Tag Archives: Baking

Passive Aggressive Thank You’s

Posted on by under Blog

I’ve heard that March is the official Passive Aggressive Month. I’m not really passive or aggressive (this already sounds like I have identity issues…) but I thought I’d take a moment to be passive aggressively grateful.

I’m not super good at saying ‘thank you’ in person. Maybe because I talk so much I feel like no one can ever tell when I’m being genuine and when I’m just on auto-pilot. Me and my motor-mouth.

So instead, here is my passive aggressive ‘thank you’ note to my ‘Housemates’ (who shall remain nameless because, how else could this be passive aggressive?).

Madrid4DEAR HOUSEMATES,

  • Thank you for you killing all the spiders. This needs to be mentioned first because it’s the most important.
  • Thank you for reminding me when I need to do laundry (and for doing it nicely instead of just being like, “Gosh, is that you or the compost pile that smells so bad?”). Not because I actually end up doing it when you remind me but because it makes me feel like you might also remind that parachute pants aren’t in style anymore if I tried to leave the house looking like Kevin Bacon. I appreciate that.
  • Thank you for not complaining when I eat the tops off all the pies, crumbles and crusty casseroles that come through our house. I know that must take some self-restraint.
  • Thank you for saving me part of the eggs every time you make them in the mornings. I like eggs. Yours are especially good.
  • Thank you for instilling in me an intense obsession with Tim Tebow. He WILL write to us one day, won’t he? WON’T YOU, TIM TEBOW?
  • Thank you for laughing at my jokes. I know they’re not funny, too.
  • Thank you for not going all Liberal Left on the nuclear waste in my bedroom. Eventually I’ll get a team in there to take care of that. Promise.
  • Thank you for letting me sing all the time. I don’t know when I picked up that habit or when it will stop. Probably not until the stairwell stops making my B flats sound like auto-tuned Taylor Swift. Gotta love a good echo.
  • Thank you for letting me practice my accordion. I don’t need to expound.
  • Thank you for putting up with my mini-meltdowns. Like when I’m hungry and just keep opening and closing the fridge door, moaning like a wounded bear. Or when I stamp my feet and flail around like a toddler because I can’t handle how cold it gets here. Or when I stare dejectedly out the window, ignoring all life around me, and mutter things like, “I miss tacos.”
  • Thank you for letting me bake. People of lesser faith would not leave me alone in the kitchen for such long periods.

Finally…

  • Thank you very, very much for everything else. I see it, feel it and appreciate it.

Genuinely,

                                                                Mary

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Fever Bake

Posted on by under Recipes, Videos

I was deliriously exhausted after a weekend-long illness and decided to make pineapple upside down cake. Because, of course.

Jared lent emotional support and read all the Czech labels for me. What a friend.

Here is the actual recipe because only part of the dribble I managed to scrape into a cake made it into the footage.

PINEAPPLE UPSIDE DOWN CAKE:

1/4 cup butter

1/4 cup packed brown sugar

1 (15 ounce) can pineapple chunks, drained

2 tablespoons chopped pecans(optional)

1 1/2 cups biscuit baking mix

1/2 cup white sugar

1/2 cup milk

2 tablespoons vegetable oil

1 teaspoon vanilla extract

1 egg

  1. Preheat an oven to 350 degrees F (175 degrees C).
  2. Melt butter in a 9-inch baking pan in the preheating oven. Remove pan.
  3. Sprinkle brown sugar evenly over butter.
  4. Arrange pineapple chunks in a single layer over the butter and brown sugar, then sprinkle with pecans; set aside.
  5. Beat biscuit baking mix, white sugar, milk, vegetable oil, vanilla extract, and egg together in a large bowl on low speed for 30 seconds, scraping bowl constantly.
  6. Increase mixer speed to medium and continue beating until batter is smooth, about 4 minutes more.
  7. Slowly pour batter over the pineapple mixture.
  8. Bake in the preheated oven until a toothpick inserted into the center comes out clean, 30 to 35 minutes.
  9. Run a paring knife between the cake and the edge of the pan to loosen cake. Cover the cake pan with a plate, and invert it to flip the cake out of the pan and onto the plate. Cool at least 10 minutes before serving.

Soul Food: A Parody

Posted on by under Blog, Recipes

I spend an absurd amount of time looking at recipe blogs. I’m not sure if it’s because it makes me feel vicariously like a perfect little homemaker or because reading the voices of no-nonsense women working in the kitchen feels a lot like getting a huge hug from an ‘Aunt Jemima’ figure. The soul needs what it needs.

Anyway, because my cooking skills are nuclear (we’re talking Three Mile Island), and because I recently just spent a week on a single baking project, I decided to do a recipe blog parody.

Enjoy, my friends. Let your heart drink it up.

Vatican Bread

Last week a woman at school gave me a jar of dough in a plastic baggy with a recipe attached. After awkwardly transporting the jar home in my purse (if I had a dime for every time I got on a bus with something completely random in my bag…), I read the brief message on the recipe. This bread takes a week to make and must be given to a friend who has not made the bread before. Already, it feels like a cult initiation, but I never say ‘no’ to baking.

Monday: 250 g of sugar – do not mix

I was so excited about getting the dough I nearly forgot the first step Monday night. Do not forget the first step. The dough in the jar is only a starter and the yeast needs to start eating the sugar right away!

Life in Zbraslav 20135

In case you’re wondering what the grams to cups conversion is, I have no idea. In fact, I faked it for the whole week and the bread turned out just fine. I like to think of measurements more as guidelines.

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