The Cake Parlour

Long story...

Hello everyone! My apologies for a few days absence. I've been working on something very special.

The news I've been bottling up for the past couple of months is that I'm shutting down my wedding cake business to help open a new bakery here in Nashville. I can't reveal a lot of details about it yet...but will be updating you as soon as I am allowed!

This has come at such an opportune time for me. I love baking and putting together confections, but I have discovered that I hate, hate, HATE owning a business. Yuck. Some people...that is just their cup of tea, but not me. I am way too prone to anxiety for that. I'd like to be a part of something, rather than in charge of something. So this is all really an answer to prayers, and very exciting!

So The Cake Parlour will be no more. And, in all this, somehow it feels beyond appropriate to shut down this blog as well and start fresh. This is technically a business blog...and I've always been really careful about what I post because of that. Well, I welcome the opportunity to open up a little more on my new blog.

Also, I've become increasingly passionate about natural foods during the past several months, and want to share the wholesome, seasonal, naturally-sweetened and leavened desserts I've been creating with you.

So, thank you so very much, all the readers that come here, and especially to the ones I've become friends with in real life. Come visit me now at Maple Sugar!

(and don't forget to update your links!)

xoxoxoxox

Rebekka

Chrismas!

Or at least it FEELS LIKE IT! I went to pick up my first CSA box from the precious families at Bountiful Blessings Farm yesterday, and it was SO, SO exciting.

Really, I can't possibly convey to you how exciting it was/excited I am. I can't even think of something that compares to this excitement...really REALLY excited! This box was FILLED with the most gorgeous produce...raspberries, kale, butter lettuce, shallots, arugula, LOOK AT THOSE CARROTS, Irish and fingerling potatoes, a few late tomatoes, beets, butternut squash, sage....enough produce to last us for two weeks. And all for $35! What? Who said eating local and organic is too expensive?

Okay, let me calm down a little bit. I have way too much to do today to be blabbering on here like this!

I hope all of you have a wonderful weekend!

embarrassing

Our camera battery died this weekend at my friend Shayna's wedding, so the only picture we managed to get of the cake was one with me in it...so sorry, but several people are waiting to see this cake so I have no choice (click on it, you can see the cake way better.) These were our bridesmaid dresses, though...they were gorgeous. Her whole wedding was gold and chocolate brown, with trees and leaves as the theme. And it was outside, on a farm, set next to an old farmhouse....it was gorgeous. The cake was apple spice with caramel cream cheese filling and cream cheese frosting. The designs were piped to resemble her invitation...and that's a handmade fondant tree for her topper. I'll have to wait for the photographer's pictures for a good cake photo. And, I didn't get a haircut mom. It's just pulled back.

So I'm so exhausted...I couldn't do anything yesterday. I feel like I can't do anything today. But I have THREE wedding cakes this weekend so I better get workin'. I do have some exciting news for all of you though, just let me get through this week.

Busy and boring and rainy and cold.

Sounds depressing, but not really. These wedding cakes are quite honestly about to drive me crazy, though. I have a steadily growing list beside my computer of "things I want to do when my string of weddings is over this month." Get Symphony tickets, sew new dinner napkins, finally organize my spice jars, and all of the puttery Autumn treats at Brocante Home. Oh, please read them if you haven't! They are so decadent it's almost silly, which is perfect.

I wish I could show you what is simmering on my stove right now, but there is no light and the picture would barely turn out. But I will gladly tell you about it...and it's very special. Cocotte de Legumes Croquants...my favorite thing to prepare on a grey day like this one. Basically, one cooks a couple of chopped shallots in olive oil in a heavy bottomed pot over medium-low heat until soft. Add a peeled and chopped apple and a pear and a bunch of chopped vegetables (I use carrots, leeks, green beans, butternut squash, and celery). Cook slowly with half a cup of water and the juice of one lemon for about an hour until the vegetables and fruit are tender. Season with sea salt and pepper and my goodness it's delicious. The recipe is from Mireille Guiliano, from French Women for all Seasons...which is a beautiful book.

So back to work.

soupaholic

Tuesday has become official soup night at our house, right after Monday official quiche night. It's just so gratifying to blend this and that together into something hearty and warming and delicious. Not to mention that, served as dinner with a chunk of homemade whole wheat sourdough bread and salad, it REALLY stretches a dollar. This one from September's Everyday Food is tasty. Especially if you use homemade chicken stock...

