Depression Era Spice Cake (fail!)

Although tomatoes are among my favorite foods now, I famously did not like them as a child. Nor did I like tomato soup, so I was surprised once when my mother suggested that we make a spice cake that had condensed tomato soup as one of the ingredients. I remember that the cake turned out moist and tasty which is why I attempted it again for this year's Thanksgiving dessert contribution. Used the recipe I found on this page - the one labeled Tomato Soup Cake (One Bowl Method). It really seemed simple enough, and I do believe I followed the recipe as written, but I ended up with two very thin layers, so thin that when placed one on top of the other and frosted they were barely the same height as one typical layer. I've decided to blame it on old baking powder. I did indeed serve the cake along with the other desserts that folks made. Mine was not a favorite. I ended up throwing most of it away. 

6.28 or Two Pies

We were happy this Thanksgiving to get back to our usual tradition of having dinner with our friends Lisa, Rob, and their children. Last year's Thanksgiving "lite" was better than not getting together at all, but for us spending the day together cooking and laughing is just as important as the enjoying the meal. 

As is often my role in this annual celebration, I made dessert. I like lots of kinds of pies, but my favorite is key lime. However, I discovered from Atlas Obscura that in fact Sour Orange Pie predates  key lime as Florida's favorite. I don't think I'd ever heard of Sour Orange Pie before, and I don't know where I would even find sour oranges, but luckily the recipe explains that equal parts orange juice and lemon juice can be substituted for the sour orange juice. The pie is much like a key lime pie, with a citrusy-custard filling and load of whipped cream on top. 

This calls for a graham cracker crust "either pre-baked or store bought". I of course made my own crust. Luckily James found that our local grocery store actually sold graham cracker crumbs for just such an occasion. Whenever I've made a graham cracker crust in the past I've had to crush the crackers myself, and always wound up with rather inconsistent crumbing.

The pie was sweet and tart. It turned out that I liked it as much as I do a good key lime.

The very first pie I remember liking was a chocolate pie. I think I had only had store-bought fruit pies up to that point in my then-short life, and they were nasty. Pies of all sorts can make me happy now, as long as they are not store-bought (even bakery pies rarely thrill me). I like mine homemade. As an adult I have always enjoyed pecan pie (even though it is often cloyingly sweet). When I saw a recipe from the New York Times for Chocolate Pecan Pie it seemed like a perfect celebratory dessert that brought together two of my favorite types of pie.

This one has a flaky crust. Crust making always feels like a major project to me, but must needs and all. This recipe calls for putting the crust ingredients in a food processor, which I do not own. So, I did what I always do in this situation, I used my blender. The crust ultimately turned out flakier than any other I've made, so I may follow this process in the future. And my resolve not to purchase a food processor remains in tact.

Image: shamelessly lifted by James
from Texas Smokehouse

The filling calls for bittersweet chocolate "to give depth to what is traditionally an achingly sweet pie". James went to the store on Monday before Thanksgiving to buy the ingredients we needed, which included bittersweet chocolate. He called me from the grocery to ask if chips would be okay, to which I responded that if he could find bittersweet chocolate chips that would be great. When I was ready to make the pie on Wednesday I noticed that there was a bag of semi-sweet chocolate chips, and asked if he also bought bittersweet chocolate. No, he hadn't. Did it matter, he wanted to know. Of course it matters. We don't want our pie to be "achingly sweet" after all. Back to the store he went for the appropriately sweetened chocolate. The pie was very good not only because it wasn't too sweet, but the filling also included bourbon to give it a "grownup finish", plus more pecans than many recipes call for which gave it better texture as well as a better flavor.

Two Thanksgiving desserts

A Covid Thanksgiving

Our usual Thanksgiving tradition involves dinner with friends. Typically three families get together, with occasional additions. Most years we arrive around noon and begin cooking and drinking wine until dinner is ready at 3:00 or 4:00. After our meal we take a walk and then have our dessert - a selection of pies, cakes and other delectables. This year we maintained our tradition with a much scaled-back version. It rained all day on Thursday, so we moved our celebration to Friday when the weather was better and we could eat outside. It was about 60 degrees out - let's hear it for global warming - so it was actually a nice day dining al fresco. Rather than spending the entire day together James showed up at our hosts' home with the turkey in the morning and he and Rob got it started on the grill, then James came back home and prepared the dressing and we went returned at 3:00 with our offerings.  I had planned on making some cranberry sauce but Lisa said they already had three different kinds, so I made two desserts instead. 

