HCB: Lemon Canadian Crown and Ladyfingers

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Do any other cooks/bakers out there has a kitchen bucket list?

I do, I decided a while ago, to write everything that I wanted to accomplish in cooking/baking - specific recipes, techniques, things that made my legs go jelly (I’m looking at you fondant).  My list has stuff like, puff pastry, pie dough (I think I got this one conquered), bread, pate, croissant, and yes among all of those difficult techniques and dishes is written “ladyfingers”.

From scratch.

This is the part where I thank my lucky stars that I found Heavenly Cake Bakers group, because without the push of having a weekly deadline, I would have never gotten around to making ladyfingers from scratch. And if I continue to write “scratch” over and over is because - Oh.my.god, I made ladyfingers from scratch!

Were they difficult? Was there a lot of swearing from my kitchen - a la Apple Charlotte? Did head rolls? Dogs and cats go into hiding? Did Tom walked out and told me to get my *stuff* together?

No, no and no.

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HCB: Swedish Pear and Almond Cream Cake

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Besides my love affair with chocolate cakes, I have a love affair with the TYPE of texture of the cake.  I like mine to be dense – a la pound cake consistency.

Those airy cakes – Not GOOD

The heavy cakes – GOOD

Those types of cakes remind me of my grandmother’s homemade cakes, heavy on the butter, eggs, with a bit of sour cream to give it a tangy taste.

Yep, those cakes are close to my heart.

So when I flipped to this weeks Heavenly Cake choice and read up, I was pumping fist in the air and yelling around the house – SCORE!

Ok, I may or may not have done that.  (The cats aren’t talking)

Not even the fact that it had a fruit in there could damper my expectations for it, because according to this, the pears would disappear through the cake, end up at the bottom, which will then be the top and well… its all a bit like maaaagic.

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GCC: Menu 6 - Spanish Vegetable Tortilla and Cod in Tomato Sauce

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This weekend we celebrated Tom’s mom birthday.  In fact her birthday is tomorrow, but we decided to throw her a dinner party today. During this whole let’s plan a birthday party dinner, it totally slipped my mind to try to come up with a menu that incorporate the Gutsy Cook choices of the week.  And she had already requested a specific menu: Mainly latin - as in black beans, rice, plantain and shredded beef [Carne Mechada] - recipes coming for those soon.

I knew there was no way I could stick the cod in tomato sauce in there. Maybe the Spanish Vegetable Tortilla?

Why not? It could work as an appetizer, so it became part of the menu. 

But, of course Tom then asked me if I was going to make “arepas” since his mother never tasted them.  The tortilla went out the window and got killed off the menu.

The tribe has spoken, sorry tortilla.

I told myself that I was going to have to make it on Monday and post late.

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