Cream of Broccoli Soup

1 tablespoon olive oil
1 medium onion, diced
coarse salt and ground pepper
30 oz chicken broth or stock
1 large head broccoli, trimmed, stalks peeled
1 medium baking potato, finely chopped
1/2 cup heavy cream
juice from 2 lemons

Heat oil over medium-high in large saucepan. Add onion, cook until soft. Add broth, broccoli, potato, and 2 cups water, season generously with salt. Boil, reduce heat, and simmer until broccoli and potato are just tender. Working in batches, puree soup in blender and return to pot. Stir in cream and lemon juice, season with salt and pepper.

Enjoy!

Marionettes

For some reason, I love marionettes. I have this idea that when Manley and I have a lot of kids, we will build an elaborate marionette stage, and when we have dinner guests over our children will entertain us Sound of Music style. And we will look at each other and our guests and say "ha ha haaaa....aren't our children dee-lightful?"

These gorgeous day-of-the-dead style puppets are from Terra Maya's Etsy shop...will someone buy them for me?

sweet potato soup

Manley and I have pretty much changed the way we plan our meals. Lately we have been going to the farmer's market once a week, buying whatever is available, and then going home and planning our meals for the week. I can't even explain what a great experience it has been...I'm a perfectionist with food, so planning meals can be extremely stressful for me. This way, we let nature dictate what we're eating...the way it should be. And the benefits of being more closely connected to your food source...just endless.

So we are eating a lot of sweet potatoes lately! And this soup is unbeleivable and simple so I wanted to share!

Cook 5-6 large sweet potatoes. Scoop sweet potato meat of each potato and place in food processor. Turn into puree; add a few cups chicken stock and plain yogurt to mixture. (You can really play around with it...depending on how thin/creamy you want your soup.)

Saute one chopped onion in a few tablespoons butter until clear. Add sweet potato mix and simmer for about 20 minutes.

Stir in a shot glass of sherry and a teaspoon of nutmeg and simmer for another 15 minutes. Season with salt and pepper if desired (you really don't need to...the flavor is so intense) and serve warm!

Have a great weekend everyone!

sorry Pat

And sorry everyone else...I'm outraged! I have the 700 Club on often because it's just on after the Today show. Now I'm a Christian and I love Jesus, but Pat Robertson can drive me insane. Why is he giving nutritional advice? Come on, Pat! Some watcher just called in asking if they should eat margarine or butter. Pat told them that "The American Cancer Society would recommend they eat trans-fat free margarine instead of butter because of the trans-fats in butter."

Sorry, Pat...butter has no trans fats. Did the American Cancer Society tell you what color margarine is before they bleach, deoderize, and dye it? Grey.

Rapadura

My favorite "new" discovery that I haven't shared with you yet. Pure, organic, unrefined, unbleached whole cane sugar. It smells like caramel and tastes kind of molasses-y. It really is different from all the other "natural" sugars (turbinado sugar, florida crystals) because the sugar is never, ever separated from the molasses stream during processing...it's essentially dried sugar cane juice. It's distributed by Rapunzel and it's fair trade. I'm really over refined sugar. Except for work, of course.

Yesterday was the first day in a realllly long time that I have been able to spend a day baking for fun. When you bake professionally, it's all about efficiency and timing, and you almost forget about those lazy, sultry, slow-motion days you once had in your home kitchen. So it was really nice to bake and cook dinner as slooowwwwwly as I could yesterday, all alone at home.

Saturday's trip to the farmer's market was kind of suprising...still full of tomatoes and eggplant and summer squash. Of course it is 90something degrees here on October 8th. So in the basket go tomatoes and green beans, eggplants and zuchinni.

And lamb. Without a doubt, my favorite. Such a treat...we bought the most tender lamb chops from DW farms in Pulaski. They were teeny ("because of the drought, and we wouldn't feed them grain, only grass" said the farmer.) but delicious. So here she is: the perfect late summer meal...Garlic and Parsley crusted lamb chops, oven roasted tomatoes, and green beans with lemon and butter.

A Swell Shower

These are my dear, dear engaged friends Matt and Shayna. They always pretty much look this way: like they should be in a Target ad. Last weekend we threw them a 1950's swinging shower...complete with Frank Sinatra and Jell-o molds!

This girl, Courtney, the maid of honor...she really threw this shower with me. God bless her heart.

Oh, yeah, by the way, have I ever told you guys that my husband makes beer? He's one of those beer people...I couldn't care less about it...but he spent a semester in Europe in architecture school and now apparently is an expert. It's really adorable...I think he loves it when people ask him what is favorite beer is because its a really obscure one you can't get in the States that he had "in a little pub in Scotland"...yeah, uh-huh. Love you Manley. Speaking of Manley, I'll leave all of you with my FAVORITE pic of the evening:

Love love love and best wishes Shayna and Matt....may your marriage be as magical as ours has!