Dear Readers,
"There are good days, and there are bad days." That's my husband's reply when asked how I'm doing
recovering from hip surgery. Today is a bad day, and in an attempt to nudge myself out of my blue mood, I decided to bake myself a honey cake.
First of all, on the Jewish calendar, this is the season of honey cake, beginning with Rosh Hashana, when it's traditionally eaten to symbolize our hopes for a sweet New Year. Secondly, I
simply love honey cake - it's such a divine treat with butter spread on it and a cup of coffee to go along. Alas, my daughter is at college, so I couldn't task her with baking it for me, and honey cake isn't something the local supermarket would carry (plus not all bought cakes are good). Thankfully, I am well enough to stand in the kitchen for the time it takes to bake this cake, and so I did. And because of my otherwise foul mood, I decided I don't have much else to say in this newsletter, so
I'll share the recipe with you. Maybe you could use a treat, too... This is my tried-and-true recipe, slightly adapted from Jewish Regional Cooking, the
cookbook my husband and I bought on our very first trip to Israel in 1986. Ominous, isn't it, that we should have bought such a cookbook, back when we were "just dating," and I was nowhere near converting?
Honey Cake
250 g (1 1/2 cups) flour 1 tsp baking powder 1/4 tsp baking soda 1/4 tsp
cinnamon 1/4 tsp allspice 1/4 tsp salt 3 eggs, separated 4 tbsp (1/4 cup) vegetable oil 225 ml (1 cup) honey 1/4 tsp vanilla essence 50 g (1/4 cup) sugar finely grated rind of 1/2 lemon 4 tsp instant coffee dissolved in 1 1/2 tbsp boiling water 50 g (1/4 cup) sliced or chopped almonds oil and flour (or matzo meal) to coat loaf pan
Preheat oven to 325F/170C. Coat a loaf pan (9x5x3") with oil, dust with flour (I always use matzo meal). In a small bowl, combine flour, baking powder, baking soda, spices and salt. In another bowl, beat the egg whites until they form stiff peaks, set aside. In a big bowl, beat egg yolks
until they froth, then slowly add in oil, honey, vanilla, sugar, lemon rind and coffee mixture. Beat in flour mixture and continue beating until the mixture is smooth. Then carefully fold the egg whites into the batter. Pour the batter into the greased loaf pan and sprinkle it with the almonds.
Bake for 1 hour and 15 minutes. Let cool in pan for 10 minutes, then pop the cake out of pan and let it cool on a wire rack.
Keeps well in the fridge and can also be frozen. You can easily double
the recipe to make two cakes! The beautifully shabby interior of the Vilna Shul in Boston
Thankfully, I've managed to keep up my blogging; in fact, it's the only writing I've done consistently this summer (Hmm, that might make a good essay topic):
As I slowly pick up my old, pre-surgery life (baking a cake was definitely a sign I'm improving!), I was happy to get into the teaching routine again this past
week as my regular memoir workshop at StoryStudio began its fall round.
And I'm happy to share that this fall I will be offering two sessions of my workshop
Shaping Family History into Compelling
Stories:
Fun that they're both on the 26th, eh? I
didn't notice that until now...
If, like me, you celebrate the Jewish holidays, I wish you Shana Tova and Chag Sameach as we embark on Sukkot tonight. And to all of you, with my favorite season upon us, I say:
Happy Fall!
Greetings, |
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