Just A Small Town Girl

Yeah, yeah. It's been more like P Hit&Miss, with a lot more miss lately.
I promise there are enough photos on Flickr to make up for it. And seeing as my paid Flickr account and P365 had approximately the same start date, I'm apparently on Day 360 or so. I think I'm going to go for a second round, trying to be less "miss" and more "hit".

Seeing as it's been a bit of a theme today...
Not my best food porn efforts, but it's a bit tricky to take pictures of white on white-flash is not your friend. Anyway, it was good. (Thankfully, these tomatoes were a LOT better than the ones sitting around last week, which I unfortunately made into pasta sauce-it was vile.)

Busy all day. Not much in the way of photography. So you get an "oh, yeah, I need to take a picture" photo. (Went with my dad on an errand that took us to Drexel Hill.)

Clearly I need a little adjustment getting onto East Coast time. (Although given that I was dead asleep on the couch by 10 I suppose waking up at 6 isn't that bad.)

Anyway, the massive uploading of photos has begun, and maybe sometime tonight or tomorrow there will be a catchup P365 entry. Meanwhile, I have some unpacking to do...last night I only got as far as finding my pj bottoms and duvet.

Lessons from this evening:
-always check you have everything before you start
-there's a reason you're supposed to wait for the cake to cool completely before applying buttercream frosting

Anyway, chocolate cake of decadence isn't actually that difficult to make. It takes maybe 5 minutes more than using a cake mix, provided you have a mixer. This really isn't one to do by hand-creaming butter and sugar by hand can be done, but it isn't all that fun.

1/2 c cocoa
3/4 c boiling water
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1 1/2 sticks butter (~165g) at room temperature (ie, softened)
1 1/2 c brown sugar
3 eggs
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2c flour
1 1/2 tsp baking soda
1/4 tsp baking powder
---
3/4 c cream (I've been using a 200ml packet)

1. Preheat oven to 350F/175C. Combine the cocoa and boiling water.

2. Combine the dry ingredients in a medium bowl, set aside.

3. In a large bowl, cream the butter and brown sugar. Add eggs, beat until well mixed.

4. Add the cocoa/water to the butter/sugar/egg mix. (If the water is still hot, add just a little first and stir before adding the rest-you don't want the eggs to cook now!)

4. Alternating with the cream, add the flour mix in 3 "equal batches". (That's in quotes cause I've never yet managed equal batches and find the phrasing hilarious.)

5. Mix well.

6. Bake in 2 greased 9" cake pans for ~35mins. (Or cupcake/muffins ~20.) Cake is done when toothpick/dry spaghetti inserted in center comes out clean. (Edges of cake should start to pull away from pan.)

7. Let stand in cake pans 10-15 mins before turning out to cool completely.

8. Decorate as you see fit.

9. YUM.

There are more photos on Flickr, but I am tired and now that I've had half a chocolate cake, I want sleep.

Happy Easter. You'll be shocked to hear I did not purchase any or all of these. I didn't even get myself a giant Kinder egg. (Those who know me are probably really falling over in shock now.) But I already have as much chocolate sitting around the flat as I can eat in a week. Besides which, the bookstore is further up the street...

Someone show my grandmother: I didn't forget this year. (The underwear is green too, but I'm not posting photos of that.)
And yes, this is the only photo I care to post, because even trying my best not to, I make ridiculous faces when I take my own picture.

This is yesterday's P365. Today's is also from yesterday. But that's because the weather is back to "pissy with a side of taunting" and I'm not going outside to get soaked for the sake of having something to post. (I could take pictures of the kitchen, but only if I wanted to scare you.)

...that there was sunshine today. For 5 seconds. Off in the distance. Before it went back to raining like we should be building an ark. Hopefully this will pass by the weekend. I want to go to the game Sunday and not get soaked.