My friends, I’m sorry my blog has been neglected. Please know Gimme Dem Cupcakes has been working and playing hard!
This MLK, Jr. weekend rounds out my holiday season, and I have truly been a very lucky girl. I think about all the people in my life, and I am so thankful. We exchange so many gifts of love. Sometimes in the form of new cooking tools for GDC, gardening gear for Harmony Gardening, goofy socks for my favorite derby girl, or mostly in the occasions to be together sharing food, laughing and learning.
I worked ahead and actually had a whole week off over the holidays to be with my family. Lars and I had a wonderful pre-Christmas with the Gotrich’s in GA, I came back for Christmas weekend lucky to find my mom was able to join us, and then we celebrated with my Grands the following Monday. Quality time was spent baking on my own, making phone calls to friends, late night gaming with my sister, and eating lots of delicious food. All these moments are so precious to me.
While I wish dearly to have a more normal work schedule, for now, I have been enjoying my work even when the hours and days run together; and I am so happy that after working so hard, there really is time to spend with the ones I love. Thank you all for being so patient with me. We all work hard, and I hope you find yourself refreshed by the new year and that you find all the time you need to be with the ones you love doing things that help you grow. Let me know if Gimme Dem can help!
We don’t all have fairy god mothers, magic shoes, or leagues of talking animals to help us along our way. What we do have is our own free will and the wonderful people we meet to help us make the days full of love and laughter. After a very long and hard September, I had a weekend with good friends to refresh me.
Lars, Becky, and Jenny with me, I had a chance to enjoy the fresh air, campfires, and lots of delicious food. These kinds of weekends are more magical than any movie.
Now that I’m back to normal, after my weekend getaway, how do I continue to celebrate the everyday? Well, I realized, a day without good food doesn’t make for a very good day. I’ve been trying to keep Mondays reserved for family dinners. So yesterday, I bought some herbs de provence for a roast for the fam and fennel for some savory lentils. To round out our first autumn meal together I concocted a new cupcake recipe: the Red Rose. It’s a combination of my favorite everyday tea and rosewater. Sweet, warm and simple, the Red Rose is fit for the everyday princess in all of us.
[This batch was gobbled... New batch and picture coming soon]
I have to say, this like many recent posts, is going the long way ’round before we ever get to the cake… Today was Katie Beckman day, aka my 26th birthday. Where am I? Who did I enjoy my birthday with? While I usually spend most Independnce days and birthdays with my immediate family or closest friends; today I was in Georgia with my boyfriend and his family. I got to meet his mom, dad, brother, sister in law, and her two little sisters (flickr album). This is my first time in GA, first time meeting his family, first time meeting a family that lives so far from me.
I’ve spent a little over a year getting to know Lars, and as much as I love him, I knew he was part of a family of good people. Our first night and day of vacation was in Athens, and while I was immeditely drawn to the open and inclusive culture of one of the country’s best college/music towns, I found myself at the edge of my seat with excitement as we drove to his family’s home in suburban Atlanta. As I entered the door, they immediately hugged me hard and made me feel so welcome and so loved. I can’ fully describe how good and how complete each moment has been, but I feel incredibly blessed. I hope for more, but I’m so satisfied for what is now.
We’ve had a wonderful few days, and today, they celebrated my birthday with me. Lars’s mom has been very accommodating to my dietary decisions, and today was no exception. She prepared a gorgeous cake, the oh so decadent Death by Vegan Chocolate cake from The Grit cookbook. Accented with blackberries and served with one of the delicious teas, I was surprised to open a great collection of records to accompany the new record player from Lars.
The evening was punctuated with family stories, music, and delicious food. I can’t believe we leave Wednesday, but I feel like this has been the most relaxing vacation I can remember. Every year feels like I’m more and more me, and I’m lucky to have the company of such wonderful, wonderful people. I hope I remember how much I love them, however long they’re in my life.
I hope as you read this post, maybe you can have some idea of how special it is to love, and then fall in love a little deeper. Please remember, I love you all and know I send you lots of happy thoughts! As soon as Lars posts bday pictures, you’ll have a better idea of the cake and Jude’s wonderful culinary skills.
Today was excellent. I slept in til and made some time to bake and meet my man for lunch before an afternoon in the office. I wound down with anice family dinner and a bout of baking.
