, but those cravings are not all that frequent. But! I dished this out to people who do really like cake, and they seemed to enjoy it. Maybe they were lying. Hard to say. But plates don’t lie, and plates were empty, so I’ll take that as a good sign.

Anyway, I stumbled out of bed on Sunday morning and started banging around in the kitchen, making the burnt sugar syrup – which I thought would be utterly trying and likely result in something exploding in my kitchen and me living out the years there with hardened caramel stuck to the walls and ceiling, but actually it was quite simple and painless – and getting the other ingredients together to make the cake.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Except I was out of milk.

And the recipe calls for milk.

And I was all, “MOTHER. FUCKER.” Because it was Sunday morning and I’d been having a perfectly good morning until that point, and was very annoyed with myself. And lack of dairy products, apparently. (I really can’t be held responsible for the reasons I yell this word. It happens so often I’ve given up hope of reigning it in.)

So I left.

I left the burnt sugar syrup to cool on the stove. I left the butter on the counter. I left the dry ingredients sitting in a bowl.

And went and got a car wash.

What?

It was on my list of things to do that day. Did you not read the part about me going up to Baltimore? Which means driving other people in my car? Which means maybe I should get rid of the “Oh, haiii! I iz transporting goggies on teh Saturzdayz to run in icky weather and nowz my car iz smelly!” perfume that wafted about. Mmm…wet dog.

It needed to be done. And I obviously had to go to the store anyway, so while I was out….

ANYWAY, back to the cake. The missing milk turned out to be the least of my problems. Wait, problems is too harsh of a word. Because really, I had no problems making the cake, save for the detour I took in the middle of the process. I did cook the two rounds longer than the suggested 20 to 25 minutes (I think I ended up at about 30-35 minutes), because they were still a bit jiggly in the middle. But they came out smoothly from their pans, and holy pants did they make the shoebox apartment smell delicious. I may have seriously considered licking the walls.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

MAYHAPS.

Once cooled, I whipped up the frosting and set about putting the cake together.

Which is where the problems started.

And then continued.

Until I thanked my lucky stars that The Girls really could give a hoot what something looks like as long as it looks semi-edible but tastes incredible.

Am blessed.

I slathered some of the frosting on one layer of the cake (which was face down), and then carefully put the other layer on top of it, also facedown, per the instructions. And then tried to frost all over. Which didn’t work because, oh, hey! There’s a huge motherfucking gap between the layers! And the frosting will not cover the gaps! And the cake looks atrocious! Good times!

 

I then did what anyone in their right minds would do. (Right? RIGHT?!) I stood and stared at the cake for awhile. Then stared at the frosting I had left over, both in the bowl and glooping at the edges of the cake. (Probably should have added more powdered sugar, that. Eh.) Then stared at the cake some more. Then decided, you know what? I’m just going to flip that layer over, so the layers are butt-to-butt. (Cakes have butts? What?) (Oh whatever. Don’t act like you don’t totally know what I’m talking about.)

So I gingerly peeled off the top layer of cake and quickly yet gently flipped it over. Ta-DAAAA! No gaps, easier to frost. And thankfully, since the cake is so dense itself, the top layer did not break in half. Hurrah! I went about happily frosting the cake – and still had plenty of frosting left over, BTW. Damn that recipe makes a lot of frosting.

Now, I’m not sure when this next thing happened. Whether it was while I was wrapping up the cake for travel or while I was actually frosting it, I can’t say. But I can tell you that I ended up not with a lovely, stacked cake, but a leaning tower of burnt sugar cake. The goddamned thing shifted on me. And not just slightly, but like, a goodly amount. See?

Yeah.

Sigh.

Pay no attention to the sloppy frosting!

I said don’t look!

It tasted good at least. I think it might be better as cupcakes, actually. I’ll have to try that next time.

But in the meantime, my friends, Burnt Sugar Cake.

 

I’ll bake it if you promise to frost it.

And cut it.

3 out of 5 stars from This Girl.

