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Happy Birthday Mom!

nobody@vox.com(Emily) — Wed, 07 May 2008 20:41:04 -0400

Happy 51st Birthday to my wonderful mother, Ruth!

Here are 5 reasons why my mom is awesome:

1. She's a librarian. The most awesome career there is.

2. She got her Masters in Library Science in her 40s, while working 40 hours a week and taking good care of her family (including my little brother, who was 3 to 5 years old during that time).

3. She has a Vox blog too, and writes great posts.

4. She always knows what to say to make you feel better.

5. She is the best mom in the world, and I wouldn't be who I am or where I am in life without her.

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Day of cooking, Part 3: World's Best Lasagna

nobody@vox.com(Emily) — Mon, 25 Feb 2008 21:36:29 -0500

The third and final part of my Day of Cooking posts (previously: parts 1 & 2). I wanted to make a Lasagna, one of Ryan's favorite dishes. I've never made one, and I used a recipe a friend uses and said is a real crowd pleaser: World's Best Lasagna.

Lasagna Ingrediants

World's Best Lasagna

INGREDIENTS
    * 1 pound sweet Italian sausage
    * 3/4 pound lean ground beef
    * 1/2 cup minced onion
    * 2 cloves garlic, crushed
    * 1 (28 ounce) can crushed tomatoes
    * 2 (6 ounce) cans tomato paste
    * 2 (6.5 ounce) cans canned tomato sauce
    * 1/2 cup water
    * 2 tablespoons white sugar
    * 1 1/2 teaspoons dried basil leaves
    * 1/2 teaspoon fennel seeds
    * 1 teaspoon Italian seasoning
    * 1 tablespoon salt
    * 1/4 teaspoon ground black pepper
    * 4 tablespoons chopped fresh parsley
    * 12 lasagna noodles
    * 16 ounces ricotta cheese
    * 1 egg
    * 1/2 teaspoon salt
    * 3/4 pound mozzarella cheese, sliced
    * 3/4 cup grated Parmesan cheese

DIRECTIONS
   1. In a Dutch oven, cook sausage, ground beef, onion, and garlic over medium heat until well browned. Stir in crushed tomatoes, tomato paste, tomato sauce, and water. Season with sugar, basil, fennel seeds, Italian seasoning, 1 tablespoon salt, pepper, and 2 tablespoons parsley. Simmer, covered, for about 1 1/2 hours, stirring occasionally.
   2. Bring a large pot of lightly salted water to a boil. Cook lasagna noodles in boiling water for 8 to 10 minutes. Drain noodles, and rinse with cold water. In a mixing bowl, combine ricotta cheese with egg, remaining parsley, and 1/2 teaspoon salt.
   3. Preheat oven to 375 degrees F (190 degrees C).
   4. To assemble, spread 1 1/2 cups of meat sauce in the bottom of a 9x13 inch baking dish. Arrange 6 noodles lengthwise over meat sauce. Spread with one half of the ricotta cheese mixture. Top with a third of mozzarella cheese slices. Spoon 1 1/2 cups meat sauce over mozzarella, and sprinkle with 1/4 cup Parmesan cheese. Repeat layers, and top with remaining mozzarella and Parmesan cheese. Cover with foil: to prevent sticking, either spray foil with cooking spray, or make sure the foil does not touch the cheese.
   5. Bake in preheated oven for 25 minutes. Remove foil, and bake an additional 25 minutes. Cool for 15 minutes before serving.

This recipe was long, but worth it. It was an excellent lasagna. I got a little worried, because it said to use 6 noodles for each layer, which felt like way too much to me, because only 3 fit in the pan, so it would have been a double layer. I used no-cook noodles, and I didn't want them to be crunchy by being on top of each other. I decided to use 4 per layer, which had just a slight overlap. Then, at the end I had enough noodles and both sauces, so I did another layer. I was terribly worried about it, but it came out perfect, with the same cook time.

(Side note: Has anyone ever found a 6.5 ounce can of tomato sauce? The store I went to had dozens, and all were a standard 8 ounces. I used the extra 1.5 ounces in both cans.)

I also made simple homemade garlic toast. Take your favorite load of bread (I used thin brick oven white bread) and butter both sides. (Place all slices on an ungreased cookie sheet.) Lightly sprinkle each side with garlic salt and parmesan cheese. Cut in half diagonally before putting in the oven. The cook time can vary from 325 to 425, if you want to stick them in with something else you're cooking. Just keep an eye on them and flip them. The bottoms will get toasted before the tops do. Leave in until your desired level of crispness, which for us is about 15 minutes, 10 on the first side, 5 on the second. These taste good on their own, and even better dipped in a tomato based pasta sauce from your main course.

