Coaching Cooking

There’s nothing quite like the journey of the last child to college. In my case, my little sister (a good 10 years younger than me) is off to Southern California. We both can’t imagine what kind of wacky adventures she’ll have down there. I hope to hear at least a few times from her this coming semester (but I’m not going to hold my breath!). My sister has been, in many gleeful ways, my partner in crime. In her honor, I’m making cupcakes. Ever since my wedding last summer, cupcakes have become the best way to celebrate special events. In my mind, there’s nothing better than getting your very own, mini cake. Sometimes you just don’t want to share!.

This time I decided to road-test the Barefoot Contessa recipe for Chocolate Cupcakes with Peanut Butter Frosting. A lot of time was spent shooing hands away from the dessert platter. That alone told me that this recipe is worth making again and again. The peanut butter frosting was easy to make and it tasted exactly the way you want peanut butter frosting to taste–creamy and chock full of peanut butter goodness. Tip: let the peanut butter frosting sit in the fridge for at least 30 minutes before you decorate the cupcakes so it reaches a more solid consistency. For frosting decoration, I use a large plastic bag (gallon size) and cut the corner off. This makes it so easy to pipe the frosting onto the cupcakes plus you can throw the bag away afterwards.

The cupcakes were pretty simple too. There are two separate bowls of ingredients to mix into the butter-sugar combination. It really helps to have a sturdy, standing mixer like a KitchenAid. The butter-sugar mixture is mixed first then you add in a buttermilk-sour cream-coffee mixture and alternate with the flour-salt-cocoa powder mix. The resulting batter is very smooth and airy. The cupcakes themselves taste very rich (use the best cocoa powder that you can get….I love the Scharffen-Berger cocoa powder).

So we ate the cupcakes and they were enjoyed by all….as you can see!

My friend over at Queenly Things posted a quick and inspiring note on cooking. Check it out here.

I can just smell (and taste) that coconut rice now! Mmmmm

The bells are synced and the kids are ready…My desk is already cluttered with papers and pencils so I have to admit that school is now in session. Admittedly, I’m not quite ready for the year because my mind is still at Vino Locale.

For a moment, let’s look back on a lovely dinner that AB and I had at Vino Locale last weekend. Downtown Palo Alto hosted its annual art and wine festival and the atmosphere was busy, but cheerful. If I had my way, I’d probably go to Vino Locale at least twice a week just to sit in that lovely garden. We stayed for two hours and it felt like time passed by so leisurely. We were a bit surprised that we’d been sitting there for two hours in such tranquility!

So, to tempt you, here are some pics from our fabulous lunch:

We started with a wonderful caprese salad. AB tells me that bocconcinis are the medium-size mozzarella and the ones we had for lunch on this day are called “pearls.” They were creamy and soft with no hint of bitterness and they paired perfectly with the local tomatoes.

We like wine flights! Especially ones that come with a beautiful garden…

Pure heaven on bread…

AB ordered the crostini (with my strong recommendation) and it was really great again. The bread was perfectly toasted on the outside and the toppings included parmesan-cream cheese, pesto, bruschetta and pistachio pate. This was one of our last dishes and we began to reach that soporific state of satiated bliss.