Bring it on!

Post-Thanksgivng Feast numero uno.

Are you ready for this?
I don't know if you're going to be able to handle it.
It might be too much.

NOTE: If you do not have 3 hours at your leisure to spend in the kitchen I suggest not taking on this challenge.

So yesterday was my sisters birthday.  It was very sweet.  She had her 6 gal pals over and they munched, played, created, and enjoyed a lovely day.  There was home made mac 'n cheese, hot apple cider, cupcake wars, art, glitter, frosting, and lots and lots of giggling.

How does one prepare for such an extravaganza?
Nicole, the mature 9 year old that she was, did most of the planning.  She picked the crafts, made decorations (streamers made out of paper), made the menu and goodie bags.

She also happened to pick out her birthday cake for the evening celebration.  That one included just our immediate family and 1 guest.  Guess what Ms. Smarty Pants picked?  A 3 layer lemon cake, Paula Deen style.

You can get the actual recipe here.

At first I had no objections to the suggestion...who doesn't love cake?  Little did I know...

 It started out simple enough, just creaming some butter (actually lots of butter), sugar, vanilla, and eggs.

 Than, I got to add this special flour OoOo.

 And I had a little helper, who lasted for about 2 min.  But it was so cute because he pulled up his little red chair and wanted to watch me before he went to bed.  I baked from 9-12.

 This is what it looked like when I added the special flour and milk in "stages".

 Oooo la la! Things are finally coming together and getting interesting.  And yes, I did lick that bowl...

 Lemon glaze....I put in something like sugar, 8 egg yolks, butter and lemons!

 This is the meringue topping - SO GOOD!  2 Egg whites, cream of tartar, salt, vanilla, water, and sugar.  

 And this is what cooking in a double boiler looks like....

 Umm let's just say that when I tried to do the electric mixer with the lemon glaze it made a huge mess.  Like everywhere.  So I got to work out my biceps and triceps for this part.  Fun times.....not.

 Completed lemon glaze!

 The meringue tasted like marshmallow fluff....I could probs eat that stuff by itself any day any time.

This is what the 3 layers lemon cake looked like when I put it together! The birthday girl let me know she appreciated my present to her...trust me, this cake was DIVINE!

 Oh, and I also had the pleasure of making cupcakes from a box.  After the 3 layer cake, this one was easy peasy lemon squeezy.

So do you think you can take on my challenge? Do you have any horrific baking stories about things that went terribly wrong that you wanna tell me? Do you have a picture of a cake that beats mine? Baking Wars are so on!

How's it going?

Today was a good day.
You know why?
I started it off by going to mass.

AND I got to celebrate my baby brother's b'day (who is adorable)!

Another cool thing that I got to do today was go on a field trip - homeschooler style.  My family and I went to the Mt. Vernon Gristmill and Distillery.  The distillery is George Washington's "liquid gold" aka whiskey producer.  Now I know how to make rye whiskey!  First, you take some rye, barley, boiling water, and something else.  Second, you mix your ingredients, add yeast to the top, let it ferment, and than you put in through this cool process of turning liquid to gas to distilled liquid.  That process is done by heating the liquid and turning it into gas that goes through a copper tube.  This tube gets cooled by running cold water, which turns the gas back into a liquid.  In order to make the best whiskey, this distilling process gets repeated multiple times.  Pretty nifty stuff.  The Gristmill is used for grinding corn, wheat, and tobacco.  It was cool to see in action - man, the engineering behind all those levers and pulleys makes my head spin.  That picture of corn is how it looks right before it's about to get smashed by the rock below it.  My mom even bought some fresh cornmeal for dinner tomorrow night...

Thanks for reading, now it is time for me to go to bed!