I forgot to take a photo of the Lasagna after it came out, but do have one from before, which is basically a big mess of cheese:

Lasagna - Before Cooking

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Day of cooking, Part 2: Ooey Gooey Chocolate Cakes

nobody@vox.com(Emily) — Mon, 25 Feb 2008 21:10:26 -0500

Part 2 of my cooking extravaganza (see part 1 here) was more ambitious: Ooey Gooey Chocolate Cakes.

You may be wondering why I decided to make Ooey Gooey Chocolate Cakes when I was already making a yellow cake with chocolate frosting. (Very possibly you were not wondering this, but let's humor me.) There is a very good explanation. The Ooey Gooey Chocolate Cakes came first. I saw this recipe weeks ago on Design*Sponge, and knew I wanted to make them for dessert for Ryan's birthday dinner. A while later, I decided I wanted to make him a regular birthday cake too. Especially since the Ooey Gooey cakes only made 4 tiny individual serving sized cakes. Plus, what's better than 5 cakes?

Ooey Gooey Chocolate Cakes

6 oz bittersweet Ghiradelli chocolate (One and a half bars)
4 oz unsalted butter
2 tablespoons cake flour
1/3 cup cocoa (unsweetened)
1/4 teaspoon salt
3 large eggs
3/4 cup granulated sugar

Heat oven to 325 degrees. Butter and sugar 4 (4 oz) ramekins. Melt butter and chocolate in a double boiler. (or do what I do since I don’t have one: put ingredients in smaller saucepan, fill a larger saucepan partway with water and float the smaller saucepan inside the larger one). Sift cake flour, cocoa and salt in a small prep bowl. Whisk eggs and sugar in a larger prep bowl. Add melted chocolate and butter mixture to egg and sugar mixture a little at a time. Fold in dry ingredients with a whisk. Fill ramekins and place in large glass pan and pour hot water from double boiler around them. Bake about 35-40 minutes until slightly cracked on top and soft on the inside. Serve with Häagen-Dazs Vanilla Bean ice cream and fresh or frozen raspberries.

Ooey Gooey Chocolate Cakes

These were absolutely incredible. I got really worried, because mine didn't crack on the top. They hadn't cracked at 40 minutes, so I left them in for 10 more. Then I got really worried that I had over-baked them and decided to take them out anyway, despite the fact that they still hadn't cracked. I then worried that I left them in for far too long and that they were dry (the tops look a little dry). The moment of truth came after dinner, when I dug my spoon into one. As soon as I saw what came out, I stopped worrying. It was very black, ooey gooey chocolate cake. It was a little ramekin of heaven. The recipe says to serve with Vanilla Bean ice cream and raspberries, and it's not kidding. These little guys are rich. My photos don't show the toppings, because after you put ice cream and raspberries on an ooey gooey cake, who stops to take a picture?

The original post on Design*Sponge is definitely worth checking out if you're interested in making these. It includes a cute intro by Matte Stephens, one of my favorite indie artists who was the one to submit this recipe to D*s. There are much better photos than I took on the original post, and they are even doodled on by Matte. (He even did stop to take a photo of the treats with their toppings. Amazing!)

Additionally, if you want to make this recipe, but don't have ramekins (like I didn't) there's a very good set of six on Amazon for only $8.39.

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Day of cooking, Part 1: Homemade Yellow Cake

nobody@vox.com(Emily) — Mon, 25 Feb 2008 20:44:11 -0500

Ryan's birthday was Sunday, and we celebrated all weekend. I wanted to cook him a nice dinner, and we decided to do that on Saturday, since it meant me being in the kitchen all day. Then we could relax on the actual day of his birthday, and play video games and watch the Oscars.

Saturday morning I started with the cake. I had never made a layer cake before. In fact, I'd only made sheet cakes that never left the pan. I'd also never made a cake from scratch before; I'd only used the boxed mixes.

Making Homemade Yellow Cake

I used this recipe for four egg yellow cake. It turned out pretty well, it had a nice flavor and was fairly moist. Both layers also came out of the round pans easily. I sprayed the pans with non stick cooking spray, and put a circle of wax paper on the bottom of the pan. (Trace the bottom of the pan onto the wax paper with a pencil, and then cut on the inside of your line.) I let the cakes cool for over 3 hours before removing them from the pans, but that was just because I was busy. Just make sure they're completely cooled.

Four Egg Yellow Cake

INGREDIENTS
    * 1 cup shortening*
    * 2 cups white sugar
    * 4 eggs
    * 2 teaspoons vanilla extract
    * 2 3/4 cups all-purpose flour
    * 3 teaspoons baking powder
    * 1 teaspoon salt
    * 1 3/4 cups milk

*I read in the comments that you can also use 1/2 cup shortening and 1/2 butter. I used all shortening, but next time I'm going to try 50/50. I think it will make it much more (surprise) buttery, which would be an improvement.

