Birthday Cake and Seafoods

Janet asked me to make her a strawberry cake for her birthday, so yesterday I went to the Downtown Farm Market (I like to call it the 505 Market) for some fresh strawberries. Cake was good, though a bit dense from the mashed strawberries I incorporated into the batter. This is what fruit in the cake does. Perhaps I could have cooked the cake longer, but then it would have been dry, so I am fine with the density of this cake. Flour, sugar, many egg whites, a lot of butter, milk--I think that's it. But the frosting or icing or whatever you prefer to call it took the cake.

More butter, confectioners' sugar, and more mashed strawberries. I mixed these items and they tasted good, though a bit sweet. Also, I had a problem with the icing separating, which did not look appealing, so I decided to add a mess of whipped cream. Problem solved. A few berries between the layers, and I had butter-cream frosting on a white cake with strawberries, and it was good.

I also made a pot of corn chowder, and it turned out pretty well. First, a mirepoix and garlic sauteed in olive oil. After that softened, I added a bit of bouquet garni and two quarts of vegetable broth. Earlier I had roasted five ears of corn, six potatoes, and two red peppers. I de-cobbed the corn, de-skinned the pepper, quick-diced the taters and added them all to the pot.

By now, it tastes pretty good, but chowder should be thick, I suppose, so I made a blonde roux from one stick of butter and a little flour. I think I used one pound of butter all told cooking today. As if that was not enough richness, I also added a pint of heavy cream and a pound of shrimp. Salt and freshly-cracked Pepper, the slightest amount of dried hot-pepper mix, and that finished the chowda. Ya big chowda head.

Is that it? No, it isn't. Janet went and visited Landon at The Shrimp Connection yesterday where she purchased the aforementioned shrimp as well as lump crab meat and scallops. Some folks call these mollusks scAL-ups, and some folks call them scALL-ups. Doesn't matter, really. Scallops are not my favorite, but some people get fired up about eating them. I think the recipe came from Landon for preparing them. I do not rinse the scallops, but rather leave their own juice for flavor. Simply dredge them in a little flour, Old Bay and Salt. Into a pan of a little olive oil and butter for brownness until they get a little crust and they are done. I will eat one or two, though, as I like their smooth texture.

Now, Janet is usually in charge of making crabcakes, and she does a right fine job of it. All I had to do was cake them and bake them. She made the mix. I made the aioli, which is quite good: Duke's, lemon juice and zest, diced garlic, and a ton of fresh basil. Mix it and serve it with the crabcakes, and it's a winner. That is quite a feast. This morning for breakfast I heated a couple crabcakes and ate them with an over-easy egg and Texas Pete. Very nice to have good-quality leftovers on a Saturday morning.