Jenny Check

summer shortcakes

Pie Club

Coconut cream pie from the Mustard's Cookbook. More details here.

Jelly Roll!

Kyle and I got together Tuesday to finally get some use out of his jelly roll pan. We made the biscuit roulade recipe from the Cake Bible and filled the cake with strawberry fruit cloud filling. Beranbaum advises to moisten the cake with a syrup if not using a moist filling. She thought that the cream filling would be moist enough to not need the syrup, but after making it without, I think I would try it next time. By day 2, the cake had moistened enough, but on day one, the cake was a little dry. Kyle took pics, so hopefully they'll be up! Hurrah!

Cake Club!

We made Boston Cream Pie from the Joy of Cooking. It was pretty good, except the sponge cake was a little eggy and bouncey. You'd have to eat it to know what I mean. The custard cream and chocolate glaze made up for it though.... See the rest of the photos!

cake club!

Sorry about the picture, Kyle, but Harold erased the other ones by mistake! I had to show the cake club neighborhoody.

Kyle and I had a CC meeting on Tuesday. The theme was "cheesecake." Our goal was to make a delicious custardy cheesecake that was light and cheesy and delicious- Kyle found the recipe on the food network website. However, after careful review of recipes, we determined that we would not be able to devour the cheesecake immediately after baking, so we decided to also make an instant-gratification-chocolate-cake. The chocolate cake recipe came from The Cake Bible by Rose Berenbaum.

The cheesecake was delicious- cream cheese, sour cream, eggs, vanilla, sugar and a little bit of lemon zest. The crust was ground up graham crackers and butter. yum. As cheesecakes go, it was a winner- but I'm still searching for yet another lighter cheesecake. When I was in Michigan, I had a Japanese adult flute student who was very conscientious. One week she came to her lesson looking very downcast bearing a cake. She said, "I didn't practice, but I made you a cheesecake. Can I just listen to you play during my lesson?" So I came home with the most delicious cheesecake I have ever had. Is it a Japanese secret?

The chocolate cake was a hit with Christopher. We slightly undercooked it, so it was very moist, giving it a pudding-like consistency. We used Dutch processed cocoa and sour cream and lots of butter.

Cake Club with special guest star!

John Launder was our special guest star at the last Cake Club. Kyle Minor and Jennifer Check in attendance. Kyle and I made a two layer yellow cake from the Cake Bible and neo-classical chocolate buttercream frosting. Then all three of us made a golden wheat carrot cake for John Polito's birthday. Both cakes turned out delicious! The buttercream frosting was very very buttery. So buttery, that you could almost not taste the chocolate. I didn't like it at first, but the more I ate it, the more it grew on me. John Launder saved the day on the carrot cake. It split coming out of the cake pan, but somehow, he got the top layer to come off in one piece and flipped it onto the base exactly at the right spots. Amazing. We doctored the cracks by making the cream cheese frosting a glaze that easily covered the blemishes. Ingenious!

Cake Club with Special Guest Stars

Kyle and I had another cake club meeting yesterday.  The mission was to make a yellow cake with dark chocolate frosting from the Jimtown Store Cookbook.  The yellow cake was made with some orange zest, egg yolks, buttermilk and rum along with the usual cakey ingredients.  The dark chocolate frosting was bittersweet chocolate, heavy cream and some more unsweetened chocolate and vanilla.  We enjoyed the visits of special guest stars, Emily and Bobby.  Monkey noises were made, we heard the elusive sounds of monkey panic and we saw pictures of Roma and Bobby's European trip and pictures of Kyle and Christopher's wedding. 

Cake Club!

This was the toasted coconut cake from the last cake club meeting, consisting of members Kyle Minor and Jennifer Check. The bottom layer fell apart when we tried to turn it out, but the cake repaired pretty easily with the help of lots of frosting and coconut flakes. Previous cakes from cake club include the infamous black cake, strawberry ribbon cake and devil's food cake. Now that I am armed with the Cake Bible and heavy gauge nine inch cake pans, nothing can stop us now!