I love to bake cakes. I look forward to family birthday parties so I can look up a new recipe and try my hand at creating something beautiful and tasty. For Carl's family birthday party last week, I found a fun recipe in the latest Bon Appetit magazine for a classic Chocolate Mayonaise Cake. Yes, mayo sounds a bit wierd, but I've learned throughout my marriage to Ron that mayo has its place in the kitchen besides in sandwich making. He has taught me that it is a killer secret ingredient, usually better left unmentioned. (He makes a mean pot of chili with mayo!) The mayo takes the place of butter or oil and brings a very nice moistness to a cake. There's no strange residual mayonaise flavor at all.
The cake was great, though I had to call in my baking-pro friend Janet for a little advice on the frosting. It called for bittersweet chocolate not exceeding 61 % cacao. I had unsweetened chocolate on hand. I couldn't figure out if they were interchangeable and didn't have the computer on to google it, so Janet was able to give me a few tips. In the end, I used mostly unsweetened chocolate but replaced 2 oz of it with semisweet chocolate chips. The frosting was really nice to work with and not too sweet.
For Carl's kid birthday party, a small affair during the day over spring break, he wanted to bring in the fun. He had seen a photo of a cake Ron made when he was single and a cat owner: a kitty-litter cake. You bake a spice cake and a white cake, tear them up into crumbs, mix them together with two small boxes of vanilla pudding colored with grey or black food coloring. Once they are mixed, you put them in a new kitty litter box and serve with tootsie rolls molded into you-know-whats using a new cat scoop. Ron was happy to be the one to make Carl's 7 year-old birthday wishes come true. 
This is a simple version of provolone. Simple, well, not really very simple, but simple compared to the fancy stuff you buy at the grocery store. The kids decided that it is even squeakier than Wisconsin cheese curds. This one was soaked in a salt brine for one hour after it had been air dried for 24 hours. Yum.
This one is queso fresco, a crumbly, squeaky Mexican cheese. I was delayed in finishing all the steps at the proper times and temperatures, so it is missing the typical squeakiness. It is a bit drier than I expected, but still tastes pretty good. I love the texture on the outside from the variety of cheese cloth I used.
Now, off to bake some bread to go with it. Or not. It is 78 degrees and beautiful outside. I just might be done with standing in a hot kitchen and baking bread for the summer.
May Day Parade 2009
I hope you had a wonderful Mother's day. I felt very loved. When the kids and I returned home from church, Ron (with help from his Dad) had a lovely brunch prepared and ready to serve to his parents and our five. We used fancy dishes and silverware and lingered at the table long after the meal was over. 
My favorite way to clean a room is to rearrange it. I love to totally switch things around, leaving no thing untouched. That way, I am forced to clean everything... even the little dust balls that lurk in the teeniest nook and cranny. Recently, it was the porch. Over the winter I had let piles of stuff for thrift store donations pile up in the corner along with other random stuff left over from last summer. Ugh. 
So, with a little help from two little helpers, I rearranged the porch and cleaned. Afterwards we celebrated with some fresh cut flowers from the garden, plus a vase for both of their rooms.
What's your method for the spring cleaning madness? Are you a rearranger? Do tell!
This cake is an Orange Chocolate Chunk Cheesecake from 
And don't forget mama, in those orange polka dotted boots. I'm dancing in the rain just as much as those three little ones.
We celebrated Easter today at my parents' house. It was complete with a sunny day, an egg hunt, snuggles with the two new babies and lots of great food. 
