Apple cake is coming.

But first:

My kids have been fighting constantly.

I’m up to my eyeballs in chains and smashed coins. An etsy shop is happening.

Tried twice to start the fire. It wouldn’t.

Not really into Thanksgiving so it’s good we’re going to my parents. I think there will be pulled pork and … squid. I’m making a cheesecake.

My room is trashed. The terrain is hilly, thanks to socks, gloves, the kids’ too-small clothes, random shoes, and magazines.

My oldest daughter is staging a Class A revolt against the lowly legume.

My daughters have declared World War III … against each other. I’m ready to put them both in the state penitentiary. Or at least their rooms. Oh wait. They already are in their rooms.

I Love Lucy is my saving grace.

I took a picture of the full moon.

Taking pictures is hard. I want lessons.

I cleaned out my bathroom cupboards.

It’s amazing how a cleaned out cupboard frees up my brain space.

Wish it would rain already.

I need a bigger blanket to cover the giant hole in my leather sofa. Or else a seamstress who wants to indebt herself to me.

There is a bushel of broccoli on my kitchen table.

And now, for cake. I discovered a new apple cake and made it three times.

I think this was the apple cake I was looking for when I embarked on last year’s apple cake quest. Next year there will be no searching for I have found the perfect apple cake.

What is a perfect apple cake? It’s an apple cake that uses lots of apples, not just a wimpy cup or two. The cake must taste of apple, lots and lots of apple. There must be no doubt that you are indeed eating a cake made out of apples.

Apples apples apples apples.

Have I made myself clear?

This cake is an apple cake all right. With 4 cups of apple to a 3/4 cup of flour, there ain’t no two ways around it.

Apple Rum Cake
Adapted from David Lebovitz’s blog

I changed the title from “French Apple Cake” to “Apple Rum Cake” since the boozy flavor is deliciously distinct. But not so distinct that the kids fussed. To the contrary, they acted like it was the best cake I’d ever served them.

They (“they” being Frenchified foodies, I presume) say that using a variety of apples is key. I used Golden Delicious, Fuji, York, and Stayman.

One time I added fresh cranberries and some chopped nuts. The cranberries were nice; the nuts were not. Another time I used ½ cup maple sugar plus 1/4 cup regular white sugar. It had a nice flavor, but wasn’t noticeable enough to warrant using up my precious maple sugar.

2 eggs
3/4 cup sugar
3 tablespoons rum
½ teaspoon vanilla
3/4 cup flour
3/4 teaspoon baking powder
pinch of salt
½ cup butter, melted and cooled to room temperature
4 apples, a variety, peeled and chopped (about four cups)

Beat the eggs till frothy. Add the sugar and beat till well combined. Beat in the rum and vanilla.

Stir together the flour, baking powder, and salt. Stirring gently, add the dry ingredients alternately with the melted butter. Fold in the apples.

Pour the batter into a heavily greased 9-inch springform pan, using a spatula to smooth out the top. Bake the cake for 45-55 minutes at 350 degrees, or until an inserted toothpick comes out clean.

Cool the cake for 5 minutes before running a knife around the edge of the pan and removing the sides. (I was dumping my cake upside down every single time—and having mighty problems, too—and just now re-read Lebovitz’s instructions and realized that was not a part of them.)

Serve slices of cake warm, or at room temperature, with whipped cream. Cover leftovers with plastic and store at room temperature.

This same time, years previous: feminism, part II

Friday night I got another migraine. I was cooking supper, feeling all sorts of splendid because it was Friday and I was making a kick-butt supper and Mr. Handsome had taken all the kids with him to run some errand because I couldn’t stand to have them under foot for one more cotton-pickin’ minute, when I suddenly noticed that my kitchen was peppered with bright lights and black spots. This time I knew exactly what was happening and I didn’t waste a second. I popped a double dose of painkillers and then called up a friend to pick her brain for more preventative measures. She recommended natural peppermint oil in water, which I did. And then, even though I knew intense nausea was in my near future, I ate.

I really couldn’t help myself. I was so excited to eat. (Picture an impatient puppy dog bouncing about on the balls of his feet while he waits for you to scoop out his portion of Puppy Chow. I’m like that puppy. I get all tail-waggy when food is around.) Plus, I was hungry and I still felt fine.

So I scooped and forked, scooped and forked, and then when I figured I had eaten more than my share, I took to hovering around the stove top, taking my “just one more” tastes straight from the cooking pot.

My stomach stuck out to China and I didn’t care.

The headache pain did come then, but it was dulled, thanks to the pills and peppermint, and there was no sign of nausea, glory be. I took a leisurely soak in a hot, epsom salt-infused bath. (Though thanks to childbirth, tub soaks always bring back sharp memories of sore bottoms—the mere act of easing myself into warm water makes me feel All Ouch. My children have ruined me. They should be arrested.) And then I crept between the covers and slept for 10 blissful hours. A low-grade headache persisted the next day, but it was nothing compared to the last miserable round. Nothing. I may be wising up.

There’s something else I’m wising up about: pumpkin pasta. Or rather, a creamy pumpkin sauce over pasta. That the sauce, the one I was making when I lost my vision, coincided with my victory over a migraine is just that, purely coincidental. But it feels providential. I mean, really, there were fireworks. I saw them!

