Notes from the field: On a very special 30th birthday...

We met on the internet. 

It started with a few mutual interests - namely the sea, the sun and a little South Coast English town called Brighton. Our first date was at The Mermaid, where we shared a silver tower of shellfish big enough for a party of grandpas in the Catskills. And we resolved, no matter the distance, to stay in touch. From there, the rest was history. 

We ate lobster rolls and reminisced about Bills. I showered her in champagne, confetti and sparkler fire as she finished her 29th lap around the sun. She dried my breakup tears with a wild weekend away and a crazy night at a beachside bar with rum punch, handsome young men and late night lifesaving egg sandwiches. 

There are some people that you meet and feel like you already know, and that right there is where the connection lies. 

Not long after that first sip of wine, you're gifting each other rainy day bouquets and finishing each others' sentences. You're sharing burgers and Bloodies at J.G. Melon and throwing back champers cocktails at your local pub. You are turning random Manhattan weeknights into spectacularly good shows - what with the endless bottles of champagne, back garden chats and dessert on the house - and the entire bar joins in to celebrate the nuttiness of life around you. You are touching base from Germany, from Vegas, from San Diego, from Philadelphia, from New York. You're talking about boys, work, lighthouses and travel dreams. About life, loss and the middle place in between it all.
 

Some people came into your life at the right time, even though I think that somehow they've been there all along. See, I believe that there are many types of soulmates. Past what we already know, we find soulmates in those that we are attached to forever, usually family, whose souls are as complexly entwined with ours as the double helix strands that tie us together. We can find soulmates in people that we attach onto, for however brief a time, and no matter what, they leave a lasting mark on us as they drift away. 

But then there are those people that were meant to be with you. They respect everything about you and expect nothing from you all at once. They think about you just when you think about them. They tell you you've "nailed it" even when you haven't because they know that sometimes life's failures are just too good to have a laugh about. They stand up for you, they challenge you and for Christ's sake, they just get you.

And so, when they tell you that their favorite flavors are banana, Nutella and sea salt, you make it work and whip up fluffy banana cupcakes in a HobNob crust with Nutella filling and fleur de sel caramel buttercream and hand painted Belgian chocolate seashell on top.
 

Happy 30th birthday, my sweet sweet Suze. You are a wonder and a joy, and this shines true in the people and the love around you. I'm so happy to get to share a brain, a thousand bottles of champagne and a little piece of my soul with you. To this weekend, and to many many more.

Notes from the Field: Until fall...

No big words here today. Just a few pictures from this summer's travels, some chocolate Nutella raspberry cupcakes from the beach last weekend and quick note to say that in my annual end-of-August fashion, I'm signing off to live the rest of summer to the fullest. 

Hope you enjoy these long days of sun as much as I will.  See you in the fall, as we close out the fourth (!) year on this little blog of mine. 

Case Study 118: "The Peach Crumble"

"This is the plum season, the nights

blue and distended, the moon
hazed, this is the season of peaches
with their lush lobed bulbs
that glow in the dusk, apples
that drop and rot 
sweetly, their brown skins veined as glands
No more the shrill voices
that cried Need Need
from the cold pond, bladed
and urgent as new grass
Now it is the crickets
that say Ripe Ripe
slurred in the darkness, while the plums
dripping on the lawn outside
our window, burst
with a sound like thick syrup
muffled and slow
The air is still
warm, flesh moves over
flesh, there is no
hurry"

- Late August 

by Margaret Atwood

It's hot outside. The August days march on and the air is heavy, as if every passing thunderstorm is a sign of the summer's passionate heat clashing in the sky. I crave clams. I only want rum and saltwater, and I'm pretty sure that my feet don't fit into normal shoes anymore. We are in barefoot season. Clothes are a nuisance, work is a chore and the sight of sunlight after three o'clock constantly brings to mind that Henry James poem: "Summer afternoon, summer afternoon...."

We are in the heart of summer's sweetest fruit harvest. Blackberries stain sweet honey on fingertips, watermelons provide the best hydration and the peaches are so swollen and ripe they can be sliced with a butter knife. 

Where there's seasonal fruit, there must be cupcakes, and better yet, Peach Crumble Cupcakes. 

The sweet local stone fruits of August were peeled, roughly chopped and thrown into moist vanilla and brown sugar cupcakes. I topped them with a vanilla buttercream, mixed with a scoop of whipped cream cheese for good measure. A peach's best sweetness is brought out by toasted bits, and so a crumble topping was necessary, making these cupcakes almost like mini- peach cobblers reconstructed.  This crumble consists of flour, brown sugar, crumbled walnuts and melted butter, spread on a baking tray and cooked crisp in the oven before topping. The crowning glory: I slid in a fresh peach slice for good measure.

