As you know, H is in Baltimore and I am in Medford. And while he is right about the value of "together" I am glad he is not here to hear my hacking and sneezing. I am sick. It's a garden variety cold but it has taken up residence in my head throat and chest, and my eyes are dripping as well. My voice sounds like that of a bull frog in heat. (And no, I don't really know what that sounds like, but that's what I imagine.)
Anyway, I have lots to do for work, am guilty about what remains incomplete with the end of the contract approaching, but I am incapable of concentrating.... so what should I do? Post to the blog!
I staved off the rheums for a trip on Saturday to one of our cake bakers - yes there are three - for a cake tasting. It was an interesting day. I recommend it to all of you - whether or not you are getting married. Just plan on buying a cake -- for the Day-after-Tuesday holiday or the Sacred-Third-Minute-After-Lunch Festival held in Croatia.
We drove through Wallingford, passing its main street and proceeding to the East. Drove through Green Mountain Forest to the railroad tracks where we took a right and a left. Drove about a mile on a gravel road into countryside. We were greeted by a bantam chicken recovering in a dog kennel after the rooster tried to kill her (he's now dead), an old shepherd-like dog, and "Marie-France" our baker. From Belgium, trained in taxes and accounting, she arrived to find she needed a new career as her training wasn't recognized here... And like many women, she decided to opt for something that would allow her to make a living at home so she could raise her three kids without paying more than she earns in child care.
The house is a combination of Belgian antiques with game-carved panels on the sideboard and leaded glass, and an IKEA cabinet in the hall and cabinets in the kitchen. The double width kitchen counter is a slab of granite from Home Depot and the sink is deep, and shaped like a blunted apostrophe on its side. She ushered us into the dining room where Linda, Ursula and I sat paging through a thick binder with photos of cakes she has made, each named for its patron, and as we paged through photo after photo of lovely cakes with candy flowers and real flowers and tiny buttons in the icing and basket-weave piping, we eventually settled on the 4 we liked best. That was followed with a tasting of 4 mini-loaves of cake: vanilla, almond, chocolate and lemon, and a platter of possible mousses and butter creams: espresso, maple, vanilla butter cream, chocolate ganache, lemon curd, raspberry mousse, strawberry mousse, and some strawberry puree. All is sourced locally and made by Marie-France. We sliced thin pieces of the cakes and put a variety of butter creams and mousses on them and generally indulged ourselves in flavors that actually made it through this nasty virus to my palate. She described her process which starts on Wednesday for a Saturday delivery, making as many as three cakes at a time. Each cake is severed into thinner layers, and refrigerated and then recomposed with the fillings the next day and then iced and then....so on and so on... so each layer of hte cake has several layers inside. Makes accounting seem tame!
We chose favorites, chatted some more and then left filled with good tastes and laughter and another window into someone's work that only rarely gets acknowledged. Herb and Mom will make the final decisions, and you will get to see the final creation in June. For now, it is a nice memory as I rest, hacking, on the couch.
Oh and one other note.. there are two other bakers with stories to tell! One is in New York and one in Boston... This will be a well traveled dessert course!
No comments:
Post a Comment