DIRECTIONS
   1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees F (175 degrees C). Grease and flour one 9 x 13 inch pan.
   2. Cream together shortening and sugar. Beat in eggs and vanilla.
   3. In a separate bowl, combine flour, baking powder, and salt. Add to creamed mixture alternately with milk. Mix well. Pour batter into prepared pan.
   4. Bake for 45 minutes, or until cake tests done. Cool.

For the frosting, I used a recipe that my mom always uses, the one on the inside of the Baker's unsweetened chocolate baking squares box. It was a good recipe, the frosting has a great flavor, and is very easy to make. The best part is you have a while between making the frosting and actually applying it to the cake. A lot of other frosting recipes I've seen say that they harden quickly, and you have to use it right away.

Baker's One Bowl Chocolate Frosting

INGREDIENTS
4 squares (4 ounces) unsweetened Baker's chocolate (I actually used Ghiradelli - one bar is 4 ounces)
16 ounces powdered sugar
1/2 cup of softened butter or margarine
2 teaspoons vanilla
1/3 cup milk

DIRECTIONS
Put chocolate in microwave on high for 2 minutes. Stir until completely melted (put back in microwave if needed). Cool five minutes or until room temperature. Add powdered sugar, butter, and vanilla. Beat (or stir by hand) until well mixed. Gradually add milk, beating until well blended.

This recipe will make 3 cups of frosting, a good amount for frosting a full sheet cake or an 8 or 9 inch two layer cake, including the middle layer and sides.

Ryan's Birthday Cake

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Happy Birthday Emma Wad!

nobody@vox.com(Emily) — Wed, 14 Nov 2007 19:40:49 -0500

Emma Wad

Happy Birthday to one of my very best friends, Emma Wad! (No, that's not her real last name. It's an endearment.)

Emma recently moved to the east coast, which makes my leg bounce up and down with joy every time I think about it. Our first east coast get together will be next week, when she and our other good friend Josh come to stay for Thanksgiving.

Emma is a special education teacher; she's started a brand new program at the school. She's also amazing at sign language and has taught us many absolutely marvelous signs.

The picture above is one of my favorite pictures of Emma. It was taken our junior year of college when we both had single rooms in the extraordinary Mason Hall. Emma could often be found in my room in that papazan chair eating various things while we watched DVDs and laughed about things.

Once we made up a song about Emma Wad, which is sung to the tune of Stacey's Mom by Fountains of Wayne. Sadly, no known recording exists of our version, so I'll have to settle for posting the original as a tribute.

03 Stacy's Mom

Cheers, Wad! See you next week!!

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September Birthdays

nobody@vox.com(Emily) — Sun, 23 Sep 2007 17:35:44 -0400

Amazon beat me to my post. I've been waiting to post about all the magnificent authors who celebrate their birthday at the end of September. But here they go posting about it first!

Actually, Jane Smiley beat all of us, because she wrote about it in the introduction of her book 13 Ways of Looking at the Novel. (Smiley's own birthday is September 26th.)

But anyway, I love the date of my birthday mainly because September is the most gorgeous month in the most gorgeous season. I also love sharing my birthday with F. Scott Fitzgerald (my favorite classic is The Great Gatsby, no contest). It's also Jim Henson's birthday. :)

Anyway, here's the list of famous authors born at the end of September: (Amazon forgot Miguel and Shel, so I added them.)

September 20 - Upton Sinclair
September 21 - H. G. Wells; Stephen King
September 24 - F. Scott Fitzgerald
September 25 - William Faulkner; Shel Silverstein
September 26 - T. S. Eliot
September 29 - Miguel de Cervantes
September 30 - Truman Capote

And, here's a picture of my extremely awesome birthday cake that Ryan made for me a day early, due to tomorrow's busy schedule:

My Birthday Cake!

We love Mario Party, if you can't tell.

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Breaking News: I'm headed for the Ed Sullivan Theatre!

nobody@vox.com(Emily) — Thu, 20 Sep 2007 22:03:27 -0400

Today something I have been waiting for ever since I moved to New York happened. The Late Show with David Letterman called me.

Would I like tickets for Monday, September 24?

Would I like tickets for my favorite talk show ever?

Would I finally like tickets to the show I have been trying every week to get tickets to since I moved to New York over a year ago?

Would I like to go to the show on the very day of my birthday?

Yes.

Yes yes yes yes yes yes yes yes!

Thank goodness that when Ryan and I bought my birthday present (tickets to Avenue Q) we decided to go Sunday night instead of Monday night.

File under S for Super Awesome.

Letterman

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