Late August approaches, and to be honest, I'm in denial that anything close to fall could be on its way.  But luckily, somehow, time moves slowly. Three more August weekends left for these traveling summer hands and feet. Whatever they lead us to, they won't be wished away. 

Notes from the Field: On baby showers...

"Snips and snails 

and puppy dog tails, 

that's what little boys are made of..."

 

I love a good summer party, and even more so, I love the opportunity to dream up some whimsy for them too. Today's cupcake order is in celebration of the sweet baby boy of a chic Manhattan mummy-to-be.

Devils' food cupcakes with vanilla, Nutella and salted caramel buttercreams topped with chevron safari toppers. Decadent, glamorous and oh-so-sweet for a West Village baby shower on a gorgeous summer night. 

Case Study 117: "The Chocolate Hazelnut Mousse Cupcake"

Sometimes, when there's party in three hours and only a half cup of flour in the house, life requires improvisation.

You're about to embark on a six week adventure through Block Island, Cape Cod, Newport, Philly, Stone Harbor and Westhampton, so you're resting your tired legs for the night because there'll be beach jaunting, wild kitchen counter dancing and dark n' stormy drinking to do. It's pouring outside, the Olympics have been on for five hours and you're happy to oblige. 


There's good butter in the fridge and that funny little bottle of hazelnut liquor dressed like a monk in the bar. There's an endless supply of chocolate in the cabinet, and so you change things up a little bit. Whip the butter with the eggs, mix the cocoa with the milk and somehow, eighteen minutes later you've got the most perfect devils' food cakes cooling on the counter. 


The aroma fills the house and the rain beats on the skylight above. 

Maybe you'll fill them with cream and those little hazelnut wafer bites - or what if you just get out your aggression and beat those cookies thin and make a chocolate hazelnut wafer bite bark instead?  The cream filling somehow turns into a mousse, which seems sturdy enough to become a frosting, and suddenly, with an old tiny piping tip and a plastic freezer bag, you've fanned out some lion-like petals on top of the perfect devils food cakes and stuck the bark in tight. 


Where there's a will there's a way, and where there's a way there are devils' food cupcakes with chocolate-Frangelico mousse frosting and hazelnut wafer bit bark on top. Sometimes you are right where you're supposed to be, and good things come from the possibilities in that.

Case Study 116: "The Summer Chocolate Cherry Cupcake"

"There is a season for everything..."

This is the start of a quote from Ecclesiastes that lines the brick wall of my parents' house, under the dogwood tree out back. I can't seem to get it out of my head. 

In my job as a consultant, we have tests for assessing a company's readiness for change. We highlight needs, investigate the culture and determine the best fit approach for an organization in flux.

But in life, things sometimes change suddenly and it's easy to be blindsided. We can study what has happened in so many ways. We can test our hypotheses against what we knew was fact. And we can scrutinize what went wrong, stacking it up against past experiences, and try to resolve the important questions.
 

In business and life alike, the most successful ways to get from point A to point B in a situation is to accept the change, to have a vision and to be fully engaged. Seasonally thematic cupcakes can also help, especially when they are chocolate cake topped with vanilla buttercream and dark chocolate dipped cherries.  

My brilliant mother, whose birthday it is today, always reminds me of the first line in Scott Peck's best-selling book: "life is difficult." This can be a hard pill for most to swallow, but once it is accepted as truth, any change that lands on our doorstep can be worked through. To be human means feeling to the extremes - through struggle, triumph, the happy and the sad - and potentially never fully understanding what any of it really means. To me, accepting this is the basis of awareness, and if anything gets us through change, it's mindfulness and being aware.

 

If there's anything that I've learned in love and loss, it's that life is difficult, but it also goes on. We must be grateful for those extremes, the experiences and the growth we receive for seeing ourselves through it all. 

Summer is in full swing. Picnics in Central Park, alfresco cocktails, rum punch and wild beach nights. I have my vision and I'm fully engaged. There is in fact a season for everything, and fortunately, my changes have come in the right one.

Notes from the field: On summer.

 "Summer is late, my heart.
Words plucked out of the air
some forty years ago
when I was wild with love
and torn almost in two
scatter like leaves this night
of whistling wind and rain.
It is my heart that's late,
it is my song that's flown.
 