Next month! It’s…shhhhh! It’s a surprise! You’ll have to wait until December 20^th to find out. Unless you live in the DC area, in which case don’t be alarmed if I come a-calling, trying to pawn off a half-eaten cake on you.

 

read

A few years ago I decided to keep track of the books I read over the course of a year. It’s varied in number year to year, and looking back over what I’ve read this year, I’d like to say it’s varied in variety, but, um, I can’t really. Seems This Girl did a lot of Chick-Lit reading over the past 12 months. Not that there’s anything wrong with that. I certainly don’t see anything wrong with it, anyway. You read what you want to read, right? After years of struggling through books when I should have just stopped reading them after page 12, I have finally accepted this in my life. For the most part. With an exception or two. (Because sometimes you just hope! The next page! It will be better! Please! PLEASE!! GET BETTER!)  If I pick up a book, and I don’t actually enjoy reading it, I will put it down. A novel idea, I know!

OMG, no pun intended.

Anyway, for those of you who are curious to see what I’ve read over these 12 months, or those of you who are looking for something to read, here you go. My reading list from November 13, 2008-November 12, 2009. Note the wonky use of asterisks in a totally bass-ackwards system. I swear I’ll revise it for next year. And no, RHW, I did not take your advice and just blow through the entire Twilight series before moving on to books that will make me feel better about myself as a reader. My fragile brain felt far too soft and flaky after the first one, I had to read something else before starting New Moon. And Eclipse and Breaking Dawn? Yeah, I’m just going to have to save those for this coming year, lest my brain completely implode at the silliness and awful writingness of it all and leak out my ears because even though they are so, so, so incredibly poorly written, I can’t seem to stop reading these goddamned books.

Anyway. The List. Enjoy.

1. Bloodsucking Fiends – Christopher Moore***
2. Four to Score – Janet Evanovich
3. Tell Me if the Lovers are Losers – Cynthia Voight
4. High Five -  Janet Evanovich
5. Things I’ve Learned From Women Who’ve Dumped Me – Edited by Ben Karlin***
6. Boomsday – Christopher Buckley
7. The Perfect 10 – Louise Keane
8. Hot Six – Janet Evanovich*
9. American Wife – Curtis Sittenfeld
10. But Enough About Me ­– Jancee Dunn***
11. Deep Dish – Mary Kay Andrews
12. Sand Castles – Rita Mae Brown
13. Savannah Breeze – Mary Kay Andrews
14. Forever Princess – Meg Cabot
15. Last Bite – Nancy Verde Barr**
16. ‘Tis the Season!  – Lorna Landvik
17. Supreme Courtship – Christopher Buckley
18. Very Valentine – Adriana Trigiani
19. How Dolly Parton Saved My Life – Charlotte Connors
20. Sleeping With the Fishes – MaryJanice Davidson
21. Swimming Without a Net – MaryJanice Davidson
22. Hello, Gorgeous! ­– MaryJanice Davidson
23. Dead Over Heels – MaryJanice Davidson
24. Roommates Wanted: Until You Fall In Love - Lisa Jewell
25. Elements of Style – Wendy Wasserstein
26. Fish Out of Water – MaryJanice Davidson
27. sTORI Tellinlg – Tori Spelling*** (YES I TOTALLY LIKED THIS BOOK.)
28. Eat, Pray, Love – Elizabeth Gilbert***
29. The View From Mount Joy – Lorna Landvik
30. The Faraday Girls – Monida McInerney***
31. Comfort Food – Kate Jacobs
32. Undead and Unwelcome – MaryJanice Davidson
33. Little Pink Slips – Sally Koslow***
34. One-Hit Wonder – Lisa Jewell***
35. Twilight – Stephanie Meyer
36. Friday Night Knitting Club – Kate Jacobs
37. New Moon – Stephanie Meyer
38. The Fixer Upper- Mary Kay Andrews
39. Schooled – Anisha Lakhani
40. My Latest Grievance – Elinore Lipman* and ***
41. Seven Up – Janet Evanovich*
42. Secrets of a Shoe Addict – Beth Harbison***
43. I Like You: Hospitality Under the Influence – Amy Sedaris***
44. Italian for Beginners – Kristin Harmel
45. Alphabet Weekends – Elizabeth Noble***

