A moment!!

The baby co-operated long enough for me to get a cake in the oven!

Of course, he woke up, hungry, six minutes before the timer was set to chime. Maybe it was the scent?

The recipe: Applesauce Spice Cake with Brown Sugar Icing
Source: Canadian Living Holiday Baking 2006

Ingredients:

3/4 cup butter, softened
1-1/2 cups packed brown sugar
3 eggs
1 tsp vanilla
3 cups all-purpose flour
2-1/4 tsp baking powder
1 tsp salt
3/4 tsp baking powder
3/4 tsp cinnamon
1/2 tsp ground ginger
1/4 tsp ground allspice
1/4 tsp nutmeg
1-1/2 cups unsweetened applesauce
1/3 cup buttermilk

Grease 9x13 inch metal cake pan; line bottom with parchement paper. Set aside.

In large bowl, beat butter with brown sugar until fluffy; beat in eggs, 1 at a time. Beat in vanilla.

In separate bowl, whisk together flour, baking powder, salt, baking soda, cinnamon, ginger, allspice and nutmeg. Stir into butter mixture alternately with applesauce and buttermilk, making three additions of dry ingredients and two of the wet.

Bake in centre of 350F (180C) oven until cake tester inserted in centre comes out clean, about 35 minutes. Let cool in pan on rack. (Make-ahead: Cover and store for up to 2 days. Or overwrap with heavy-duty foil and freeze for up to 2 weeks; thaw before icing.)


Icing ingredients:
1/3 cup butter
2/3 cup packed brown sugar
2 tbsp corn syrup
2 tbsp milk
1/2 tsp vanilla
1-1/2 cups icing sugar, sifted

In saucepan, melt butter over medium heat. Add brown sugar and corn syrup; bring to boil, stirring constantly. Boil just until blended, about 1 minute. Remove from heat.

Using wooden spoon, stir milk and vanilla into butter mixture. Using wooden spoon, beat in icing sugar until smooth and spreadable; let cool for 1 minute. Spread over top of cake just to edge, letting icing drizzel over slightly.

Makes 12 servings.

Nutritional information:
Per serving: about 508 calories, 5 g protein, 18g total fat (11 g saturated fat), 83 g carbohydrates, 1 g fibre, 99 mg cholesterol, 527 mg sodium. % RDI: 8% calcium, 18% iron, 18% vitamin A, 3% vitamin C, 32% folate.

Butchery

We received a care package from our church's 'pastoral care' committee. Unlike all the other presents received in recent weeks, this one was primarily for us. Sure, there were a few books and a toy, but most of the contents were for the benefit of the tired, overwhelmed parents. Juice, nuts, chocolate, biscuits.

And a fresh, whole pineapple.

We are both fond of pineapple, so this was a welcome gift. But the effort of preparing it for consumption got me thinking about the act of preparing said pineapple. All that peeling, coring, slicing... It seems to me that I didn't so much have to prepare the pineapple as butcher it.

Just a thought. A sleep-deprived thought, at that.

Wishful thinking? Masochism?

I'm not sure this is such a good idea.

I've been reading cookbooks.

I received Alton Brown's I'm Just Here for More Food for my birthday, and bought the "director's cut" version of I'm Just Here for the Food soon afterwards. As always, I bought Canadian Living's latest magazine-style cookbook, this one filled with holiday treats, and got suckered in by Fine Cooking's special chocolate issue.

Countless new, enticing issues. Neither time nor opportunity to try them.

{sigh}

I used to love cooking; now it seems a chore. Baking¹ used to be my favourite stress reliever; now I can only endulge if the baby is either asleep (and will be for a long enough time) or my husband is able to care for him while I'm in the kitchen.

How can I be an overeducated Hausfrau if I don't present my family with healthy, love-steeped meals on a daily basis?


¹ Yes, baking. I certainly do like nibbling on the yummy outcome, but it is the baking I enjoy most. Thank heaven I have a husband who enjoys homemade goodies (are there husbands who don't??), so I have a willing consumer of said yummy outcomes!

I am so glad I planned - and prepared - ahead!

Last night I took a lasagna out of the freezer. Enough for four servings, so good for two suppers.

Hooray! It was delicious. I'm so glad now that I took the time then - when I was nine months pregnant! - to make homemade noodles.

Damn, that was tasty lasagna! Maybe it tasted better because it was such a treat? Homemade, yet no effort (at the time, anyway)?

In any case, I am so glad I filled the freezer. Aside from the lasagna, we've had a raspberry pie and cannelloni. There's still lots to choose from, and I'm glad of that. Seems like it will be a long long time yet before I get to really cook...

I'm gonna need some warm gloves

The freezer is so well stocked that getting things out is a bit of a challenge. The ready-made homemade food is a welcome treat now that I don't have time to cook, but I think I'm at risk of frostbite!

Mmmm... tastes like summer!

I've fished one of the pies from the freezer. Raspberry pie - tastes just like summer! What a treat!

The stocked freezer

My well-stuffed freezer. Almost everything that's been stockpiled. Three apple pies are in the fridge freezer, as is the cookie dough, and this close-up photo doesn't show the frozen berries and other goodies stored on the door. It does, however, show the growing stash of frozen breastmilk.