 

Outdoors all afternoon
under a gunmetal sky
staking my garden down,
I kneeled to the crickets trilling
underfoot as if about
to burst from their crusty shells;
and like a child again
marveled to hear so clear
and brave a music pour
from such a small machine.
 

What makes the engine go?
Desire, desire, desire.
The longing for the dance
stirs in the buried life.
One season only,
and it's done.
So let the battered old willow
thrash against the windowpanes
and the house timbers creak.
Darling, do you remember
the man you married? Touch me,
remind me who I am." 

- Stanley Kunitz

 

Desire, desire, desire. So lucky for me, my summer has finally arrived, and just in time. The sun is hot and the grass is green. The ocean is a baptism for tired winter bodies and the weekends provide endless opportunity for adventure and awe. 

Summer also gets sweet with these ripe strawberry cupcakes with balsamic spiked vanilla buttercream and local strawberries on top.

So relish in it. Drink it up, enjoy the magic, and remember that manifesto of a summer child is to let the season perpetually astonish you. 

Case Study 115: "The Summer Babycake"

As far as I was concerned, there were five ripe bananas on the kitchen counter of the house on the edge of a cow farm, and this meant something had to be done. 

Summer swept in last week. The city is stifling, Wall Street has slowed down and out in Pennsylvania my brother's garden is in full bloom. Oregano, zucchini, ripening tomatoes and a brand new baby boy who came into the world on the second to last day of June.   
 

New life is fascinating. We marvel at how touching a babies foot will cause the tiny toes grasp your finger with an eerie force. We watch as fresh grey-blue eyes look around, no doubt processing the alien shapes and sounds above. And we remember that just as things grow and things end, everything also becomes new again.  

The day after my nephew was born, we came back and held down the fort. At sunset we strolled past the four foot high corn fields and met eleven Amish cows gathering in the golden light of the clover field by the stream. We clipped squash blossoms from the garden out back and a sole rose from the bush. My nephew slept between my parents,and when I woke up, I saw that the bananas had turned black. 
 

With fresh eyes and inspired for the first time in weeks, I mashed them up and whipped into a batter.  I mixed up butter and cinnamon with a graham cracker crust and topped the banana cupcakes with vanilla-honey buttercream and a sweet blue hydrangea blossom.

Scientists have found that the way we process relationships and love as adults relates back to our interpersonal neurobiology as newborns. The sensations and communication experienced in those first few days of life leave a lasting effect on the rest of a lifetime's behavior. 

I am so lucky to have been a part of these first days of my nephew's life. Like his brother, I can't wait to dote on him, to love him and to watch him grow. I wonder how he will be different and how he will be the same. And most of all, I'm excited to see how he will continue to remind us, just by existing, how much of a miracle life really is.

Notes from the Field: On parties...

 

Last weekend was lovely. It started with cocktails on the back patio and closing down a little French restaurant with my boyfriend and his parents off of Passayunk Ave. It peaked on Saturday night with a shrimp boil for thirteen, with crisp rosé, cold pale ale and a bowl of guacamole as sides for the table of crustaceans bathed in a can of Old Bay and beer. And it ended with a good brunch, travel planning and a whole lot of delicious lounging to revel in a weekend well done.  

Somewhere in between the sun, the chatter and the al fresco dining, there was a birthday party for two little miracles in the dream home on eleventh street. Thanks to their loving mama, there were pops of color, a ceiling full of balloons and a dozen little boys under two. And I had the honor of baking up six dozen red velvet, chocolate peanut butter and bourbon pecan cupcakes for Ollie and Dash, crowned with toppers representing their hometown pride and the Chicago Cubs.   

I cannot claim to be an event planner by trade (my experiences lie mostly within cupcake baking and partymaking for fun). But I must say that this weekend's celebrations went off without a hitch. I can see many similar gatherings on the horizon...viva the summer of fantastic parties.

Case Study 114: "The Margarita Cupcake"

There are few things in this world I know are true. Of them, I am certain that love is divine, knowledge is a god and I will never ever turn down a margarita, whether it's Cinco de Mayo, or any other day. This, this, is the wisdom that twenty-seven years of life has given me. 

Give it to me on a hot night at a corner bar, with chili pepper fairylights strung around the bar and a light breeze passing through the cross streets. Serve it spicy, infused with habanero chiles, mixed quick with grapefruit juice. And pour me a pitcher straight, over ice cold rocks with a squeeze of fresh lime, and hold that damn salt.

Here's hoping your fifth of May is equally divine: full of tacos, amigos and lime cupcakes topped with tequila-lime buttercream and one helluva sprinkle fiesta.

