Apple Cake and The Adventures of Robin Hood

It's interesting how days unfold. Yesterday, Boston was gripped with the edge of Hurricane Sandy, spewing torrents of wind. Rain rattled like a shower of marbles against my windows. The lights flickered on and off ominously. However, today the sky shines with a light blue hue and sunlight dapples the piles of brown and orange leaves dotting the grass. Only the wet twigs strewn across the road and a fallen tree down my street bear witness to yesterday's calamitous weather. The Earth is renewing itself, healing its wounds, ready to begin again. It is a lesson we all can learn.

September was a hectic month for me. I began graduate school, and it took me awhile to become accustomed to academic rhythms yet again. Happiness swells inside me whenever I engage in a class discussion, realizing how much I missed talking about history and sharing viewpoints with others. I also started a column for an Italian-American newspaper entitled about the holidays, customs, and folklore of Italy, and I have found this more rewarding than anything I have ever done. However, I found myself itching to get back to baking, to those quiet nights spent in the kitchen measuring ingredients and watching them transform, as if by magic, into a delectable treat in the oven. So once October began, I vowed to dive into baking and blogging again.

What better time to start baking than late October, when the dark nights settle into a quiet stillness and the kitchen light bathes the room in a cozy, homey glow. This is the time of cinnamon and apples, pumpkin and ginger, pears and nutmeg, all rich scents and tastes that tap into the very essence of autumn. Writing this now on the day before Halloween, I look outside at the yellow leaves blowing against a tranquil sky and can practically feel ancient souls and memories surrounding me. In honor of the sense of history fall inspires, the medieval origin of Halloween and my new-found affection for the television show Game of Thrones, the movie I chose for this blog entry is The Adventures of Robin Hood. Here are Dan's thoughts.

The Adventures of Robin Hood

Adding the finishing touches to his Robin Hood, Kevin Costner made some caustic remarks about Michael Curtiz’s The Adventures of Robin Hood and vowed to improve upon the accuracy and the spectacle. His glum film did neither and The Adventures of Robin Hood remains the ultimate swashbuckling classic. Striving for accuracy in a Robin Hood movie is a dubious venture anyway. As with King Arthur, so much of what is known about the Sherwood Forest outlaw exists in a no man’s land of history and legend.

Given the futility of presenting a purely historical, the measure of a Robin Hood movie is the sheer joy and thrills. The Adventures of Robin Hood delivers that in spades, feeling fresh each time Errol Flynn, in the green tights that immortalized him, welcomes us to Sherwood.  It’s a beautiful, lush, movie and Warner Bros. knew it from the start.  They splurged on this one and the studio’s spare-no-expense approach in recreating Sherwood in California and with the lush Technicolor. Robin Hood and his Merry Men swing by and fight the tyrannical Prince John’s (Claude Rains) minion Sir Guy of Gisbourne (Basil Rathbone), in the sword fight to start and end all sword fights, creating a magnificent splash of colors. 

Errol Flynn is the ideal outlaw, charming enough for Maid Marion (Olivia de Havilland, taking our breath away) and agile enough to evade capture. It’s a thrill ride before the concept of thrill rides at the movies became synonymous with CGI. Flynn may have taken the swashbuckler thrown from Douglas Fairbanks, but in The Adventures of Robin Hood he makes it his own.  And so it has stayed, Flynn remains the ultimate Robin Hood stunning us with feats that not even the wizards behind the Pirates of the Caribbean franchise could duplicate with all their computer and digital slickness. 

See The Adventures of Robin Hood for its beauty, sheer joy, and for the role that forever cemented Errol Flynn as a man of flight. 

Thanks, Dan! And now for the recipe...

Oh, wow. This recipe. I knew I wanted to make something with apples for Robin Hood ever since I read a medieval recipe for an apple galette. I settled for a cake, however, but I never expected to make a cake this good. Speaking completely without hyperbole, this is the best apple cake I have ever tried. It is soft, silky, and hits the right balance between sweetness and spice. The butterscotch sauce on top adds a light yet decadent surprise. This recipe was a contest winner at Taste of Home magazine, submitted by a reader named Debi Benson. It's no contest, I'll be making this one again.

