I used to dislike lemon desserts; they just seemed like a giant waste of time. If I wanted something sweet, I would go for chocolate, smooth and creamy, every time. But as I got older, my palate as well as my appetite grew. I learned to appreciate the delicacy, the brightness, that puckery twang of a good lemon dessert. And now, many years later, I even crave a little bit of lemon zest in my sweets. Chocolate may be tried and true, but lemon is clean and lustrous.
When glancing at a recipe, there are some that read only like a list of ingredients. Nothing about it calls out to you, beckoning from the stove. Then there are the recipes that are utterly enticing. You make your ways through the basics: a bit of sugar (got it), some flour (yes?), buttermilk (mmm), lots [...]

I have been on a mission. It is one that has taken me as far as the depths of my kitchen and the to the wiles of the public library. Yes, I have searched long and hard, and waged many a calorie-ridden day happily in hungrily in pursuit of the perfect cake recipe. And by perfect cake I mean this: it has to be versatile, it must be trustworthy, and it has to be simple. Those are the hallmarks of a good recipe if you ask me. And I just may have found the cake of my dreams.
Simplicity, meet coconut cake. Coconut cake, meet simplicity. This cake is really only called a coconut cake because of the thin shavings of golden, toasty brown coconut sprinkled gingerly on top. The cake is truly called Brown Sugar Lightning Cake from Sally Schneider’s tome, The [...]

Simple can mean many things: stripped down, easy, commonplace, or everyday. Today it has become a bit of a catch phrase when referring to those typical 30-minute meal options. But simple can also mean pure, unadulterated…delicious. This is the type of simple I mean when talking about Vanilla Bean Cream Cake.
Pure unadulterated vanilla, a tender, pound cake-like crumb, perfect for dessert, or even with a cup of coffee for breakfast (cake being the breakfast of champions, of course), the cake was simple, but it was also complex. This cake is definitely ingredient-heavy. With 5 eggs, butter counted not by sticks but pound measurements, and flecked with real vanilla bean seeds, this cake was not necessarily simple in its composition, but rather simple in its taste.
So I went to the library again, this time to scour the shelves for a good baking book. And I found one; Lisa Yockelson’s book Baking [...]