Just like the lunch lady used to make

Growing up and attending public school in Baltimore County in the 1970s I usually wasn't thrilled with the hot lunch offered in our cafeteria, and opted instead to bring my lunch. Exceptions to that rule were pizza day and open-faced turkey sandwich day. In the case of the turkey it wasn't so much the main course that I was interested in as the dessert that came with it - "peanut butter confection". 

I've often thought about how much I liked that crumbly, sweet dessert and it seemed this year was a good time to try to find a recipe (and, after all, we were having turkey). On a bag of confectioners sugar I found a recipe for Peanut Butter Fudge that seemed like it might allow me to create reasonable facsimile of what I remembered. It was a simple recipe with only four ingredients (confectioners sugar, milk, marshmallow fluff, and peanut butter) and I did end up with a super sweet '70s treat that was exactly as I remembered.

Is it cake or pie?

My second dessert came from the New York Times cooking page. I told our hosts that I would bring pumpkin pie, but this recipe is called "Pumpkin Skillet Cake with Cream Cheese Frosting" It has no crust, and is made with flour, so it probably is more of a cake than a pie. Nevertheless it was delicious and baked right in our indispensable cast-iron skillet.

This year there were only six of us enjoying our Thanksgiving dinner together. Here's hoping that next year we will be able to return to our usual festivities with everyone in good health.

Thanksgiving Dessert - Pumpkin Layer Cake with Caramel Buttercream

This recipe came from the New York Times Cooking. The online recipe was accompanied this lovely photograph, which looked only a little bit like my finished product. The color of the cake and icing are the same, and I did have three layers. Although mine were rather lopsided, and the caramel cream did not ooze down the sides in quite so perfect a manner. I am sure however, that mine tasted just as divine as this one must have.

With a rather ambitious ingredient list and a whopping 15 steps it was a good thing I left work early on the day before Thanksgiving to get started on this. The first problem I encountered was that I did not own three round cake pans. In fact I had zero. Off to the store went my wonderful husband to bring back the necessary baking items.

Once the appropriate equipment was procured I started mixing the ingredients for the cake. The instructions regularly refer to a stand mixing bowl, and its various attachments. In our house we have only hands, arms, and muscles for mixing. Mostly it wasn't a problem, but I will admit that in making the buttercream frosting it did present a bit of a challenge. Thankfully, my wonderful husband is also a rower and has Popeye-the-Sailor-man-type biceps and forearms (sans anchor tattoo). Ultimately I did have to pick out some biggish chunks of butter from the frosting so that I could more evenly spread the buttercream. Our college child was home for the holiday and suggested using store bought caramel sauce and/or frosting. I explained that was not an option because "on Thanksgiving we go all in". Said child also made a comment along the lines of "what, no pie!" which the New York Times Cooking page actually indicated was a possibility. Fortunately, there is always more than one dessert at Thanksgiving, and a pie was offered by one of the other families with whom we spent the holiday.

In the end the entire family had some hand in preparing this delicious dessert, and it was a hit on Thanksgiving day.

See directions below. This is not a quick one!

    

Honey Ginger Pie

I always like to try a new dessert recipe for Thanksgiving. This year I made Honey Ginger Pie from the Teeny's Tour of Pie cookbook. This custard-filled tart was a definite hit among the foodie friends with whom we shared our holiday meal.

I first made the Buttery All-Purpose Crust as directed by Teeny:

• 2 1/2 c. all-purpose flour
• 2 t. salt
• 2 T. sugar
• 3/4 c. cold unsalted butter (cut into pieces)
• 1/4 c. vegetable shortening
• 1/4 c. cold vodka (I took mine straight from the freezer)
• 6 T. cold water

I sifted the dry ingredients together, then added the butter and shortening and cut everything together with a pastry cutter. The liquid ingredients were added next, a little bit at a time. Everything was mixed with a rubber spatula and formed into a ball. The ball was divided into two, and each was pressed into a disc. I placed one disc in the freezer for later use, the other I refrigerated for one hour, then rolled out and placed in a greased pie pan and baked at 350 for about 25 minutes.

The filling also took a bit of work. Ingredients include:

• 2 c. whole milk (divided)
• 3 T. cornstarch
• 3 egg yolks
• 2 t. freshly grated peeled ginger (Teeny recommends a microplane, and I followed this advice and can assure you that Teeny is absolutely right about this)
• 3 T. butter

First I whisked together the 1 3/4 c. milk and the honey until the honey was dissolved (this did not take long). Next I whisked the remaining milk with the cornstarch and yolks until smooth. This then went into the saucepan with the rest of the milk and honey. Everything was cooked over a medium heat while whisking constantly, this continues even after it starts to boil (when constant whisking and scraping becomes even more important to prevent scorching). The mixture boiled until thick, but still pourable and removed from the heat. The grated ginger and butter were stirred in, and then the mixture was poured into the pre-baked pie crust. The pie was then covered with plastic wrap to prevent a film from forming, and placed in the refrigerator to set. Teeny says it needs at least two hours. I had made this the night before, so it was nicely set and easy to cut after our meal on Thursday.

