Sunday, August 17, 2003

It is the penultimate weekend of the Julie/Julia Project – Day 357, to be exact.  I have eight days and twelve recipes remaining.   Easy… too easy. Well, so last night was not probably sufficiently glamorous for a celebration of the great Julia’s entrance into her tenth decade.  It’s a housekeeping sort of weekend, and for dinner we had London broil,  leftover alfredo pasta with Julia’s Solution for Canned Onions, and Julia’s Solutions for Frozen Asparagus and Brussels Sprouts.   Both Solutions involved simmering the partially thawed vegetables in a little bit of water and some butter until the water mostly evaporates.    Which for all I know may be exactly what they tell you to do on the side of the package.    I then tossed some melted butter on the asparagus and let the Brussels sprouts simmer a few more minutes in cream.  The Brussels sprouts held their own just fine, and you know, they were in cream.  The asparagus not so much.  But that’s two recipes done so I’m not complaining.  For dessert, Gateau a l’Orange et aux Amandes avec Crème au Beurre a l’Orange – Orange and Almond Spongecake with Orange Buttercream Icing.  The cake I made in the afternoon – a relatively simple matter of beating together egg yolks and sugar, adding orange zest, orange juice, almond extract, pulverized almonds and finally cake flour, then folding in some melted and cooled butter and some egg whites beaten stiff, and baking up in an eight-inch pan.  The heat, I think, didn’t help with the poofiness of the egg whites, or maybe I just folded them too hard, because the cake wasn’t quite as rising-ish as you’d like but whatever.  I let it cool a good long time while I made the Rein de Saba, or Chocolate and Almond Cake.  I melted some semisweet chocolate with a bit of coffee, stirred in the butter, let that sit while I creamed together some softened butter and sugar, then beat in the egg yolks, and beat up the egg whites until stiff.  I stirred the chocolate with the butter and sugar, and folded the egg whites and the flour gently in in alternate fourths.  Was to bake it for twenty five minutes.  Julia particularly wasned not to overcook, or else “the cake loses its special creamy quality.”  So of course I forgot about it and overbaked it by ten minutes.  For about half an hour I was completely bereft.  For some reason it seemed worse because the cake wasn’t ruined, it just wouldn’t be good.  It was a waste of time, ingredients, and most of all opportunity.  I was terrible depressed for a bit.  But I got better.  I made the orange icing by making some more orange filling by stirring together egg yolks, whole eggs, butter, sugar, orange zest, orange juice and orange liqueur in a double boiler until it was melted and hot and thick, then beating it over cold water until it was cool.  Then I beat in a stick of unsalted, softened butter, one tablespoon at a time.  And then I stuck it in the fridge until it was stiff.  And then I iced the cake, which I cut in half horizontally first and filled with leftover filling from the night before, which is just the icing without the stick of butter beat into it.  Now this was good.  Very orange-y.  The icing, particularly, was good because, you know, butter. I lost the will to ice the Rein de Saba, so the cake went into the fridge once it was cool.  We watched Mission to Mars, which is the worst movie you’ve ever seen, but in a mesmerizing sort of way. This morning, housekeeping continued when I finally got around to Oeufs Mollets, which are, I kid you not, boiled eggs.  I have finally learned to boil an egg.  I boiled them for six minutes.  I peeled them.  We ate them with salt and pepper and Kristin’s Georgian relish.  It’s been awhile since we’ve eaten eggs, and I confess to have reverted a bit to pre-MtAoFC tendencies.  I didn’t want to eat the egg.  But I did, and it was not at all repulsive.  It was good.  Especially with relish. The original plan tonight was to revisit Roquefort quiche and make some wax beans for Eric Mom and Carol, who were coming to visit on their way back from a wedding.  I even went to Dean & DeDevil for wax beans, since I could find them nowhere else.  Oh God I hate that place.  I hate it with a hatred that is pure and almost enjoyable.  Hating it fills me with glee.  I love ranting about class rage in the produce section (“No chives?!!  Well, I guess chives are a little low-brow, after all.”)  I love nearly spitting at the twelve-year-old metrosexual standing outside with the sunbleached Hamptons hair and the Abercrombie T-shit and the necklace woven out of white rope.  I love buying yellow green beans for six bucks a pound. Then I cam home and iced the overcooked Rein de Saba.  The icing is just chocolate melted in rum, with butter stirred in.  I ate some of the cake when it was done.  It was good enough that I could tell that if I had cooked it right it would have been great. But now Mom and Carol are here, and they’re exhausted, and we’re going to eat Indian instead.  We shall enjoy.  The last twelve recipes can wait.    5:50:01 PM    comment []