Apple Cake

From Taste of Home, by Debi Benson

Serves 12-14

Ingredients:

• 1/2 cup butter, softened
• 2 cups sugar
• 1/2 tsp vanilla extract
• 2 eggs
• 2 cups all-purpose flour
• 1 1/2 tsp ground cinnamon
• 1 tsp ground nutmeg
• 1/2 tsp salt
• 1/2 tsp baking soda
• 6 cups tart apples, peeled and chopped into small square chunks

For butterscotch sauce:

• 1/2 cup packed brown sugar
• 1/4 cup butter, cubed
• 1/2 cup whipping cream

1) In a large bowl, cream butter, sugar and vanilla. The mixture will appear crumbly. Add eggs one at a time, beating well after each addition. In a small bowl, combine flour, cinnamon, nutmeg, salt and baking soda. Gradually add the flour mixture to the butter mixture and mix well--the batter will be stiff. Fold in apples until well combined.

2) Spread batter into a greased 13- by 9-in baking dish. Bake at 350 degrees Fahrenheit for 40-45 minutes until lightly browned on top or until it springs back lightly when gently touched. Let cool for 30 minutes before serving.

3) For sauce: Combine brown sugar and butter in a small saucepan. Cook over medium heat until butter melts. Gradually add whipping cream. Stirring constantly, bring to a slow boil over medium heat. Remove from heat. Drizzle on top of cake slices when serving.

Next Time: I'm thinking All Quiet on the Western Front, not sure about the recipe

Pineapple Upside-Down Cake and Jurassic Park

I meant to write this entry yesterday, but Hurricane Irene had other ideas about what to do with the electricity in my house. But I suppose that's rather appropriate, because in Jurassic Park, the movie du jour, a power outage  is what sets the whole plot in motion.

I've missed blogging so much! This summer has been absolutely crazy, what with job interviews and the arrival of several relatives from overseas, and I've hardly had much time to bake or blog. That's okay, though, because my favorite time to bake is during the fall, when the air is crisp and the nights are wrapped in cozy darkness. Then baking takes on an especially magical and comforting quality. I'm already tingling with excitement at the recipes I'm planning to make for this blog in the fall, featuring yummy autumnal ingredients like apples, ginger, pumpkin, and cranberries! For now, though, I've decided to pay tribute to the last lingering days of summer by revisiting a classic summer blockbuster and featuring a classic summer recipe for this entry.

When I was younger, Jurassic Park freaked me out to no end. It was the T-Rex that did it, especially that shaking cup of water that announced the dinosaur's presence. I remember being too scared to go on this ride in Disney World that featured animatronic dinosaurs because of this movie. However, when I got older, I began to appreciate the summer fun that was Jurassic Park. It helps that Steven Spielberg is an awesome director, so he created interesting characters and a sharp sense of tension that elevate Jurassic Park to a higher standard than other summer blockbusters. By the time I was a preteen, I thought that this movie was so cool, that whenever I used to swim in a certain friend's pool, which was surrounded by a tropical-looking forest (well, as tropical as you can get in Massachusetts), I would pretend that there were dinosaurs hiding in the woods. Weird, I know. But indicative of the decade-spanning power which is Jurassic Park! And now for Dan's thoughts (who, as a boy growing up in the early 90s, became very attached to this film).

Jurassic Park


Everybody has a childhood favorite they refuse to let go of. Some, like me, have a few, and Jurassic Park is one of my top nostalgic celluloid trips. That's not to say, however, that I like Steven Spielberg's adaptation of Michael Crichton's novel simply on a sentimental level.

No, in many ways Jurassic Park is as brilliantly conceived an excitement ride as Raiders of the Lost Ark. The adaptation is vintage Spielberg with its awestruck gaze at the possibility of genetically creating prehistoric giants as well as the dangerous possibilities of unregulated scientific discovery.

