happiness is a brown banana....

I got a little carried away with my banana purchases this week. This picture is the pre-production for Day 2 of some banana bread loaves. Check out those nice mushy bananas. How that stuff in the bowls transforms into loaves of bread boggles my mind. It must be my magic mixer.

I made 6 loaves yesterday and 6 loaves today. I think Kevin was going to celebrate by buying tub of butter in anticipation of his bounty.

glimmerglass....

I did a "drive by" of Cooperstown on Friday (8/27). I took Ruth out to dinner at Pizza Hut, paid too much for a room at the Lake and Pines Motel and ate breakfast at the Cooperstown Diner. The weather in central New York was great. It was cold at night (50's) and warm during the day (70's). It made for foggy mornings. I had breakfast around 6:00am and then stopped by the lake front park before heading out of town. It was so foggy on the lake, I couldn't see the end of the boat docks.

progress report....

I'm halfway through the cake. Eight more slices to go. giggle.

I forgot to mention that I used a mix of regular cocoa and a dark chocolate version of bakers cocoa in this recipe. I haven't quite figured out what dark chocolate cocoa is but I'm researching it.

Chocolate cake, ganache and glaze produces some interesting dreams at night. Last night in my dream, I had an aquarium with little kittens that could breathe underwater. Their fur stayed dry and they just walked along the bottom looking cute. They never showed an interest in swimming. How do you interpret that?

This cake screams to be eaten while I drink a cup of black coffee. So far I have resisted the urge. That might over stimulate my little pea brain.

withdrawal....

It's been over a month since my dental fun started. I've been sensitive to cold and sweet foods. This has led to a huge chocolate craving that I decided to do something about this weekend. I started with a 9" Devil's Food Cake that I baked on Saturday and stuck in the refrigerator. I pulled it out on Sunday, sliced off the top and sliced the remainder in half for a two layer cake.

I then whipped up some ganache using heavy cream and dark chocolate

Here it is after assembly (filling) and smoothing (masking). I never claimed to be a cake decorator so don't be critical of my edges. The cake is on a cooling rack for chocolate glazing.

Glaze is more dark chocolate, heavy cream and butter. It's poured on hot and allowed to coat the sides.

The scariest part is transferring the cake to the cake container without dropping it. This was the first time that I glazed a cake at home and it wasn't too bad. The bad news is that it is a 9" cake and there aren't enough people in this house to eat it all. My future versions will be 6" cakes. That is almost individual sized!

that's just peachy...

I'm going through a peach phase. Central Texas has some good peach orchards and I can't seem to get enough of them. This is peach crisp and I'm making a batch every other day. It also means I'm making a bottomless batch of whipped cream. For breakfast, I've been having buttermilk pancakes with peaches and I have peach ice cream planned for this weekend.

I don't know what brought this on but I'm going to hate it when peaches go out of season.

implants....

I figured if I said "dental implants" in the title, no one would read this. giggle

Over the years, I have had my share of tooth extractions. Back in May, part of a tooth broke off. I've never considered myself remotely vain but I felt if I didn't do something, I would start to look like a hillbilly. I went to see a dentist and a discussion to cap the broken tooth led to a discussion about dental implants. I had no idea.

The first order of business was to deal with some gum disease and do some bone augmentation where the implants are going to go. I had this done about two weeks ago (June 30) and I'm just now getting back to normal. The worse part is the resulting cold sensitivity. I may not be able to have a beer for another month or two. Yikes.

Eating hard food is still impossible so I'm losing a little weight. The implants will go in when everything is healed - possibly in September or October. I hope they look more natural than those implants in the picture!

baseball fever....

The Austin American Statesman ran a front page story this morning on a 91 year old fan of the University of Texas that has been keeping score of every baseball game for the past 26 years. She does it in person or listens to the game on the radio. They included this picture of her in action at the game that was held on Friday afternoon. The real story, however, is that true baseball fan that is seated a few seats down from her.

It's playoff time for college baseball. Texas is playing TCU in the best of 3 series in Austin. Because of television, they are playing each game in the afternoon. A good friend of mine thought it was more important to celebrate his 20th wedding anniversary in Napa Valley so he gave me the tickets. He's getting drunk and I'm on the front page of the paper.

My SPF 100 sunscreen isn't working. I'm a tad red after 2 afternoons in the sun. The series final is tomorrow afternoon. I hope I survive. I need to get one of those burnt orange shirts. I stick out in the crowd.