 

 

 

 

*Denotes audiobook

**Did not think it was very good.

***Recommended

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

words to live by

Remember when I was a bridesmaid in October? Good times. As my gift, my best gal gave me a bag of goodies she knew I would love because, well, she’s known me for over half my life and generally during that time you get to know a person’s likes and dislikes pretty well. She knows that I like shoes and pizza, and I know that she hates when you sing at her, using your thumb as a microphone.

What?

Sorry.

My point is one of the items in my bag of presents was a sassy flask. This makes two flasks that my lovely best girl has given me. They are the only two flasks I own. A girl should always have more than one flask in her life, because different situations require different sneaky booze, and every smart gal lives by the credo of always being prepared. Which actually belongs to the boy scouts, I think, but we’re prettier than them, so I don’t think they’ll mind too much if I just pilfer it for my own use just this once. It just goes so well with my #1 set of words to live by: Do it for the story.

 

 

and then there were three

When sister #3 is ready to go, she is Ready to Go. And you’d better be on board or you should probably just get out of her way. This is nothing new; she likes punctuality and really, she’s been this way since the beginning. When she was ready to get born, it only took her 20 minutes to get out there and greet the world.

She is passionate about the White Sox and will rattle off names and throw in a stat or four if you ask, and as a bonus she will give you her personal thoughts on specific players. Pay attention, she knows of what she speaks and will smack you down if you dare challenge her.

Sister #3 also throws great parties, the kind where people are always shouting and laughing and general tomfoolery occurs. She is outgoing and makes friends easily and if you don’t like her it’s probably because you are either A) boring, or 2) stupid. Sister #3 can be demanding, and why shouldn’t she be? But she will take your suggestions into consideration, and she is not opposed to trying new things. In fact, she loves new things, especially if they are new travel-things. Foods…eh, maybe not so much. But it doesn’t take much to get Sister #3 on a plane. She’ll go just about anywhere.

She is smart and she is funny. She is loyal and loves muchly, even when she is annoyed or irritated with you. She will always be there to give you advice (even if you don’t want it) and a cup of booze or a cigarette if you really need one. She is the friend and the sibling you want to call if you ever need to make bail. (Not that I know this from experience, I’m just saying.)

Sister #3 is lovely and bossy and has a beautiful smile and if I was with her right now I would put on the movie Overboard and hand her the cocktail of her choice on a silver platter and say, “Happy birthday, I love you very much.”

 

it’s just part of what makes me…um…me.

Here are McPolish we love food.

Have you noticed?

We love everything about food: making it, looking at it, reading about it, taking pictures of it, eating it, giving it to other people to eat, shopping for it, smelling it, touching it, talking about it obsessively at inappropriate moments.

And by we I mean me.

I. Am. McPolish!

And I. Love. Macaroni and Cheese!

Even the kind from the box.

With hot dogs.

 

I tried to be classy once.

 

 

It didn’t take.

 

I can’t really explain why I love the stuff from the box so much. I’ve had better. Much better. I’ve had ooey, gooey, deliciously cheesarifically better mac’n’cheese. Exquisite dishes made with creamy goat cheese or sharp white cheddars. Rotund noodles with crevices dripping with muenster or Colby jack. And this boxed stuff? I should be sick of it, having eaten it just about every Monday night for years on end while my mom was in grad school, the dinner duties left up to my oldest sister. Endless Monday nights of the same thing: hot dogs, boxed macaroni and cheese, and fruit cocktail, making sure that everyone got one cherry in her fruit dish. Because the cherries were the best part of the fruit cocktail.

Logically, I’ve eaten so much of it over the course of my lifetime that it should make me want to yarf in my mouth a little.

But it doesn’t.

It makes me happy.

So does the good stuff.

I guess I’m just not all that particular, when it comes to mac’n’cheese.

