Ode to Dust (dedicated to all bunnies out there)

Previously published on theSmartlychicago.com
(Mom, please, DO NOT read this. I know you won’t but don’t try to find a translator who would tell you all about my take on dust. It would give you the chills and deprive you of sleep for many weeks.)

Dust…for the first 18 or so years of my life, you were like a myth to me. I mean, I knew of you, read your name printed in books and magazines, heard about you on TV and the radio but rarely – if ever – saw you. Never got the chance. You were The Enemy in a house kept spotless thanks to a housewife solely dedicated to immaculate cleanliness. I mean –  a cleaning freak. Like, nuts. For real. Daily vacuuming, cleaning of the stove and the kitchen and, worse yet, scrubbing the bathtub after every single shower. Not a single drop of water allowed in the bathroom please.  That would be so out of place.

She was a (more than) willing slave, and we were dragged in with her.

Talk about hell (without brimstone powder or ashes, of course)

But after – Gosh! – 16 years out of the nest I know all about you, my friend. Mi casa è su casa. I am not exactly welcoming you with open arms but the result is quite the same: you are everywhere. What the hell was I thinking while buying dark furniture? That I would be rug in hand every five minutes? Ha! And, sneaky you, you love company and usually don’t come alone to the party: dirt, crumbs, hair, the occasional flowers petals, bits of cake and other scrubs….yeah….I know all of you guys.

But I am not ashamed.

I decided long ago that I lived in a house, not a museum. You and your friends are LIFE. Well, part of it.  Not the most glamorous one, for sure but still evidence that I open my windows, go outside, bake, eat, pet my cats and dog (and yes!! horror - they do lose their hair everywhere), breathe and enjoy. I don’t live in a dump though, and I will always frantically go in “Mom Freak Mode” during the few hours before my guests are supposed to arrive because I want the best for them (and also maybe for them to say that I am quite the house-keeper…um, um…) But I refuse to spend my nights and weekends mopping, sweeping, wiping up, down, across and in-between. Yes, it can be messy. Dirty even sometimes. But guess what? I deal with it. And I haven’t died of septicemia yet. I am a firm believer in germ exposure anyway. The cleaner, the weaker.

Right?

One thing for sure: as soon as I get a steady job, a grown-up one where I earn money every month, I will give some work to someone who needs it, and hire a cleaning lady. And worship her. In the meantime I give myself a break, and so should you. 

So I baked a (surprise) cake...

What do you do when an important birthday is coming up, and you are completely, totally, utterly broke?
You cry your heart out, try to make a decision between panhandling in Wicker Park and asking your husband to rob the bank he's working at but finally come back to your senses to put your best "Pause Gourmande" move forward and offer to bring dessert to the party bien sûr!


Except it was not really a party, because it was not really a birthday celebration.

But that's just semantics.  It doesn't change much to the elaboration process; I just had to drop the candles at the end; fine by me. I am not good at blowing:

I know my girl. She likes good things, fine wines (hello sweet bottles of Pommerol!! I loved you all dearly), boudin (blood sausage), quenelles, raspberries (already covered by dessert #1), chocolate (but not with raspberries) and pistachios. Hates blue cheese and not a fan of liver.
No headaches. They are not great in desserts anyway.


Plan of action: find a chocolate-pistachio cake-ish recipe.
Means: surf the Internet.
Time-line: a week.


I quickly found the winner, on my beloved Chocolate and Zucchini. Really darlings, if you don't know the lovely Clotilde Dusoulier you should. Not that she desperately needs your patronage, her blog is well and running but still...she is quite the reference. And her Gâteau surprise chocolat-pistache was the obvious choice.
Phewwww!!
The hardest part was already behind me.


Or was it?


First obstacle: find pistachio paste
One of the problems with using a French recipe is:
- you have to convert the measurements; I am not good at math. In fact I also hate with a fierce passion the American system which belongs to the 16th century. Found on my butter wrapper: 1 lb = 2 cups ; 1 stick = 1/2 cup = 8 tablespoons; 1 tablespoon=1/2 ounce.
My hair hurts just reading this line. Metric is the only way to go; it's also the work of a collective genius. Just sayin'.

- you are supposed to use ingredients that are impossible to find in the US. Yup, pistachio paste is exactly what I have in mind. I mean, what the hell?!?!? Never even heard of it. To C&Z defense I didn't search the whole city of Chicago to find it. Mea culpa. I should have. Maybe. But I did find a solution.
Saving grace?!?

Accidental Hedonist, after deciding that Fxcuisine was too elaborate for me. I love you Pierre Hermé but damn....you don't make it easy on us, simple mortals. You are just too good to be true.


(side note: if you are planning on making the said 'pistachio paste', A. H. instructions are slightly off....too much water. You don't want a pistachio syrup.)

Second obstacle: find unsalted pistachios

Easily solved: just don't go to the supermarket next door and head on a busy Saturday morning to one of the most crowded parts of town to the Mecca of complete, full, integral and undivided Food (no free advertisement for corporate America on Pause Gourmande, if you'll excuse me).


Third obstacle: stay awake
No comment...


Fourth obstacle: read the recipe PROPERLY
And that was definitely the biggest challenge of them all.
Which is scary, a bit embarrassing and worrying for my culinary future. Or not. It might just mean that I am too cool for school AND recipes. In truth it just means that I am a creative wizard and don't need anyone to tell me what to do and how to do it.
Yeah....
I wish.


My main problem was the word HALF. See there are basically two batters in this cake: the chocolate one, and the pistachio one. Easy enough to follow, right? Well....obviously not.
I kept walking between the kitchen counter and the computer to make sure everything was done according to instructions. That's really the sad part. Because I tried. Hard.
Here is how the recipe goes:
"In a food processor, mix together half of the sugar and half of the butter until fluffy. Add in two of the eggs, one at a time, mixing between each. Add in half of the yogurts and all the vanilla extract, mix again. In a medium bowl, combine half of the flour with half of the baking powder, half of the baking soda and all of the cocoa mixture. Add the flour mixture into the food processor and mix again until just combined. Pour the batter into the cake pan, and reserve in the refrigerator".


I mixed half of the sugar with all of the butter, added all the yogurt, combined half of the flower with all of the baking soda, forgetting the baking powder but adding it in extremis to the mix in the pan freshly removed from the fridge.
FML.


Since my pan was way too small I had to make do with a bastardized version of the pistachio component of the dish, already bastardized a first time by my poor home-made rendition of the PP (stands for pistachio paste if you followed anything at all in this post).
That was a pitiful day for your trusted Amélie. I already know I sucked at math but still....I thought my limited abilities were enough to carry me without trouble in the kitchen world....
Not so, my friends.
I will never be a baker extraordinaire.....
I only hope I won't mess up fairy tales when I read them to my kids and talk about The Six Little Pigs, Snow White and the Three and a Half Dwarfs or say that a mermaid is just a big-ass fish....


I let my cake cool down, made a chocolate ganache, iced the cake and even drew a big M - just to make sure that I still had some basic skills (math: F, reading: F, writing: A-)
And you know what? In the end, all was well.

Just like in Fairyland.

The end.