Peanut Butter Chocolate Frosted Cake

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Peanut Butter Chocolate Frosted Cake

Peanut Butter Chocolate Frosted Cake

Dear Friend,

It's been awhile since we've last spoken. Months, years—I've lost count. We used to be close, you and I, talking and laughing over ordinary events and everyday life. We discussed the simple things, such as what we were making for dinner, as often as the big events, the events that would eventually lead our lives away from each other and down different paths.

We no longer live in the same place together, now separated by time zones and countless miles. Our friendship held in the beginning. Though we never talked as often as we wished, we made time now and then to sit in front of a computer and catch up, stealing glimpses of each other's new lives through our living room backdrops. A painting here, a splash of color there; foreign to me, but so familiar to you.

Peanut Butter Chocolate Frosted Cake
Peanut Butter Chocolate Frosted Cake

Then, as time predicted it would, our friendship grew strained. A missed call here, a forgotten reply there, and we began to drift apart. As our new lives took hold, it all but seemed to evaporate together. We didn't talk anymore, but we thought of each other often and then less. I learned about your daily life online, so informal and impersonal, but I would take it over silence.

Time and distance pulled us apart. We had fallen victim to the most common reason of lost friendship. We were not the first, nor will we be the last, but knowing this doesn't make it any easier to stomach. Perhaps it was the right time for our friendship to come to a close. Perhaps we will never know.

Peanut Butter Chocolate Frosted Cake

I feel as if too much time has passed to reach out to you and pretend as if we still are the friends that we were so long ago. I'm torn between writing you to say hello and never writing words to page in the first place. I think of you every now and again, wondering what your daily life is like, hoping that you are happy. I do wish the dearest of happiness to you.

If we do find each other again, I'd love to invite you over for an afternoon, where we could drink coffee and eat cake and talk about simple things and big events. I'd make you this cake, a combination of flavors that you loved more than I ever did. I'd love to hear how you are doing. I've missed you.

As always,
Me

Peanut Butter Chocolate Frosted Cake

Peanut Butter Chocolate Frosted Cake is a classic cake with a familiar flavor combination. The cake is mixed with peanut butter, which permeates the cake through and through. The final cake is dense, but moist. Spread with a thick chocolate buttercream, it begins to taste dreamy. This is the type of everyday cake that should be enjoyed with friends and loved ones, on sunny afternoons with a side of conversation.

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Almond Cake

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Almond Cake

Almond Cake Almond Cake Almond Cake

This year I have been about simple food—simple muffins, classic desserts, and hearty loaves of bread. Truthfully, I haven't had the energy for layer cakes or multi-step desserts as of late. The endless winter has taken what little I have left to give. There is no fuss, no frosting, no flair in my cooking. The focus has been solely on flavor and all the many straightforward forms it may come in. A simple goal, perhaps, but one I believe worth pursuing.

This Almond Cake falls squarely under simple food, but nothing about the flavor is plain. The sweetness rings true, a pure blend of almond and vanilla bean that is wholly dreamy in theory and in reality.

Almond CakeAlmond Cake

I made this cake twice over the last two weeks (and would make it again in a heartbeat should the ingredients find their way into my cupboard). The first occasion was on a Monday evening after a long day's work. When it cooled, I wrapped it up tight so I could photograph it the next afternoon, much to my boyfriend's dismay. Once the scent of almond had settled into the apartment, it was hard to ignore the cake on the counter. The next afternoon, once the photographs were finally taken, we split the cake in two, each eating half and calling it dinner. We had no regrets.

The second time I made it and brought it to a family gathering, leaving it unadorned with a jar of raspberry jam to complement it. It disappeared quickly once again, as little slivers were stolen for breakfast, lunch, and dinner. It is a classic cake which can be dolled up for a fancy dinner or left simple for an afternoon treat, but never will it disappoint.

Almond Cake

This Almond Cake is a simple one, the ingredients common and the flavors pure, but it is somehow utterly unforgettable. A jar of almond paste and the seeds from a vanilla bean provide the flavor to the cake's tender crumb. Though the cake in the photographs is slightly overbaked, it still turned out well, the oven providing a toasted almond flavor to the outer edge. The glaze is optional; the cake is lovely enough left bare. However, I do recommend cutting a slice and spreading your favorite jam across the side. It will be memorable.

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Cranberry Upside Down Cake

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Cranberry Upside Down Cake

Cranberry Upside Down Cake

Each year, just before the turn of the new year, marks the anniversary of the day I quit graduate school in physics. Though it has only been three years, it feels like a lifetime ago. I feel so much older than that bright eyed girl with high hopes and soaring dreams. The hopes are no less great, but a touch of experience has tethered me a little closer to earth. I feel as if it is difficult to keep track of all the changes since then, all the emotions—positive and negative, exciting and disappointing—that I have passed through. I’m older. Not just three years, but what feels like a decade in life and stress and growing.

I’m not the same person I was then, but I wouldn’t want to change the person I’ve become.

Cranberry Upside Down Cake Cranberry Upside Down Cake

The past year has been exhausting. I feel as if I have been running forward, so eager to get on my path, to find where I am supposed to be, that I’ve forgotten to stop and just breathe. I have been trying to do too much, a phrase which has become my unwanted motto for many, many months. Some lessons take longer to learn than others. Since I stopped baking professionally over a year ago, I went back to grad school for a masters in education, with the goal of becoming a high school physics teacher.

When I stopped pursuing physics, I swore up and down (and left and right) that I would never stray towards science again. I had convinced myself so thoroughly of this that I threw away every physics notebook I had kept all the way back to high school in a ceremonial sweep (a sin that I have since regretted).

Cranberry Upside Down Cake Cranberry Upside Down Cake

In August, I took on my first teaching job—you can call me Ms. Rosenau now. Teaching for the first time is a whirlwind. I feel as if I should have been a little more forewarned of the adventure ahead. Teaching is more overwhelming and challenging than I could have imagined, consuming all of my time and energy to create entire curriculums from scratch. Teaching is also extraordinarily rewarding. There truly is never a dull moment when surrounded by 80 sixteen and seventeen year olds both eager to learn and hungry to distract.

If you had told me three years ago that this is where I would have ended up, I may have very well laughed in your face. Life, I found, keeps me on my toes. Once I am certain I have everything figured out, it throws another curve in my path and sends me in a new direction. Even so, right now this is where I feel like I am meant to be. I just hope that life waits a few more years before sending me around the next bend.

Cranberry Upside Down Cake Cranberry Upside Down Cake

Cranberry Upside Down Cake is tart, textured, and colorful enough to impress your holiday guests. The cranberries are cooked on the stove until they "pop" and release their juices. Mixed with raspberries and a bit of orange zest, it forms the bottom (or "top") of the cake. A quick cake batter is mixed up, which is made with brown sugar and sliced almonds for a bit of texture and greater depth of flavor. The cake itself is on the tarter side, but will not make you wish for more sugar. Share with family and friends to bring out the holiday spirit.

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