Teeny also admonishes bakers (and eaters) not to "skimp on the whipped cream". Right again, Teeny!

Thanksgiving Pot-Luck Contribution

This year we spent Thanksgiving with some friends at the Second Annual First Parish Thanksgiving Dinner. About a dozen people chipped in and shared a traditional Thanksgiving dinner at the Unitarian Universalist church in Bridgewater.
James and I spent the morning preparing Wild Rice Stuffing from the New York Times cooking page. Mostly we followed the recipe as presented, with two small changes. The proportions of wild rice to brown rice were reversed, and we used hazelnuts instead of pecans (only because I didn't put pecans on the list for James to buy because I thought we already had some, only to find out they were hazelnuts).  The dish was sweet and savory -- and the leftovers were divine.

Good food, sparkling conversation, and a warm setting made this a lovely holiday. Also, we brought the biggest bottle of wine ever!

The empty bottle of homemade Barolo wine we brought to the dinner.
Shown here with a regular-sized wine bottle for scale.

Cranberry Gingerbread

James' post about the Cranberry Noir describes how he got the fresh cranberries from a former student. Said student actually brought so many cranberries (6 cups!) that not only was he able to make the sauce that we'd been salivating over, there were still plenty of cranberries so that I could make the Sticky Cranberry Gingerbread recipe I found in the New York Times. Sticky is definitely the right adjective to use when describing this gingerbread. These adjectives are also appropriate:

• Spicy (I used even more spices than the recipe called for including fresh ground cloves and allspice)
• Sweet
• Yummy

It took longer to bake than the 50-minutes indicated in the recipe (more like 75) and it stuck badly to the parchment. Next time I will just grease a pan.

Cranberry Noir

Teaching is a great job because of the students. We gain at least as much as we give them. I learn something from a student every day, and because on Fridays my students are usually in elementary or middle school, I gain even more fresh ideas than the average university professor.

Photo: Leah Nash for NYT. Food photography is definitely best left to the professionals, especially for a dish like this.

And sometimes what I get from students is not just fresh ideas, but actual cool stuff. In this case: very fresh cranberries. A few years ago, I played a small role in a student getting an internship with a major cranberry grower. She is still with that grower, and this Thanksgiving I am thankful that she has brought us berries!

She did so just as I learned of a recipe that calls for Pinot Noir and cranberries. I was prepared simply to put equal amounts of each in a pan and cook until it was sauce, but I found the actual recipe is a bit more interesting, full of spices.

I used a spice grinder rather than a coffee grinder, because spices would definitely taint coffees. I also used vanilla extract because our local store did not carry vanilla pods. I then heated all of the ingredients in an indispensable cast-iron skillet. I cooked it for a bit longer than called for, but otherwise stuck pretty close to the recipe.

When Pam walked in the house she exclaimed, "It smells like Christmas!" Which of course it did.

We are going to let this chill overnight and will pair it with another Pinot Noir, but for now we can rely on taste tests of the warm sauce to confirm that this is delicious!

• 10 whole allspice berries
• 10 whole cloves
• 10 whole black peppercorns
• 4 cups fresh or thawed frozencranberries
• 1 ½ cups Oregon pinot noir
• 1 cup light brown sugar, loosely packed
• 1 cup clover or wildflower honey
• 1 cup fresh orange juice
• 6 strips orange zest, about 1 inch by 3 inches, removed with a vegetable peeler
• 2 (4-inch) sprigs rosemary
• 1 small cinnamon stick
• 1 vanilla pod

• PREPARATION

  1. Combine allspice, cloves and peppercorns in a spice grinder or coffee grinder and pulse until finely ground.
  2. In a medium saucepan, combine cranberries, wine, brown sugar, honey, orange juice, orange zest, rosemary, cinnamon stick and ground spices.
  3. With the tip of a paring knife, split vanilla pod lengthwise. Use the back of the knife to scrape seeds from pod. Add seeds and pod to pot.
  4. Bring mixture to a boil, then reduce heat to a gentle simmer. Cook, stirring often, until cranberries have burst and liquid thickens slightly, about 15 minutes. Remove from heat and discard zest, rosemary sprigs, cinnamon stick and vanilla pod. Transfer mixture to a bowl and let cool.