But so you know that I do have some taste in me, now would probably be a good time to share with you my new favorite homemade mac’n’cheese recipe. What I like about this recipe is that it doesn’t have any of those stupid breadcrumbs on top. Breadcrumbs are the one thing about homemade mac’n’cheese that I don’t like. If you put breadcrumbs on top, you are ruining your mac’n’cheese, ruining it, I say.

This recipe comes to me from my friend Coco, who is one of The Allison Girls. The Allison Girls are friends of the family who we have known since forever. Which is a really, really, REALLY long time. In essence, they are simply extensions of my own sisters, which means when we all get together there are nine girls running around squawking and singing show tunes, 11 if you count moms, too, though they don’t really sing. My dad and Mr. Allison just sort of wander off into any other room that is empty and quiet to sit in silence and hope to God none of us finds them. Coco made this at our Christmas gathering a couple years ago, and I think it is simply delicious. She says it’s a Paula Deen recipe that she doctored up a smidge, and God Bless Coco for it. Her are her directions as emailed to me:

4 cups cooked elbow macaroni (1 box cooked is usually about right)

2 cups grated cheddar

1 cup grated Muenster (I usually buy a block and grate it myself – I don’t really measure since it’s cheese and you can never have too much in my eyes)

3 eggs, beaten

½ cup sour cream

4 tablespoons butter, cut into pieces

½ teaspoon salt

1 cup milk

 

Directions:

Preheat oven to 350 degrees F.

Once you have the macaroni cooked and drained, place in a large bowl and while still hot add the cheddar. In a separate bowl, combine the remaining ingredients (except Muenster) and add to the macaroni mixture. Pour macaroni mixture into a casserole dish and top with Muenster. Bake for 30 to 45 minutes.

YUM!

Coco

And it really is so very YUM. Don’t believe me? Are you kidding? THIS doesn’t look YUM! ?

 

 

Yeah, that’s what I thought.

YUM!

 

 

 

 

lurv

I find my friend JMac very inspirational. Not only is does she inspire me to be more organized, but she also inspires me to get nifty gadgets that make my heart sing in the kitchen. I look up to her for this reason. Actually, that’s a lie. She’s shorter than me, so technically I look down on her. But inspirationally I look up to her.

Whatever.

You know what I mean.

Anyshoes, have I ever told you how much I love olive oil? I love olive oil. There is nothing I don’t love about olive oil. It smells good. It feels good. It tastes like heaven. It comes in both large and small quantities, and I usually buy the large quantities because I love olive oil. And I tend to blow through even the large quantities pretty quickly.

And yet.

Those large quantities: so unruly. Part of why I blow through olive oil so quickly is probably because I get all sorts of excited over olive oil that when I’m cooking with it (and not measuring how much I’m using. Who measures?) I tend to throw some in. And then maybe a little more. And then sometimes a smidge more. And it just flows with that lovely glug sound out of the unwieldy bottle. And then poof! It’s gone. And I have to make another trip to the Safeway for another bottle of olive oil and everyone in the store is staring at me like, “For serious? You’re out of olive oil AGAIN? You’re going too turn into an olive. I think your pit is already showing.”

So, inspired by my friend JMac’s recent purchase (see? Full! Circle!) of a handy dandy olive oil bottle with pour spout, I bought one too. (Yes, of course I bought it at World Market. This is not a question.)

 

 

And I am lurving it. Much less excess olive oil in my cooking. No awesome deep glug sound, but it does have a lilting, feminine ploop stream sound. (What?) I didn’t think it was possible, but using this olive oil bottle has increased my love of olive oil. I feel like olive oil possibilities are endless. Even endlesser than before.

And don’t even get me started on flavored olive oils.

Too late.

 

Back in August, we threw a baby shower for Sister #1, and as a thank you gift to me she gave me a bottle of blood orange olive oil and a bottle of white peach balsamic vinegar.

 

It’s like she knows the true joys of my heart.