Notes from the Field: To my nephew on his birthday...

"We ate well and cheaply

and drank well and cheaply

and slept warm and well together

and loved each other"

- Ernest Hemingway

To my little cookie monster on his third birthday, 

The older I get, the more I realize that life is far too short and sweet to worry about the little things. What we take out of life truly is what we put into it. You'll figure these things out over time, but in the meantime...

Allow the world around you awaken your senses. Be open with your tastes. Try something new at least once, but don't put yourself in danger. Stay curious and seek truth. Read the classics so that you have something to compare all those new theories with. Indulge yourself, but put your values in the basic necessities. Share what you find with others, and listen to their discoveries. Do this with everyone. I've learned that when you put out enough kindness in the universe, it will come back to you and surprise you when you need it most.  

Let music move you. Revel in it when you ache and let if fill you up until there's nowhere for it to go but out of your dancing limbs. Fly down the Garden State Parkway blasting Bruce Springsteen; search for The Beatles in Liverpool. Keep your eyes open. There's so much to see in this big world of ours, but sometimes the most beautiful things are right under your nose. These are the treasures you can give yourself, experience is of the greatest of riches in life.

Everything, they say, is relative, but we all hurt the same. Feel, but understand when to let go of the feelings. Treat people well, treat yourself the same. Learn to balance these two things well and set boundaries. Know when enough is enough. Not everything was meant to be yours forever; not everyone was meant to be yours forever. On the other hand, when you know it's right, fireproof your relationship and build walls around your fortress to protect it. Cherish it.

Spend time with your family. This is not an issue now, but we're all getting older, so really spend time with them. Learn the stories of your grandparents, learn the lives of your parents. They are your living history. They are why you are here. Have hope, have grace, have faith. These are the things that will help see you through when you are up against yourself. Give to get, mind your manners, and please, sweet thing, love.

Happy birthday little one. To many many more.     

Notes from the Field: On Grace.

Grace.Origin: 1125-75; Middle English, from Anglo-French; Latin gratia favor, charm, thanks, from gratus pleasing, grateful; akin to Sanskrit gṛṇāti he praises.

Thanking the oven gods' good graces(Origin: 1125-75; Middle English, from Anglo-French. Favor or goodwill)that my third batch of cupcakes in a row did not burn. It is endlessly gra·ti·fy·ing(Origin: 1605–15; Giving satisfaction, pleasing)to know that when the heart is aflutter, kitchen results can follow suit.

Times have been a bit trying around these here parts lately, but that doesn't mean that I can allow myself to forget about the important things. 

Showing grat·i·tude(Origin: 1400–50; late Middle English, Medieval Latin grātitūdin. The quality of being grateful or thankful) for the wonderful things and people that one has is a start. Being gra·cious (Origin: 1250-1300; Middle English; Latin: grātiōsus, Characterized by or showing kindness)can give you the gift of knowing that there are things out there much greater than what you currently see. 

Third time's a charm, and I am so very grate·ful (Origin: 1545–55; obsolete grate, pleasing. Warmly or deeply appreciative of kindness or benefits received) that these sweet banana cupcakes with peanut butter and honey buttercream turned out just right. To be honest, there are so many things to be grateful for.


This is a reminder of the times I've acted with grace. This is a reminder to always act with grace.

Case Study 113: "The Easter Nest"

"And all the season of snows and sins; 

The days dividing lover and lover,

The light that loses, the night that wins;
And time remembered is grief forgotten,
And frosts are slain and flowers begotten,

And in green underwood and cover
Blossom by blossom the spring begins."
 
- Algernon Charles Swinburne 
 

 

A few months ago, my love, amidst an amazingly positive turn of life events, had proclaimed that Easter had come early this year. As we plow through April, my outlook is just so bright, that I now completely know what he meant by it.  

 

This spring has given many gifts so far. In a few months of hard work, I've been given a new awareness about my strengths and limits. Another nephew is arriving soon, and I'm completely consumed by the idea that my family could grow even more full with this new addition of wonder and awe. And honestly, has this not been the most gloriously warm spring? That has been a gift in itself.

 
And so we're celebrating it all with these caramel coconut-y nests, reminiscent of Easter themed Samoas. Vanilla cupcakes in chocolate cookie crusts, topped with melted chocolate, caramel buttercream, toasted coconuts and peanut M&M eggs.

Happy holiday and happy spring. However you celebrate, I hope the season brings you an abundance of newness and life.