Lemon Tart with Walnut Crust

Easy Peazy Lemon Squeezy
This past winter, I thought for sure I would lose all my citrus trees during that long stretch of sub-freezing temperatures. There was a lot of frost damage, and I had to cut them way back. But if you walk into my back yard right now you would never know it.

The trees are in bloom, and the scent is phenomenal. When combined with the fragrance from my honeysuckle it almost smells like Hawaii, without the beach, or the guy with a Mai Tai.

As wonderful as all this is, unfortunately I will have to wait months for the fruit. And I’ve got a wicked craving for all things lemon: lemonade, lemon sauce, lemon cake, preserved lemons…well you get the idea.

To tide me over until harvest, I picked up some beautiful Meyer lemons downstairs in the store, and made a tart from a recipe from the August/September 1997 issue of Fine Cooking magazine—which I bought years ago. It is easy, and so tasty, and a great way to end a Spring meal. Read more…

Classic Yellow Cake with Chocolate Frosting

Let Them Eat Cake

This Sunday, My dad will turn 70 and we will have a big celebration which is tradition. There will be the usual grilled fatty meats, adult beverages and, of course, there will be cake.

In my family we take birthday cake pretty seriously. We all have our personal favorites. Growing up, my mother’s mother would make sure that we all got “our cake” for our birthday dinner. A few years ago though I learned that a great travesty had occurred. The usual death by chocolate cake that Gam made for Dad every year was, in fact, not his favorite cake. (Gasp! Say it ain’t so!)

The running joke when I was growing up was that Dad was Gam’s favorite despite the fact that he was a USC grad (Gam went to Cal) and married her only child. Every year Dad got a promise from Gam that she would someday buy him the red Ferrari he always wanted. Alas, it never happened and instead, every birthday Gam would give Dad the biggest piece of his “favorite” chocolate cake with chocolate frosting. As it turns out though, it wasn’t his choice, and Dad being Dad never said anything. (Or maybe it was the promise of the Ferrari?)

Turns out Dad’s favorite cake is a yellow cake with chocolate frosting. And if it comes from a box, so much the better! Since I have learned of his preference, I have tried to make up for the many years of incorrect cakes by making sure that there is a yellow cake with chocolate frosting at Dad’s birthday celebration. Though, the food snob in me can’t handle doing it from a box.

Yellow Cake is the epitome of a classic birthday cake. For me, when I picture a slice of birthday cake, the picture of a yellow cake with chocolate frosting quickly comes to mind. But you just don’t see it served all that often which is a crime. Yellow cake is moist and tasty and is the perfect compliment to a good chocolate frosting recipe.

Interestingly enough, there aren’t a whole lot of yellow cake recipes even in the so called “baking bibles”, but I have found a few. The best one is from The Joy of Cooking. (Of course it is.) I also give you Gam’s Chocolate Frosting which was legendary—especially when she added some instant espresso to it. Read more…

Valentine Ice Cream Sundaes

Lovin’ Spoonful

Everyone has their own ideas about how to celebrate Valentine’s Day. My family is no different.

In the past, my husband and I would do the usual things to celebrate Valentine’s Day. By usual things I mean that I would remind him about February 14th, to which he would reply, “That’s today?!?” (Sigh.) Times are a bit different. Gone are the chocolates, fancy dinners and roses. Though there never really were any roses—Cupid has horrible allergies. And, of course, the reminders are still required. But we do manage to enjoy some fun for Valentine’s Day.

My husband has always loved ice cream. His love of ice cream is second only to his love of cookies. I come in a distant third…maybe.

A few years ago we started the Valentine’s Day Ice Cream Sundae tradition. Instead of dinner out, or eating huge boxes of chocolate, the five of us make our own Hot Fudge Sundaes. And I do mean Sundaes. We’re not talking a couple of scoops of vanilla with some Hershey’s squirted on it. I mean legit Sundaes. We go all out.

Anything we could possibly want in or on our sundaes is available. We have multiple flavors of ice cream on hand including the hand-packed, special trip up the street to purchase, gallon of Fenton’s Toasted Almond. To my mind, it ain’t a real sundae without Fenton’s Toasted Almond.

The toppings are myriad, and range from Hot Fudge to Marshmallow to chopped nuts and fresh brewed espresso. (If you have never poured cooled espresso over your ice cream, you haven’t lived. And if you add some chocolate chips? Shut The Front Door!)

This year I might stray from my usual path, and go a bit outside my comfort zone just to shake things up a bit. (However, these things require a lot of thought. I wouldn’t want to mess it up.) As a family rule, we tend to stick to the chocolate, vanilla and nutty type flavors but adding coconut and raspberry sounds interesting…

This is my proposed line up for this year: Read more…

Fresh Blood Oranges with Lemon Honey Syrup

Fresh Blood Oranges with Lemon Honey Syrup These brilliantly-colored fruits are at their peak, and this year’s season is a great one for citrus. They juice beautifully, are a welcome sight in lunch boxes, liven up salads, and make delicious marmalade. If you have not had the pleasure of experiencing a blood orange, Read more…