 

I’ve paced myself using these delicate, flavorful oils, savoring them in each dish. I like the olive oil best – so far – when a little is used to sauté some veggies and toss them with pasta. And when you add in some chicken that’s been marinated in a bit of the white peach balsamic.

Just a suggestion.

Sigh.

Aren’t they all just so pretty to look at?

 

Flavored oil and vinegar from Olive &Well in Oak Park, IL. www.oliveandwell.com

 

neat

Inspired by my friend JMac’s recent cleaning and organizational frenzy, I took it upon myself to neaten up my own apartment. Cleaning products were sprayed and swiped, magazines were corralled, shelves were even dusted.

I know.

I can hardly believe it myself.

I hate dusting.

Truth be told, I only really dusted two things – one set of shelves and my wine bar. The other set of shelves still bears my full name written in curlicue script in the filmy gray layer. Because I am so fancy.

The one area I can truly be proud of, however, is underneath my bathroom sink. Have you ever taken a look under there? Yeesh. You are probably much more organized and together than I will ever hope to be, so don’t be afraid when I show you the mess that lurked beneath:

It was amazing what I found in that cabinet: pens, random plastic bags, coin purses, an inordinate amount of feminine products. For serious? I think I’m set until menopause.

Thankfully, tackling all this meant a trip to World Market.

Ew! Gross! No! Okay.

I just love that store. I could spend hours and hours there and oodles and oodles of money. And lo! They have baskets. Fun baskets, in a host of shapes and sizes and patterns and wouldn’t you know? They are perfect for corralling the clutter and feminine products that threaten to overtake my bathroom.

I love you, World Market. And I love you, too, seemingly abnormal amounts of soap. (Why do I have so much soap? I am only one person.)

 

belated

Sister #1 is a new mama, and when I called her on Saturday to ask her how she felt about being another year older, she replied, “Tired.”

To be expected.

You’d think she’d have gotten over the tiredness of being a mom, really; she’s been taking care of me for quite some time now, helping me navigate through life, teaching me the important details of staying organized and working hard. She is the one who told me, as I neared my college graduation, “You work for what you want. You are not entitled to anything.”

Sister #1 has beautiful hair and is a terrific cook, and though I may not be entitled to dinner at her house when I stay there, if I ask very, very nicely she will usually make me something delicious. She is demanding only in that she demands sister time, taking charge as the oldest, leading us out to the back porch and pouring wine and keeping us talking until just after 4 am. Without exceptions, you don’t even need to look at the clock, trust me, if you’re asking what time it is, it is 4 am.

She is a talented writer, she taught me necessary lessons in life, like staying cultured, so she took me to a Harry Belafonte concert. And being well-socialized, so she took me to my first keg party. All before the age of 12.

She is the one of the three sisters that people say I look like the most, which I guess kind of makes us sort of like bookends of the four of us, the oldest and the youngest.

She is funny and friendly and opinionated and strong, and if I was with her right now, I would hand her a glass of wine and some mushy brownies on a silver platter and say, “Happy Birthday, I love you very much.”

 

Sisters…sisters….there were never such devoted sisters…..

 

no sex in the champagne glass

Have I ever told you I know from weddings?

I know from weddings.

I happen to have been in many several of them (eight, to be exact, if you’re counting bridesmaid positions; 11, if you also count the three I did readings for), and have been to many several more. In fact, I went to two while on vacation recently—bookended weekends of weddings, one in Chicago, one in Traverse City, Michigan.

Beautiful, both of them, the weddings. The brides looked gorgeous, and I am not just saying that because they are two of my closest girls in the whole wide world. Them girls looked real Hawt. In a classy, bride-like way. Lucky guys, Doug and Pete, to be hitched along for life with these gals.

