Turning 10.

Do you remember when you turned 10? There is something about a child entering the "double digit" years that is momentous.  A very special almost-10-year-old I know celebrated her soon-to-be birthday this past weekend. She and her mom planned a sweet bake shop theme.  The plan was for the birthday girl and her friends to decorate cupcakes, cookies and make other treats - chocolate covered marshmallows, strawberries, pretzel sticks and more. It was a blast to watch and sneak in a few decorated treats myself.

Of course, the kicker for me was that she asked me to bake a dozen of her favorite cupcakes - red velvet, for the occasion. In the meantime, I started to panic a little bit, I desperately wanted these cupcakes to be *perfect*. When someone asks you to make something for an event to be remembered, I tend to feel the added bit of pressure, so I scoured the Internet for the *perfect* recipe. 

I heart Tasty Kitchen. Bookmark. It. Now. It's one of my go-to-websites for recipes and suggestions. Test, tried and true, I have yet to make something from that site I didn't like and/or love. There I found several potential recipes, but honed in on one particular title that was rather confident - Red Velvet Cake To Die For. The reviews were glowing and I trusted my instincts on this one.  

They turned out fantastic and this perfectionist baker was quite pleased with the results. Moist, delicious, light and very very red. Mission accomplished. The original recipe is for a two layer cake, but I opted to lower the baking time (approximately 20-24 minutes, depending on your oven) and I was able to turn out 16 cupcakes.  I also think the trick here is a light hand and to mix everything by hand - so for those with control issues, this recipe is right up your alley!

unwrap this - birthday bread.

Tomorrow is my boss' birthday. He's not a particularily "birthday celebration" kind of guy, but I wanted to do something nice in his honor. So I decided to bake him some birthday "quick" bread. You gotta love quick breads, not only are they rather easy to squeeze in between everything else, they also can easily adapt to becoming a snack, dessert or breakfast treat. Quick breads are the baker's multitasking dream recipe. Functional, easy, tasty and interchangable. This "coco-nana bread" features a not-so-traditional banana bread, chock full of cocoa powder and chunks of bittersweet chocolate. Skimming through my vast collection, I found this gem in Baking: From My Home to Yours by the infamous Dorie Greenspan and figured it would be a safe bet. (Side note: pictures of her kitchen on her website might encourage drooling, though I am not legally responsible for the mess). My kitchen smells like heaven, of course, cutting off a slice for myself would be rude and anti-birthday-quick bread etiquette, so if it tastes as good as it smells, I think we have a winner here.

30.

An extremely momentous occasion took place this past Friday, I hit the big 3-0! Paul and I took the day off and took a day trip up to the art coast of Michigan, Saugatuck and Douglas, to be more specific. What a beautiful area, on Lake Michigan, scenic with it's fall colors holding on for dear life. Art galleries, wine tasting, tourista shops, restaurants, beaches, and more, we couldn't have asked for a better day. For the birthday dinner, we went to Everyday People Cafe in Douglas. I found this gem through Chowhound, an excellent resource for foodies across to the nation to recommend restaurants of all walks. The executive chef of Everyday People Cafe has been hailed as "best chef" on the east side of Lake Michigan and trust me, it's no lie. This joint doesn't take reservations and is a hoppin' place and we were lucky to even get it. After perusing the menu for quite a while, it was obvious that these decisions would be tough. I ended up ordering the braised lamb shank and Paul ordered one of the specials, blackened ahi fish tacos. For an appetizer, we went with the Pizza Bianco and I think that was our very part of the whole meal, it was a perfect balance of flavors. For a birthday dessert, we ordered the creme brulee, deconstructed. Not your typical creme brulee my friends, it was layered on top of two puff pastry triangles and doused with a divine raspberry sauce. tart, sweet and creamy. A perfect way to end a perfect birthday.