What did I make? Well, you remember, I had one criteria the first time I tried to be vegan: sweets. Now, it’s take two, the Suzie-homemaker mod: everything I produce for my own consumption will be vegan. I made that dream real with last week’s success creating vegan salteñas. My coworkers requested a made to order salteñas day, so now I have 18 beautifully browned pockets of savory goodness and a great how to for dough braiding “fresh out da box!”
I was sad I couldn’t find any demo videos for braiding to link last week, so I made one for you tonight. Enjoy!
The past couple days, I was really bumming, but I went into the restaurant last night and decided to stop feeling so sad for myself; just get back to running shit and loving my everyday. It worked. I had great guests and even when things weren’t perfect, I was able to course correct and really connect with people in a good way. I even got into a really nice conversation with a couple about their 6 kids, blogging, and baking. Inspired and feeling full of love, though I went home tired, I decided to get into the kitchen.
So, you may or may not know, the meaning of life is locked in the braided dough of a delicious salteña. A childhood favorite, I learned how to make it vegetarian recently in the past couple years. Today, I have reached true baking nirvana: VEGAN salteñas. Last night, I prepped my vegan mod of the traditional filling and I chilled a batch of Terry Romero’s empanada dough over night. It was perfect. Less buttery and heavy than the original, these salteñas were just as satisfying and flavorful as I ever remembered. Check it out:
Original Recipe for traditional Bolivian salteñas is here. Vegetarian mod. Ultimate Vegan mod.
Results:
Thank you to everyone who continues to send good vibes to Gimme Dem Cupcakes!
For years, I’ve loved the idea of getting a tattoo. Ideas are great, but sometimes not realistic. I think we have a lot of right and need to control our body image and so I decided to really flush out some concepts to see if it really was important to me.
“In Cupcakes We Trust” is a phrase that echoes in my mind along with “Burritos and Justice for All.” These are some of the sort of whimsical kt-isms that have made the idea of getting a tattoo make sense. Yet, before there was food, hippos were my first obsession. They are just such a funny dichotomy between the doughy, friendly things humans like to idealize, and the actually massive, territorial, dangerous animals that they are.
vs.
I’ve always said, that if i ever got a tattoo, it’d have to fit certain criteria:
1. Whatever idea I get has to stick after at least a year of ruminating in my head.
2. The phrase or image should be in a place I can see it so it’s for me and not just other people to look at.
3. Most importantly, the phrase or image should represent me.
4. And lastly, it’d be nice to have original artwork.
So, I finally selected a concept and an artist I think will do great work, and I’ve decided my first tattoo will be a roaring hippo tattoo to go on my side probably 6-8″ tall/wide. Something like this image
I’ve stewed on the idea a whole year and I still really love it. Matt, the artist does great things and I’m really excited about working with him. A co-worker has already lined up an appointment with a tattoo artist for April, so sometime soon you can poke me in the side and I’ll wince! It’ll be “in the flesh!” I’m planning to see how I like the hippo and then get the other two phrases for my biceps and eventually I’d love something like this, placement and time tba.
This is my favorite time of year. I’m hoping to get my tree up tonight so I can sit in the dark with the lights twinkling while I try to drag Cocoa Bean away from the beckoning ornaments!
So far, I’m having a great time! So much celebrating! I enjoyed a flawless family Thanksgiving + Lars and I got a little weekend time with my homies back from grad school , too. And upon reflecting the future challenge of life without Can Can, my wonderful Corolla DX wagon, I went on my usual existential bend and concluded my life purpose is to concoct and share cupcakes. (It’s getting real: business cards are ordered and I’m working with a friend to write up a business plan!) Meanwhile, we had a great 2009 Holiday Party for our community of volunteers, students and staff here at the Literacy Council, Cocoa Bean enjoyed her very first snow, and I was again blown away by the culinary feats of the Perry House homies at Friendsgiving. (:
All these ooey gooey sharing caring events have my cupcaking noggin churning ideas for new cupcakes and business ideas… thinking about what I need to do to certify my kitchen for commercial use, how to market more effectively to people I don’t know, how to do community service with cupcakes… Could GDC hold workshops for the community or be totally structured as a non-profit? We’ll see…
Sometimes, people are like a gateway drug. You meet one nice person and find they are surrounded by an infectious little tribe of equally talented, nice people. Well, this post is for you guys over on Perry Street. I love you. From the bottom of my cupcake.
