A wedding

The happy couple

Our brother got married last weekend to the girl he's been dating for 7 1/2 years. Everyone loves her and she has been a part of the family for years already. My brother was my best friend thru high school and has always been one of the most important people in my life. I was so happy to see them together all dolled up and married that I think I cried more than anyone. And I don't cry much about external things. The wedding was perfect. The photographer was brilliant, the flowers stunning. The bride was so organized that she knew exactly how things were supposed to go and they certainly all went right. Amanda and I had our first bridesmaid experience along with T's other two sisters, and we all had a fun girly time getting ourselves and T ready. She made us hangers with our names on them for bridesmaid gifts.


Best wishes to both of you in your new life and enjoy moving home again!

While I was home, I helped make dessert for the groom's dinner Friday night and 120 cupcakes for Amanda's graduation party in two weeks. For the cupcakes, she picked lemon and chocolate. I spent Thursday morning baking for about 3 hours. It was heavenly. I can now probably make cupcakes in my sleep. For the groom's dinner, mom and I decided to go with an array of bars. I pulled out our trusty New Best Recipes (which I gifted to the bride and groom :) and picked lemon bars, pecan bars, and brownies. When my mom learned that I wasn't going to frost the brownies, she decided she had to make them herself in order to ensure sufficient amounts of sugar were involved.

Part of the huge cupcake parade

The lemon bars were pretty fun and turned out fantastic. Afterwards, I was left with 2 cups of egg whites and so was forced to make an angelfood cake too. Poor me.

What lovely yolks

Lemon Bars
from the New Best Recipes cookbook

• 1 1/4 cup flour
• 1/2 cup powdered sugar
• 1/2 tsp salt
• 8 Tbsp. butter, softened
• 7 egg yolk, plus 2 whole eggs
• 1 cup plus 2 Tbsp sugar
• 2/3 cup juice and 1/4 cup zest from 4-5 lemons
• 4 Tbsp. butter
• 3 Tbsp. cream

1. Spray a 9x9 pan with baking spray and line with foil. Spray the foil
2. Process flour, powdered sugar and salt in a food processor. Add 8 Tbsp butter in 1 Tbsp blocks and process to blend until the mixture resembles cornmeal or 8-10 seconds. Sprinkle mixture into pan and press to an even layer. Refrigerate for 30 minutes.
   
3. With oven rack at middle position, preheat to 350 and bake the crust for 20 minutes.
4. For the filling, whisk yolks, and eggs until combined and whisk in sugar. Add lemon juice, zest and salt and whisk again until combined. Transfer mixture to a saucepan, add the 4 Tbsp. butter in pieces, and cook over medium-low. Stir constantly until the curd thickens to a sauce-like consistency and reaches 170 degrees (about 5 minutes).
5. Strain the curd if you like and pour onto warm crust.
   
6. Bake 10-15 minutes until filling is shiny and opaque and jiggly in center. Let cool for 45 minutes before cutting.
   

Used lemons. So sad.

A little bit of spring in the renewed winter weather.

Winter came back with a vengeance yesterday as rain/snow fell most of the day in most of the state. We were up in the mountains in the morning and had planned to go skiing, but after seeing how windy and snowy it was, we decided to just stay in. We're so spoiled. I'm out of town most weekends for the rest of the season, so I may not get many more ski days.


At Matt's work, they run a shindig called "Cafe Chopin" on Thursdays, where every week, someone brings in a tasty snack to share. I always get unreasonably excited when Matt is signed up to bring something because it means I can make something amazing and decadent and not have to eat it all myself. I've seen a lot of pictures of citrus upside-down cakes and they're so pretty, I decided we had to make one. Plus, I've been madly eating citrus this month because it's been so good.

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Upside-Down Orange Spice Cake
adapted from David Lebovitz

• 4 Tbsp butter
• 1 cup brown sugar
• 4 medium navel oranges, peeled and sliced into 1/4" slices
• 1/3 tsp ground nutmeg

• 2 cups flour
• 3/4 tsp salt
• 2 tsp baking powder
• 2 tsp ground nutmeg
• 8 Tbsp butter, at room temp
• 3/4 cup sugar
• 3 eggs
• 2/3 cup milk or half&half
• 1 tsp vanilla
• zest of one orange

1. Preheat: 350F
   
2. For the topping, melt the butter with the brown sugar and nutmeg in a 12-inch cast-iron skillet (The original recipe is for a 10-inch). When all melted and smooth, set aside to set.
3. Layer the orange slices in some pretty manner atop the caramel topping.
4. Mix the flour, salt, baking powder, and nutmeg together in a bowl.
   
5. Cream the butter and sugar together in a bowl. Add the eggs one at a time.
   
6. Combine the milk, vanilla, and orange zest in another container.
7. Add half the dry ingredients to the sugar/butter, then add the wet. Add the rest of the dry and mix until combined.
8. Spoon batter over the orange slices and bake for 5 minutes at 350.
9. Let the cake cool for 15 minutes, then invert onto a plate.

Supposedly it's best warm, but it was still darn good the day after.

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