Oh, but there's more. There are kids in danger when the dinos break free after a backstabbing park employee (played by Wayne Knight...remember him?) messes with the park's electric system. As in all of Spielberg's best films the heroes are those who turn their concern first to the kids. This time, it's the curmudgeonly paleontologist Dr. Grant, played by Sam Neill.

The real stars, though, are the dinosaurs. I still remember how much they shocked audiences and reporters in the summer of 1993. It was the first time computers created not just what looked like elaborate puppets but flesh-and-bone creatures. Science has proven much of what the film says about dinosaurs correct. Fossil evidence does indicate that dinosaurs had many commonalities with birds. Raptors may even have been covered with feathers! But in their scaly-lizard form they help make the climactic kitchen showdown a spectacle to remember.

Still, the iconic moment belongs to the T-Rex. What Generation Yer, for whom this film surely played an important role during adolescence, did not suffer a nightmare after seeing the monster attack the car with panicking children inside? Boomers had a spook with Night of the Living Dead, Generation X had a demon in The Exorcist, and finally, how fitting that the wired generation gets its share with a genetically created dinosaur.

Thanks, Dan! By the way, I think the whole raptors-had-feathers idea is really cool. It kind of makes them look like a character from Sesame Street, but watch out, because they're still raptors and therefore worthy of respect!

Anyways, on to the recipe. For Jurassic Park I chose a pineapple-upside down cake from the excellent Australian cookbook entitled Baking: A Commonsense Guide. It was absolutely delicious. How delicious? My boyfriend not only helped himself to a second slice but also wrote a Facebook post about it. I think it's the perfect cake to add to a Labor Day celebration: it's sweet with a hint of tropical paradise, but the biscuit-like texture of the cake underneath keeps it from getting too sugary. If the T-Rex had this cake he wouldn't bother chasing after humans!

Pineapple Upside-Down Cake

From Baking: A Commonsense Guide 

Ingredients

• 1/2 oz unsalted butter, melted
• 2 Tbsp firmly packed light brown sugar
• 1 lb canned pineapple rings (with natural juice)
• 3 1/4 oz unsalted butter, softened
• 1/2 cup superfine sugar
• 2 eggs, lightly beaten (I used EggBeaters)
• 1 tsp pure vanilla extract
• 1 cup self-rising flour

1) Preheat the oven to 350 degrees Fahrenheit. Lightly grease an 8-in ring tin.

2) Pour the melted butter on the bottom of the tin. Tip the tin around so that the butter spreads evenly. Sprinkle with brown sugar.

3) Drain the pineapple rings and reserve 1/3 cup of the juice. Cut the pineapple rings in half and arrange on the bottom of the tin.

4) Using an electric mixer, beat the softened butter and the superfine sugar until creamy. Add the eggs gradually, beating well after each addition. Add the vanilla extract and beat until combined. Fold in the flour alternatively with reserved pineapple juice.
5) Spoon the mixture evenly over the pineapple rings. Smooth surface. Bake for 35-40 minutes, or until a toothpick inserted in the middle comes out clean. Let sit for 10 minutes. Invert the cake on a wire rack to cool.

Next week: Blueberry bread and Pete's Dragon

Macaroon Cake and Pirates of the Caribbean

I love witnessing the changing of the seasons in all their glorious, small details: the first crocus popping up under the crusty snow, a chilly late-August morning where you can practically smell autumn in the misty air, the wild geese honking away across a cloudy, early winter sky. There is something thrilling about sensing the wheel of time in motion. However, the signs of summer truly fill me with a unique sense of joy and anticipation. I love the hum of a fan on the first hot day of the year, the sound of my Old Navy flip-flops slapping against the pavement, and filling up on dessert recipes overflowing with tropical ingredients like coconut and pineapple.

