Cupcakes anyone?

I spent my Saturday baking cupcakes. I can’t explain why other than cupcakes are in fashion again – since  Sex and the City’s Carrie Bradshaw and Miranda Hobbes made NYC’s Magnolia Bakery cupcakes world famous. 

There should be a disclaimer in kitchen stores:

‘Danger – expensive kitchen gadgets you will never use will meet sudden death by credit card.”

Kitchen stores are as dangerous for me as shoe stores, stationary and book stores.  It is impossible to go in without making a purchase. Among my favourites? Williams & Sonoma, Crate & Barrel and Sur la Table. To my delight, a Charleston, South Carolina dinner at Slightly North of Broad, led me to its Maverick Southern Kitchens store on East Bay Street. 

My eye immediately caught the colourful cupcake window display featuring the cookbook, Cupcakes! by Elinor Klivans. Leafing through it, I was pleasantly surprised to see the book featured recipes for homemade yellow and chocolate cake batter, rather than the usual references to Duncan Hines ready-made cake mix. An important detail, because Belgium is not big on ready-made cake mixes and they are difficult to find and not very good. The recipes looked easy enough. As much as I love to cook and bake, cakes have always brought out my insecurity. Would they be dry like cardboard? Heavy as a brick? The fear of baking failure led me to avoid baking cakes altogether. For the first time, I looked at these recipes and a little voice told me, I could do this! But first, Le Crueset’s re-usable silicon cupcake wraps…(in red)

Cupcakes in 30 minutes? (10 minutes to mix the batter, 20 minutes to bake). This was NOT the case. What about the minor detail of homemade frosting! That said, I have to hand it to Mrs. Klivans. A couple hours later, I was the proud chef of 30 chocolate and vanilla cupcakes! They didn’t rise in the middle to form a peak (like in the pictures) but they were still light and flavourful. No ready-made mixes, just fresh ingredients and a little patience.

The thrill and the possibilities! With THE bakery frosting recipe from my aunt and a little more practice, I see a cupcake future with flowers and leaves! Add coloured sprinkles, lemon zest, chocolate mousse filling and I’ll become a cupcake and birthday cake queen!

The test of a true chef is to taste test but not over-indulge. I admit to only eating one cupcake (in addition to licking the spoons from the batter of course.) 

Errrr …. and then there was the white shirt. Regrettably, it did not fare as well. Using an apron truly never entered my mind. Unfortunately the chocolate stains and neon blue food colouring left a couple permanent marks on what was otherwise, a very satisfying cupcake day.

The beauty of laughter

You have to put on your best pair of rose coloured glasses and consider the glass half full in times like this to keep perspective and a sense of humour.  Friends are doing an amusing job of keeping me laughing as we navigate through excruciatingly long days, egos and uncertainty at work.

Laughter and camaraderie have a way of lightening the load and reinforcing you are not alone:

- We laughed until we cried testing the new ‘telepresence meeting’ room this week. London has never looked so close as we covered our eyes, yelling ‘nOOOO!’ to avoid examining the nose hairs of our comedian colleague who seemed to delight in pressing his face against the camera. (I can tell you high definition television takes on a whole new meaning!)

- Arriving in my office to see ‘Happy Birthday!’ on the white board in big letters, my desk covered in presents and a fabulous birthday book reminding me the day was mine and to live it up.

February birthday cakes

- Another friend winding me up about my birthday all day making me think it was forgotten yet again, until I received an email with a ridiculously cheesy ‘Hippo Birdie to Ewe’ tribute just before midnight.  

- My Flemish officemates teaching me Dutch: (translated) ‘a man with an ape’, ‘I did NOT sleep well’, ‘I love you’.  These are the phrases of the week…

- Borrowing a random lady’s mexican sombrero in a bar in Brussels (when she wasn’t looking), passing it around, taking pictures of all five of us, only to return it without her realising it….  followed by the great ‘frites’ escapade in search of Belgian fries and mayonnaise at 2.00 AM on a Thursday.  (We finally found an open friterie in the red light district on the suggestion of one savvy New York-based friend who ‘had never spent much time there’.) The owners were so amused by us, we ended up with free portions. (I am still finding frites in my cream coloured car interiour where no one is ever allowed to eat but it was worth it!)

- The Italian carnival trip last weekend with its own priceless adventures and laughter deserves a post of its very own.

- And so much more…

Yes, laughter heals and makes life all the more entertaining.  It’s been a good couple weeks.

Gong Hei Fat Choy! The year of the ox is upon us

Happy Chinese New Year!  For a day with more dreary news of layoffs and ‘business process optimization’ around the world, I am taking every opportunity to celebrate the new lunar year. Today, I am wearing red and very proud to be an ox!  For those that think they know me well, do the following characteristics accurately describe me?  LoL!  

Positive traits of the ox: Responsible, dependable, honest, caring, honourable, intelligent, artistic, industrious, practical

Negative traits of the ox: Petty, inflexible, possessive, dogmatic, gullible, stubborn, critical, intolerant, materialistic 

Read more about Chinese New Year and your Chinese zodiac sign here.

For the ox, it’s not supposed to be an easy year, but if we work hard, ‘it will be a year one can look back on with pride and a genuine sense of achievement.’

Oh and I am supposedly ‘good at implementing some sort of physical activity into my routine’ – (this will help my health this year) which is why I am starting the gym again tomorrow. (Really, I am.)

Fortunately, I am in the company of many great oxen as we navigate through the coming supposedly tumultuous year.  In addition to the list of 1973 babies I am proud to have as friends, we join 1961 oxen, Barack Obama, Timothy Geithner and my personal favourite, George Clooney!  We are the chosen ones to toil and plow through the thick earth with steadfast resolve. And then it will be spring, and with it, new shoots and leaves…