I let Dan pick out his Father's Day menu from Martha Stewart's Dinner at Home: 52 Quick Meals to Cook for Family and Friends because he is both family and friend and I like quick things. Except whoopsy! I forgot it was Martha, so it was more "quick" as in, "I quickly spent two hours and forty-five minutes in the kitchen and used the food processor twice."
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| Turns out turkey burgers are pretty bland even if you put parsley in them. I know! I was surprised too. |
But I am here to tell you that every second spent and every food processor blade cleaned (TWICE) was worth it for these Blackberry-Almond Shortbread Squares, because they are perfect. (At least the book version, which does not have orange zest, is perfect.)
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| I also see that, according to the picture that goes with the recipe, they are meant to be eaten with a fork. Which makes sense. |
Anyway, everything was very picturesque, great holiday fare, definitely nothing disastrous emerged from the kitchen okay bye guys see you Friday!
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| Shhh, Anna, we don't have to tell them about that. It's fine. Forget it. |
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| That's right. Happy normal face. |
Alright, well. I don't really trust Anna's poker face to hold up, so I may as well tell you about the chocolate cake. It begins, as so many unfortunate stories do, with The Book Lover's Cookbook. I thought it would be cute to make the "Daddy's Rich Chocolate Cake" that accompanies the excerpt from Bill Cosby's Fatherhood for, you know, Father's Day. FULL DISCLOSURE: for the first time since this project began, I did not actually read the book before attempting this recipe, because I have seen Bill Cosby: Himself somewhere on the order of five dozen times and was pretty sure I had the whole chocolate cake for breakfast thing covered oh don't worry I was punished for my hubris.
In case you, for whatever reason, have not seen Bill Cosby: Himself five dozen times, here you go:
FUN FACT: Remember when I reread Little House on the Prairie and was slightly devastated to realize that I was no longer Laura but rather Ma and that was a shift in perspective that mostly sucked? Well, I am ALSO no longer the lucky child getting cake for breakfast but rather the understandably cranky Mrs. Cosby. So, yay.
The premise of the bit is that the ingredients of cake are generally breakfast-esque when you break them down, so I guess the editors of the BLC decided to double down on that theory and add applesauce? I'm not opposed, but it's a little weird. Also weird that it's one of those "add a bunch of boiling water" cakes which I made even weirder by "not paying attention and adding twice as much boiling water as I was supposed to."
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| Also, there was no salt at all in the entire recipe, so I added bacon. |
Anyway, sure it was in the oven for a pretty long time and the texture's a little off, but aren't you girls still SO EXCITED to be having chocolate cake for breakfast???
Come on, guys. It's not that bad.
Okay, granted, there is a little bit of leakage.
Very slight caketoplasm situation.
I mean, it's just sugar water. It's a HUMMINGBIRD'S PARADISE!
Come on.
It's fine.
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| Fine. |
