Strawberry Summer Cake

A couple of weeks ago, in my stumbling via stumbleupon.com, I came across this amazing food blog.  The recipe that was displayed was for this beautiful looking strawberry summer cake.  And as amazing as it looked, I knew I needed to try it out.  (I should note, a very important factor in deciding whether I'm going to try a recipe or not is how many ingredients I need to buy - for this one, it was just the strawberries - win-win).

If you want to see the original recipe, head on over to Smitten Kitchen.  I'm going to repost is here, along with my picture of the beautiful finished product.

You will need:

6 tablespoons unsalted butter, at room temperature, plus extra for pie plate
1 1/2 cups all-purpose flour 
1 1/2 teaspoons baking powder
1/2 teaspoon table salt
1 cup plus 2 tablespoons granulated sugar
1 large egg
1/2 cup milk (I used whole since that's what we have in the house because of Katie)
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
1 pound strawberries, hulled and halved



-Preheat oven to 350°F. Butter a 10-inch pie pan or 9-inch deep-dish pie pan. I used a standard 9-inch pie pan, because this is what I had.  I noticed with my first attempt there was just a tad bit too much batter, and it spilled over the edges just a teensy bit.  Didn't affect the taste, obviously, but didn't look as pretty.  With my second attempt, I just left out about a 1/4 cup of the batter.  Worked wonderfully.
-Whisk flour, baking powder and salt together in a small bowl. In a larger bowl, beat butter and 1 cup sugar until pale and fluffy with an electric mixer, about 3 minutes. Mix in egg, milk and vanilla until just combined. Add dry mixture gradually, mixing until just smooth.
-Pour into prepared pie plate. Arrange strawberries, cut side down, on top of batter, as closely as possible in a single layer (again, on my first attempt, I left a little bit of space.  This allowed the cake to swallow the strawberries into the cake.  Didn't look as pretty as I'd hoped, so with the second, I overlapped the strawberries so there was virtually no cake batter showing). Sprinkle remaining 2 tablespoons sugar over berries.
-Bake cake for 10 minutes then reduce oven temperature to 325°F and bake cake until golden brown and a tester comes out free of wet batter, about 50 minutes to 60 minutes. (Gooey strawberries on the tester are a given.)
-Let cool in pan on a rack. Cut into wedges.

Here's my finished product:

Hello, Sunshine!

Wow, hard to believe it's been a full month since my last post!

Things have been a bit crazy, but crazy in a good way.

I finished last semester with yet another 4.0 GPA.  Now, normally I wouldn't brag about something like that, but since I'm a mom, a part-time worker, and a full-time student, I'd say that's a pretty big accomplishment and deserves a wee bit of bragging.

Katie is growing way too fast for my taste and she's discovering new things every single day.  Unfortunately, I can't find my camera battery charger so I don't really have any photos.  Fear not, though, for I just purchased a new one today from Amazon and it should be here by next week!  Hooray for summertime pictures!

Katie and I took our first trip to the pool a few days ago.  She absolutely adored it - couldn't stop going down the water slide and getting all upset when I made her get out to put more sunblock on.

We got some wicked colds this last week which just knocked us all pretty much completely out.  Daddy's on painkillers, so the last few days have been .... interesting, to say the least.

And as soon as the bug decides to wake up, we're getting right back out into the sunshine!!!!  Hurry up Katie, Mommy needs some vitamin D!

30 Day Music Challenge - Day 09

Day 9 - A song that you can dance to

Now, honestly, what song can you NOT dance to?  And exactly what kind of dancing are we talking here?  Are we talking slow, romantic dancing?  Silly, girlfriend dancing?  Mommy/daughter dance party, dancing?  Elaine Bennett dancing?

Le sigh.

Okay, I'm going with a song that I like to dance to with my darling, sweet Katie Mae, usually when she's not being darling, sweet Katie Mae, but incorrigible, tempter-tantrum-throwing Kathryn Mae.  I don't know if it's the repetition, the fact that Mommy can't help but sing along and therefore lose all lung power and proceed to mildly hyperventilate, or what, but this song gets the girl out of a funk like nobody's business.  And I apologize if I get it stuck in your head.

30 Day Music Challenge - Day 08

Day 8 - A song you know all the words to

All right, here's what you need to know about me.  I am a lyrics queen.  I will listen to a song that I like SO many times that I know exactly what's being said.  And if I'm unsure, I look it up.  So, this one proved to be a bit challenging because there were so many to choose from.  However, there is one song that slowly crept into my mind until I thought, "well, shoot, I know all the words to that one - PLUS, it's kinda sorta a rap song, so it's even COOLER that I know all the lyrics."  Yeah, I'm a nerd.

Little backstory with it, though.  I can't remember exactly when I first heard this song, BUT I can tell you that the first time I really listened to it was when Sam and Artie performed it on Glee.  This is not making me look any cooler, I can already tell.  But then I grew a bit tired of the watered-down, G-rated version of the song and decided to really pay attention to the original.  And so here you are, for your viewing (they're both so cute) and listening pleasure:

Want to see a beautiful woman?

This is my grandmother, Estelle.  Unfortunately, I never got to meet her.  She died when my dad was still a teenager from lupus, a disease that essentially makes your body allergic to itself. 

I really wish I had gotten to meet her - doesn't she look like so much fun?  I don't know if you can really see it here, if this photo does her justice, but when I look at this picture, I see a woman lounging on the floor, bare feet, giving someone a piece of her mind or adamantly telling a story.

I got to go through some of her old jewelry today that my father has had up in his closet for ages, he thinks since about the time my parents got married (so about 30 years) ago.

I had so much fun going through all of her jewelry, imagining her getting all dolled up to go out with girlfriends or with my grandfather (although, from what I hear, that wasn't a regular occurrence).  The woman had style, I can tell you that.  Just knowing that some day that jewelry will probably be mine (hopefully, anyway, seeing as how I'm her only grandchild, the offspring of her only child), it just gives me thrills and chills.

And it's not the monetary aspect of it - the jewelry probably isn't worth much at all, it's all pretty much costume jewelry.  It's having a connection with a family member I never met, knowing that there were women in my family who did get dressed up to go out, who did wear jewelry (my mother and sister definitely are not fancy-schmancy people). 

My grandmother has always been my answer to the question "If you could have lunch with one person, dead or alive, who would it be?"  I'm fascinated by this woman.  It may be because I never met her.  It may be because of the stories I've heard about her.  It may be because my grandfather never remarried after she died so many years ago (and as far as I know, he never went on any dates, either).  I just feel like there's this grand romance when it comes to her.  Estelle.  My middle name.  In Hebrew, it translates to "star."  Go ahead and tell me she doesn't look like a star.  :)

30 Day Music Challenge - Day 07

Day 7 - A song that reminds you of a certain event

This one's easy.  So, so, so easy.  The most precious moment of my entire existence.  And you may be thinking, ooh, a song that reminds her of Katie's birth!  Well, no.  You see, as much as I love my daughter and her birth will be with me forever, there's an even more precious moment than that.  Without my husband, Katie would not be here.  So, instead of a song that reminds me of Katie's birth, I'm going with two songs from our wedding, the song from the ceremony that was playing while we took communion and the song we first danced to as husband and wife. :)

30 Day Music Challenge - Day 06

Day 6 - A song that reminds you of somewhere

Okay, this one was difficult.  I don't tend to associate songs with places, so I went with a general place, which could also be a time period, technically.  Ready to transplant back to 1998?  Junior High ... oh yeah, baby, I'm going there.