That's why I chose to make a Macaroon Cake, with its subtle coconut and almond flavors, for my recipe this week. Here in Boston, it's been raining for the past two days, after we had a week of wonderful summer weather, so the tropicality of this treat was much appreciated! And what better movie to pair a coconut concoction with than the first Pirates of the Caribbean? I remember seeing that movie in the theater way back in 2003, and thinking that it felt like the personification of summer: exotic, fantastical, funny, and spontaneous. While I have not enjoyed the sequels of Curse of the Black Pearl that much (I thought that there were too many characters who faded into the background, the plots were convoluted, and their overdependence on Jack Sparrow diminshed the traits that made him so charming and original in the first film), the original stands in my mind as the quintessential summer film. So here are Dan's pirate-dialect-heavy musings on the film:

Pirates of the Caribbean:

Who would have thought that one of the most successful franchises at the movies could be spun from one of Disneyland's most iconic rides? Despite its seemingly limited source of inspiration, Pirates of the Caribbean: Curse of the Black Pearl  is a jolly yo-ho-ho rollicking good time, mateys, based on the beloved tropes of classic pirate lore. Maybe the secret is Johnny Depp, who gave life to renegade sea dog Jack Sparrow with a bit of Douglas Fairbanks and quite a bit of Keith Richards in the spirit.

Jack Sparrow himself has become a movie icon with his drunken swagger, freedom from authority, and nonetheless charming ways. Could we describe a Depp incarnation any other way? Nary a chance, me lads. But the fun doesn't stop there. The Pirates movies are filled to the brim with a wide arrangement of colorful scoundrels, aquatic hobgoblins, and mere humans. Throw in Geoffrey Rush as the nasty Captain Barbosa, Naomi Harris as a size-changing sea witch, and Pirates of the Caribbean becomes one voyage you will never forget. Ahoy and welcome aboard!

Ahoy back at you, Dan. Now for the recipe.

So this recipe for Macaroon Cake was adapted from one of my favorite cooking magazines of all time, Taste of Home: Healthy Cooking. This originally was a recipe sent in by a reader to be made healthier by the magazine's awesome Makeover staff. And they did an excellent job! The coconut flakes are integrated into the batter, lending it a sublime tropical flavor that seeps into your taste buds rather than overwhelms them. I love how surprisingly fluffy the cake is, making it lighter than a Port Royal sky. My whole family enjoyed this cake, and we agreed that it tasted even better the next day, when it acquired more flavor, especially from the almond extract. The word "macaroon" has always reminded me of pirates, probably because it sounds like "doubloon," so this is the perfect treat to munch while revisiting Curse of the Black Pearl.

Macaroon Cake
Adapted from Taste of Home: Healthy Cooking 
Ingredients:

• 6 egg whites
• 4 egg yolks
• 2 1/4 cups sugar
• 1/2 cup unsweetened applesauce
• 1/4 cup canola oil
• 3/4 cup fat-free milk
• 1/2 tsp almond extract
• 1 1/2 cups cake flour
• 1 1/2 cups all-purpose flour
• 1 cup flaked coconut
• 3 tsps baking powder
• 1/4 tsp salt
• 1/2 tsp cream of tartar
• 1 tsp confectioners' sugar

1) Let egg whites stand at room temperature for 30 minutes. After the time has passed, beat egg whites and cream of tartar until stiff peaks form. Place aside.
2) In a small bowl, combine the flours, coconut, baking powder, and salt. 
3) In a larger bowl, beat the egg yolks, sugar, applesauce, and oil until well blended; beat in the milk and the extract. Gradually beat the flour mixture into the egg yolk mixture until well blended.
4) Fold the egg white mixture into the batter until the color is uniform.
5) Spoon batter into an ungreased 10-in tube pan (*if your oven has the tendency to burn cakes easily, like mine does, you may want to grease the pan a little*). Cut through batter with a knife to remove air pockets. Bake on the lowest oven rack at 325 degrees for 65-75 minutes or until the cake springs back when lightly touched.
6) Invert the pan immediately upon taking it out of the oven and let the cake cool about 1 hour before serving.
7) Remove the cake from the pan by running a knife around the sides and center of the tube. Sprinkle cake with confectioners' suger before serving.

Next Week: Sour Cherry Muffins and Fight Club