Seeds and Feeds of Love

I show love with food. I show thanks with food. I show I care with food. I don't know how else to do it. I'm not big on saying how I feel unless it's on paper or cyberspace. I can't do it face to face due to my high emotional eruption point - I start crying around the "I" of "I love you".

My parents and I have found a casual version of love confirmation for when we part, almost like a little verbal wave. "Luvya." This is frequently tossed over the shoulder like an afterthought. It sounds no more important than "later dude". But we know it means we love each other. We just wouldn't dream of actually saying it.

But for my brother and I even saying "Luvya" is going too far. Can you imagine?! We'd lose face completely. He'd have to hit me to restore the balance. So how I show it is by making him food every opportunity I get and how he shows it is by taking charge of things in my life that I'm incapable, unwilling or disinterested in bothering with. Like my balder-than-Kojak tyres. Or, currently, my garden. I don't have a green bone in my body. I have trees and viney things in my back garden and a lemon tree in the front. I don't hate botanical objects and bear them no grudges. But if they grow on my premises they're on their own. If they live they live. And if they die they die. I don't pluck I don't prune and the only way you're getting water at my house is if you ask for it or bark for it.

However, in his roundabout loving way my boet has now brought various flower infested greenery and planted them in pots all around my house and on the bamboo trellis he made for me. He's also replacing my front lawn with stones. There are even bulby things in the front and, God help me, a cutesy picket fence.

Am I ungrateful? NO. I love my brother (he doesn't read my blog so it's safe to say so). In fact, I idolise and adore him. And there's the rub. Because not only do I fear that I will kill everything he planted, but there simply isn't enough food in the world that I can make to show him how much it means to me that he wants to give me something pretty.

xx

J

CHOCOLATE CAKE AND CUPCAKES
 

 

This recipe is ridiculously good. It makes one big cake in 2 x 23cm cake tins. But I found these dead cool 18cm cake tins. So I used half the recipe to make a gorgeous 18cm cake and the other half to make 18 cupcakes. Double score! 

2c Flour

2c Sugar

3/4c Cocoa

2t Baking soda

1t Baking powder

2 Eggs

1t Salt

1c Buttermilk

1c Oil

1.5t Vanilla essence

1c Boiling Water

Mix together everything but the boiling water for about a minute. Add the boiling water. Butter two cake tins and split the mix between the two tins. Bake at 300F for 50 minutes - 1 hour.

I like to fill the middle with Nestle Caramel and the top with Coffee or Vanilla Icing. And if I'm feeling really kitchy (which I often do), I decorate with Astros or M&M's.

Vanilla/Coffee Icing

1/3c Butter

2&2/3c Icing sugar

2.5T Milk

1t Vanilla extract

1t Instant coffee powder (if making coffee icing)

Put everything in a mixer and mix on medium high for about 5 minutes. If making coffee icing heat the milk and stir in the coffee to dissolve. Allow to cool completely before adding to the other ingredients.

IRISH CREAM LIQUEUR

1c Cream

1 Tin condensed milk

1c Whiskey

1t Instant coffee powder (dissolved in 1t boiling water)

2T Chocolate syrup

1t Vanilla extract

1/2t Almond extract

Mix everything together. Serve on crushed ice or hell, just down it.