Vakkotaur

For a couple years I had a part-time job, to help fill things in a bit, that took up every other weekend. The person who ran the place had another job as well, helping care for a few folks with some disabilities, including one fellow who had some sort of nerve disorder that kept him in a wheelchair and made it hard for him to communicate. I can only imagine how frustrating that must be, or have been, as his mind worked just fine, but it was trapped in a body that didn't operate very well.

I often wound up baking cakes or brownies, one of the nights before this job and brought them in. Sometimes coworkers would enjoy them, sometimes one would take the works home ("Oh, good, I forgot to make a birthday cake. I can use this!" happened once) and sometimes the manager would take it to the other job for "the guys." It got to where they decided to get me a covered cake pan to make it a bit easier for all of us - it would be less work for me to make a single sheet left in the pan than a layer cake, and it would be simpler to handle for them as it would take less care than worrying about a layer cake sliding around in a plastic cake container of dubious integrity. It worked out quite well.

I found out, eventually, about the wheelchair bound fellow and that any cake or brownie served to him had to be cut up into bite sized pieces (of course) and soaked in milk to make sure it was more than just normal cake soft and easily swallowed. After that I was careful about not adding chips or M&Ms or such to brownies for "the guys" as I might have done, to avoid complicating things.

It eventually occurred to me that a tres leches cake would be ideal - it's already soaking in milk. But such a thing needs refrigeration and generally the fridge didn't have room for a cake pan. That is, until recently, when I made a point of keeping one drawer empty or nearly so. A couple weeks back I made a tres leches cake (from a mix, as usual) to try it myself. I wanted to be sure of things before having anyone else try it, just to be sure of things. It worked quite well, as one would expect from a mix.

Last night I baked another, and this morning took it over with the explanation of why I choose that particular cake rather than something not needing to be kept chilled. And then I was informed, or perhaps re-informed that the fellow I had had in mind had died in November. I might well have been told that back in November and had forgotten or had not realized, by name. exactly who it was. So.. well, I felt rather awkward. However, evidently this fellow's name has been coming up a fair amount of late and the idea that someone was thinking of him will over well with "the guys." I still feel rather odd about this. I am pretty sure I was told but... somehow missed it or forgot in the few months or it didn't register that it was that person. And of course, it's too late for him, no matter how good the intent might have been. So, yeah, it's an awkward feeling.

A few days ago I made beer bread and tried to make it a rye bread. It did not work out. The oven was too hot or the bread was in too long and I must have gotten some of the ingredients in the wrong ratio. The bread was bitter and seemed, to me, oddly salty. The crust reminded me a pretzel. Most got tossed. I can't even blame the Blatz for this one. I do plan to try making a rye beer bread again, and making some changes. A bit less rye flour, keeping an eye on the loaf in the oven, and backing off on the baking soda all seem like Good Ideas.

A day or so later I made "5 minute chocolate mug cake" with a couple changes from the last time. I mixed it in the 2 cup measure and microwaved in a small pyrex mixing bowl. I remembered the salt. I used Merry's Irish Cream rather than milk (the little "airline" sized bottle is the right measure). I added chocolate chips since I had them. Again, I cut the baking time 15 seconds short of the suggested 3 minutes. The result was good. It was not noticeably rubbery. It served two quite well. It's not truly a "5 minute" thing, but it is fairly quick and the result is good.

Today I tried something new and instead of chocolate chip cookies, started with a recipe for a chocolate cookie with chocolate chips and used cherry chips instead. All the things I managed to get wrong before I seem to have finally overcome. The results look like proper cookies (not spread oddly thin) and they don't wilt when I pick them up, but they are still reasonably soft.

What did I do this time? This paragraph is mainly a note to myself, but what I did was this. Following the linked recipe (omitting any nuts and substituting a 10 oz. package of cherry chips for chocolate chips), I sifted the flour, then after adding the other dry ingredients (except for the sugar) I sifted that mix, twice, to mix them. I used "air pan" cookie sheets with parchment paper. I baked only on the top oven rack for 8 minutes and at about the 4 minute mark, I turned the cookie sheet 180 degrees so the cookies would all get about the same heat (I had noticed some unevenness to the cookies in an earlier batch). Before I re-used the cookies sheets, I cooled them with cold water so the cookies always had a cold start.