And after both lovely ceremonies, the real mess of weddings happened. The receptions. The party-on-Wayne, party-on-Garth receptions. Both had unique venues – Mare’s in a converted warehouse, Anne’s in a heritage center overlooking a river. Or so I’m told. Seeing as how my table was perfectly situated between the bar and the dance floor, and the windows that showed the lovely greenery/river/landscape outside were on the other side of the room, and seeing as how, as my friend Smell put it so eloquently the next morning, “Yeah, when I get around you guys and I get drunk I think that I’m a really good dancer,” I did not make it far enough across the room to see said lovely landscape. I saw that there were windows, at least. I saw them from a distance.

Photos were taken, dancing was to be had, conversations with Native American statues took place.

Booze may have been consumed. Sexy booze was consumed!

Do you even have to ask if I stopped one of the servers at Anne’s reception and asked, “For serious?” as I pointed to the bottle? “Pink champagne called ‘SEX’?”

“Um, yeah,” the young man replied. “I’ve never seen it in pink, usually it’s just white SEX.”

Do you even have to ask if I then scuttled over to the head table and hissed delightedly at the Bride and her Matron of Honor (and other simply terrific college friend of mine), Nora, “You guys! Do you realize that we are drinking SEX? Why is yours white? Mine is pink!”?

And I’m sure you assumed—correctly—that I didn’t bother waiting for an answer before scuttling off to another table to gleefully tell those guests the same thing.

In case you were wondering, one of the reasons I am not yet married is because I am 12.

Later on in the night, I was sipping pink SEX, talking with a friend of mine (who it should be noted asked me over the weekend if he could have a code name on this here blog should he ever be mentioned, to which I said yes, of course, and now, since he is being mentioned, we shall not use his real name but his code name which, since I am feeling incredibly creative today, will heretofore be That Guy) and by that I mean I was yammering on about God Knows What at That Guy who probably wasn’t still standing there for conversation’s sake so much as he was there because he couldn’t figure out how to slip away without me noticing. (Hint: Just go. I talk so much half the time I don’t even notice if someone is there to listen. Barring a human in my range, I’ll talk to a wall. And if there are no walls, I’ll talk to myself.) So we’re standing there, and I’m gabbing away and then—and I think this is how it happened, but I really can’t be sure, as I’d had a glass or two of adult beverages by that point—for whatever reason, I decided to set my glass down.

Which is when I discovered that when drinking pink SEX champagne, I turn into The Incredible Hulk.

I finished my glass of champagne and turned away from That Guy to the table next to us and set my glass down in what I thought was a normal manner. And it would have been, for a normal girl. But like I said. Pink SEX. Lots of babbling. Knowing me, there may have been a gregarious hand gesture or three in there.

And bam.

 

The glass shattered when I set it down. It took me a minute to realize what had happened. That Guy and I both just sort of stood there, perplexed, looking at the glass for a moment. And I continued looking at it, perplexed, for another long moment while That Guy helpfully and carefully cleaned up the jagged stem and glass, dusting up the small slivers and throwing the lot away.

“I’m like The Incredible Hulk!” I believe I yelled at That Guy when he returned. “I don’t know my own strength!”

And then a really good song came on and I bounced off to the dance floor and then I think I switched to red wine so there wouldn’t be anymore Incredible Hulk moments the rest of the night. Though I did inelegantly hurdle over some chairs later, but that’s because I’d just found out my sister was in labor, and that’s the only proper reaction to such news. And at one point I tried to climb in a canoe.

Don’t ask.

I just know from weddings. And my incredible, incredible Hulk-like strength. We can just leave it at that.

 

cake slice bakers – cinnamon pecan coffee cake

As you may or may not know, I am now officially a member of a secret interwebs baking club.

I first heard about this club from Monica’s blog (Hi, Monica! *waves*), and basically, it’s a group of peeps who bake their way through a cookbook. I find this an ideal group for two reasons: A) I like baking things and then taking photos of it, and 2) I, in general, like reading blogs of other people who also like to bake and take photos of it.

My needs and wants are simple, really.

So when I realized that the Cake Slice Bakers were getting ready to dig in (heh) to a new book, I quickly and politely elbowed my way into their group. Actually, no elbowing was involved. Email was, which can’t really be considered elbowing. And since they were starting a new cookbook, it wasn’t like I was being pushy, as they are a very accepting group, so really it was just me emailing Monica and asking how I could join this band of merry bakers, and ta-da! Here I am.