Why Red Velevet? Upon request for Mr. Doyne, the man who likes his Budweiser and animal fats… leaving us for the twinkle of NYC. Twinkle your heart out, my friend. Thank you for the dancing, the camping, and the future visits to your new hood.
Dad was watching the Today Show as usual (he’s turned into a teary pouty middle-aged woman) and Ann Curry barreled through the announcement that Obama had won the Nobel Peace Prize. ::Gasp:: Everyone’ surprised, and at first I was realing.
I’m glad I had baking time set aside to process. The AmeriCAN Dream cupcakes are almost grotesque, I love it. It so suits my reaction to the Nobel Committee’s announcement. I called my two best friend Joy and Becky to hash it out. Did I miss something? When was the last time Obama went on a hunger strike? But that isn’t the point. It’s not really about the man, or his actions exactly. It’s the messages and how they moveothersto make a better life. It’s about how he represents a shift in attitude and approach; dignified posture that sheds the shameful, neanderthal approach of the Bush administration and gets back to approaching leaders and talking instead of shooting. I have to agree, he must be stretched thin, and not that much policy has changed, but he’s leading a movement, he’s changing minds. Maybe he hasn’t gone on strike but he’s made moves, and moreover, I’m he’s sacrificed. He’s going to make so much more possible. I worry that as this award is somewhat premature, it amplifies the expectation we all place on him. Can he really save us?
Mr. President, free cupcakes for life. That’ a promise. Just say when.
I’m glad I got to churn out these awkward litle lovelies on such a special day.
cherry, backberrry, blueberry
Until the President calls, I’ll have to share elsewhere.
So today, in celebration of the new class of AmeriCorps surviving their first registrations. I made the Tiramisu cupcakes. Then I found out Courtney has a gluten allergy. Va bene… after tonight’s registration, I stopped at Wholefoods and picked up All-Purpose Gluten Free All-Purpose Flour. I was hoping that’d give me what I needed for a gluten-free Babycakes or VCTOTW recipe, but I was short all sorts of ingredients like arrowroot and potato starch among other things. Too many things that I couldn’t control the ratio of.
I looked at the GF flour package and it claimed to be able to substitute 1:1 with regular all-purpose flour, even better if you add Xanthum gum, which oddly enough, I did have. I went for the vanilla cupcake recipe and did 3/4 c. GF flour, and 1/2 c. almond flour and almond extract. I was planning to top it with an almond chocolate ganache. I did a dozen mini-cupcakes and then there was batter for 4.5 regular-sized cupcakes.
Even I burn cupcakes. I knew, but forgot, never use the bottom rack. The minis were on the bottom and turned before I knew it. The regular sized ones came out fine. I ate the .5 size for taste testing. The cupcake wasn’t what I hoped and it didn’t have the body or flavor to stand up to the ganache (though it was delicious: semi-sweet chocolate chips, almond milk, almond extract, almond butter). Alternative, fill with cherry preserves and top with the cream cheese almond icing. We’ll see how Courtney likes them. I’m looking forward to trying gluten-free again with the right ingredients.
In other news, I also made a specia batch of chocolate cupcakes for a cople of my favorite guests at Artie’s. They’re an elderly couple that come in twice a week usually. They are the most vivacious, well-travelled, sharp witted, sweet people. The husband does most of the talking, not out of a sense of dominance, but love; his wife had a stroke and mostly wears a sweet reassuring smile while she nods approval to his responses. They come into Artie’s after her physical therapy appointments. We’ve talked about our love of chocolate, people they’ve met, languages, traveling, anything. When they come in, they usually get a icecream sundae with hot fudge or a chocolate waffle. They love their chocolate. They definitely deserve cupcakes, and I did the VCTOTW chocolate but subbed in some almond flour. It made the texture of the cupcake somehow softer and richer. Then I used the ganache and garnished with sliced almond. The ganache cools to a nice shell to maintain the moisture of the cupcake and the amlonds add a crunch. The modification was dynamite and will be repeated.
Now, tucked in bed "over the river and through the woods." Great evening w/ my Grands: wine, pizza, choc chip cookies and playing Canasta. 22 hours ago
Enjoyed today's conference for VA Literacy Leadership. So greatful for our advocates (Jeannie Baliles, David Baldacci, Delegate Kim, etc.) 22 hours ago
that’d give me what I needed for a gluten-free Babycakes or VCTOTW recipe, but I was short all sorts of ingredients like 