Lasagne, cannelloni, bolognese sauce, turkey stock, macaroni and cheese, cod au gratin, turkey chili, pies (strawberry-rhubarb, blueberry, raspberry, peace, apple, apple-pear-cranberry, apple-cranberry), muffins...

Plus meats, veggies, fish, phyllo (yeah, like I'll have time to use that!), juice...

And a couple of frozen pizzas and packages of perogies and stuffed pastas, for the truly desperate days.

Open house offerings

While my parents were still here, we hosted an open house for those local friends who had yet to meet Jakob. With time fully subscribed and energies low, the offerings weren't fancy, yet nevertheless both savoury and sweet seemed to have been enjoyed by all:

My birthday cake

I did have a birthday cake! A delicious surprise, made by Cupcakes. Chocolate-coconut cake with chocolate-orange buttercream, the same flavour combination I had whilst visiting Cupcakes just hours before going into labour.

Yummy, beautiful, and apparently Alton Brown agrees:

I managed to cook a meal!

Ok, not much of a meal, but nevertheless I did cook supper last night. Bulghur-stuffed peppers. A labour-intensive recipe, as it happens, and I'd forgotten how tedious it really could be. Fortunately, thinking that I had three weeks left as a mother-to-be, I had planned to make this before the baby was born; yet realising how little energy I actually had, I bought pre-shredded asiago. (Horrors!) Saved at least one step. And, using the food processor with which I didn't really want to fight, Werner chopped the mushrooms for me.


The recipe: Bulgur-Stuffed Sweet Peppers
Source: Canadian Living (September 2003)


Ingredients:
1/2 cup (125 mL) bulgur
4 small sweet red peppers (about 2 lb/1 kg total)
4 cups (1 L) mushrooms (12 oz/375 g)
2 tbsp (25 mL) extra-virgin olive oil
1 onion, chopped
2 cloves garlic, minced
1 tbsp (15 mL) finely chopped fresh sage (or 1 tsp/5 mL dried, crumbled)
3/4 tsp (4 mL) each salt and pepper
1/2 cup (125 mL) shredded Asiago cheese
1/4 cup (50 mL) toasted slivered almonds
1/4 cup (50 mL) chopped fresh parsley
2 tbsp (25 mL) lemon juice
2 plum tomatoes, seeded and diced

In large bowl, pour 1-1/3 cups (325 mL) boiling water over bulgur; cover and let stand for 15 minutes. Drain and press out moisture; return to dry bowl.

Meanwhile, slice tops off peppers, leaving 2-inch (5 cm) high sides; core and scrape out seeds. Dice tops and set aside.

In food processor or by hand, finely chop mushrooms. In large nonstick skillet, heat half of the oil over medium-high heat; fry diced peppers, mushrooms, onion, garlic, sage and 1/2 tsp (2 mL) each of the salt and pepper until liquid is evaporated, about 10 minutes. Add to bulgur along with cheese, almonds and parsley; toss to combine.

Spoon bulgur mixture into peppers, mounding if necessary. Place peppers, stuffed side up, in 8-inch (2 L) square glass baking dish. Drizzle with lemon juice and remaining oil; top with tomatoes. Sprinkle with remaining salt and pepper.

Cover with foil; bake in 350°F (180°C) oven until peppers are almost tender, about 1 hour. Uncover and bake until tops are crusty, about 30 minutes.


Tips:
Bulgur is steamed dried wheat kernels that are ground to various degrees, from coarse to fine. If it's not specified on the box, it is medium.

You can replace cooked bulgur with 1 cup (250 mL) cooked rice or couscous.

Nutritional information:
Per serving: about 302 cal, 10 g pro, 16 g total fat (4 g sat. fat), 35 g carb, 8 g fibre, 12 mg chol, 564 mg sodium. % RDI: 15% calcium, 23% iron, 73% vit A, 518% vit C, 29% folate.


One problem with this recipe (and similar recipes, too): I've never figured out what to serve with it. The stuffed pepper alone is satisfying (and sufficiently well-rounded) to be a main dish, but it looks so naked on a plate without a side-dish. A side vegetable seems redundant, however. Werner suggested a side dish of meat - maybe he's onto something?

The first supper

My parents headed home on Sunday. On Monday, rather than dip into the well-stocked freezer, I cooked my first postpartum meal.

I had previously bought a pie pumpkin from the university's farm, intending to roast it with other vegetables at some point or other. But I had also bought a butternut squash, which ended up in the roasted veggies, and the pumpkin sat, in a container in which a flower arrangement had been delivered¹, on the breakfast bar.

So Monday evening, I split, seeded, and baked the pumpkin and turned it into a soup. In chicken stock, I boiled a couple of white potatoes. I added some garlic, a bit of cream, ginger, curry powder, and cinnamon, salt and white pepper. I tossed in the cooked pumpkin and smooshed it all together with my immersion blender. Served it with leftover baguette.

It was... ok. Not bad, but something was missing. I've made something like this before, but in my sleep deprived haze I must have forgotten something. The soup was fine, but a bit flat. (And not helped out at all by the stale baguette.)

In any case, I ended up with a fairly big pot of soup, which was also supper on Tuesday (Hallowe'en calls for a pumpkin-based meal, doesn't it?), and will return again today either for lunch or supper. Leftovers will be my salvation this week, even if they aren't very good.

(Maybe tomorrow I'll raid the freezer...)


¹ Oh, but it is a nice container! Like a little bucket. Quite cute, really.