I’ve seen recipes for creamy pumpkin sauces all over the place, and I’ve even tried one or two, but I was never very impressed. The pumpkin sauce was always too bland and/or watery and/or pumpkiny. (The one that I already have on this site has sausage in it—not the straight-up pumpkin sauce I’ve been looking for.)

But then I made this sauce and, well, you’ve already read about the pot-swiping and repeat-dishing. It’s nothing short of stupendous, richly flavored with Parmesan and rosemary and bolstered beautifully by the addition of a little vinegar. I know! Vinegar! I never would’ve thunk it, but it dost sparkle up the dish considerably.

Pasta with Creamy Pumpkin Sauce
Adapted from the November 2007 issue of Everyday Food

I used butternut squash for this recipe (directions for roasting are here), but I think a combo of carrots and sweet potatoes could be blended up along with the pumpkin.

1 pound short tubular pasta, like ziti or penne
2 tablespoons olive oil
1 tablespoon fresh rosemary
2 cups pureed squash or pumpkin (or 1 15-ounce can)
1 garlic clove, minced
½ cup half-and-half
1 tablespoon white vinegar
1 cup grated fresh Parmesan
1/4 teaspoon red-pepper flakes
1 teaspoon salt

Cook the pasta, drain, and set aside. Reserve 2 cups of the pasta water.

In a heavy-bottomed pan, fry the rosemary in the olive oil, but do not let it brown. Scoop the rosemary out of the oil and set it on a napkin to drain. Carefully (the oil is hot!), stir the remaining ingredients into the oil. Stir in a cup of pasta water, adding more only if you want a thinner sauce. Taste to correct seasonings before tossing the sauce with the pasta. Garnish with the fried rosemary and extra red-pepper flakes.

This same time, years previous: steel-cut oatmeal

I’ve been on the lookout for a pendant necklace, something simple, classy, and earth-toned. I even spent valuable shopping time perusing the discount jewelry at Kohl’s. I found nothing, not even when, in desperation, I searched the regular priced racks.

Not even a week later, Mr. Handsome pulled a smashed penny out of his jean’s pocket and passed it around the dinner table. He had been working on a house that was located smack-dab beside some railroad tracks and, on a whim, had sacrificed a coin to the chugging choo-choo.

Before the dishes were even cleared from the table, the kids were out in the barn, bashing their money senseless. I thought nothing of their new game until Yo-Yo walked into the kitchen and handed me a smashed gold dollar. Immediately, I seized upon it. “This is exactly what I’ ve been looking for! It would make a perfect necklace. Can you punch a hole in it for me?”

“Sure,” he said, all nonchalant-like, and he did.

I stuffed two coins—the smashed gold dollar and a smashed quarter—in my purse and next time I was out shopping I swung by Michaels to look at their chain selection. Totally overwhelmed and confused by the endless options, I gave up almost immediately, deciding instead to take the coins to the next belly dance class to show Rose, the instructor. She makes chainmail, among other things, in her spare time, so I figured if anyone would know how to make a necklace, it’d be her.

“Wow! These are so neat!” she exclaimed, fingering the coins. “Tell me again how he did it? With just a hammer? No kidding! But how did he get the design? What did he pound it on? Is it very hard? Do you think he’d make some smashed coins for me? I wonder if these would work for a coin belt…”

And so it came to be that a couple days and a phone call later, Yo-Yo had an order for twenty smashed pennies.

I headed to town yet again, this time armed with Rose’s jewelry-making directions, as well as the Penny Smasher himself (and the two littles who did an excellent job keeping their grubby little paws stuffed in their pockets). Our first stop was the bank for two rolls of pennies, and then on to a little shop downtown where Yo-Yo and I poured over chains and jump rings. The shop owner listened intently to Yo-Yo’s plans, and then drew pictures and made lists for him. Yo-Yo asked questions and stated preferences, nodding sagely (our shaggy-headed-and-sweatpant-clad little businessman) at all the advice. Several hours later, after a visit to Michaels for more chains and clasps, a stop for some bagels, and some fancy maneuvering of a needle-nosed pliers back at our kitchen table, I had my new pretty fastened round my neck, and boy oh boy, was I ever tickled.

Yo-Yo’s shop has been upgraded from barn to basement, and the new space is all decked out with a workbench (a board atop two logs), space heater, and radio. Mr. Handsome set him up with a drill (nail-punched coins crack and split too easily), and just yesterday he brought home a piece of angle iron for a new and improved pounding space.

Now Yo-Yo spends most of his free time below ground, pounding and drilling to his heart’s content. Through my kitchen floor, over the ring of metal on metal and the twang of the country singers, I hear Yo-Yo’s happy whistle. Every now and then he trots his creations up to the kitchen for me to inspect, and then together we arrange and fashion the jewelry.

I’m not yet sure what the point of this venture is (etsy anyone?), or even if there needs to be a point. Just having fun together, making something new, savoring our creative genius (the term “genius” being used quite loosely here)—perhaps that’s the point for now. It’s more than enough.

(That the jewelry just happens to be dandy-nifty is a pretty sweet bonus.)

This same time, years previous: chocolate pots de crème