Which is really a longer explanation than needed.

Back to baking!

This year the Cake Slice Bakers will be baking our way through Southern Cakes: Sweet and Irresistible Recipes for Everyday Celebrations by Nancie McDermott. So every month on the 20^th here at McPolish, you’ll find my version/results of the recipe of the month. This month’s recipe, as voted on by the CSBers, was a cinnamon pecan coffee cake. Voila!

I’m not going to lie, I was only semi-happy with how this cake turned out. It tasted terrific, but it just…. I don’t know….it just wasn’t ideal. I made it during Baby Watch! 2009!, because I had run out of other things to do and I was sitting around watching entirely too much HGTV and The Bonnie Hunt Show to be healthy.

The dough was a little thick to spread evenly, and it didn’t cut as cleanly as I would have liked, but overall, it wasn’t bad. I’d give it a 3 out of 5 stars.

Cinnamon Pecan Coffee Cake

(Recipe from Southern Cakes by Nancie McDermott)

Makes a 13×9 inch sheet cake

For the Cake

3 cups all purpose flour

1 tbsp baking powder

1 tsp salt

1 tsp vanilla extract

1 cup milk

1 cup (2 sticks) butter, softened

1 cup sugar

2 eggs

For the Cinnamon Raisin Filling

1½ cups light brown sugar

3 tbsp all purpose flour

3 tbsp cinnamon

1½ cups raisins

1½ cups coarsely chopped pecans

¾ cup (1½ sticks) butter, melted

Mmmm…raisins

Part of the fun was using my sister’s Kitchen Aid mixer. I do not own one of these, unfortunately, though if I did, I would have to mix things on my living room floor. As it is I slice and dice and mix at my own peril in my shoebox of a kitchen, in my shoebox of an abode. Ah, studio apartment life.

In case anybody is wondering, the cake batter is delicious when fresh off the paddle. I do my research for you,  people. FOR YOU.

Method

Heat the oven to 350 degrees F. Grease and flour a 13 by 9 inch pan.

To make the filling, combine the light brown sugar, flour and cinnamon in a bowl and stir with a fork to mix everything well. Combine the raisins and pecans in another bowl and toss to mix them. Place the cinnamon mixture, nut mixture and melted butter by the baking pan to use later.

To make the cake batter, combine the flour, baking powder and salt in a bowl. Stir the vanilla into the milk. In a large bowl combine the butter and sugar and beat with a mixer on high speed until pale yellow and evenly mixed, about 2 minutes. Scrape down the bowl to ensure a good mix. Add the eggs and beat for another 2 minutes, scraping down the bowl now and then, until the mixture is smooth and light.

Use a large spoon or spatula to add about a third of the flour mixture to the butter mixture and stir only until the flour disappears. Add a third of the milk and mix in. Repeat twice more until all the flour and milk mixtures have been incorporated. Stir just enough to keep the batter smooth.

Spread half the batter evenly into the prepared pan. Sprinkle half the cinnamon mixture over the batter followed by half the melted butter. Scatter half the raisins and nuts over the top. Spread the remaining batter carefully over the filling, using a spatula to smooth the batter all the way to the edges of the pan. Top with the leftover cinnamon, butter and nut mixture, covering the cake evenly.

Bake for 45 to 50 minutes, until the cake is golden brown, fragrant and beginning to pull away from the edges of the pan. Place the pan on a wire rack and allow to cool in the pan for 5 to 10 minutes before serving in squares right from the pan. The cake is delicious hot, warm or at room temperature.

The finished product. Meh. It tasted pretty good, but I could have done better. On to next month!

Sorry, Toby, you won’t be able to help me next month, since I’ll be baking from my home kitchen here in DC. Not that you were much help anyway. Unless by “help” you mean “sitting on my feet until I dropped something so you could snarfle it up like a hoover.” Because in that sense you are incredibly helpful.