Baking and Grilling

It's a beautiful day today.  Windows open to let the mild breeze freshen the closed up house.  This past week we replaced a bi-fold door in our kitchen.  It was a door we rarely closed because on the other side is the air intake for the heating/cooling system.  The bi-fold that was there was solid and we determined that a louvered door would allow us to close the door now and then and not worry that the fan might come on and create a vacuum in the laundry room.  Anyhow, we had the old, solid bi-fold with no place to put it, and there really was nothing wrong with it.  Lightbulb moment... we have a really great grill on our deck.  More often than not there is a wind tunnel between the house and garage, where the grill sits.  I have asked Ron if he could think of a way to create a wind block for the grill.  It took some doing, but we now have a bi-fold door attached to the garage and it folds back in place against the garage when we aren't using the grill.  It's white and blends in pretty well.  Now I'm anxious to grill something to see if it will make a difference.

On the cooking front, I tried a new recipe today.  It was for an unusual cake that I found while I was looking to see if there was a recipe feature that should be available somewhere in MasterCook.  I thought maybe one of the recipes that came with MC would show this feature, so I opened one of the MC cookbooks and then I stumbled on this recipe.

            Armenian Nutmeg Cake
  2          cups  firmly packed brown sugar
  2          cups  sifted flour
  2          teaspoons  baking powder
  1          teaspoon  baking soda
  1          teaspoon  salt
  1/2       cup  butter
  1          cup  milk
  1           egg -- beaten
  1           teaspoon  nutmeg
  1/2        cup  chopped walnuts

Combine sugar, sifted flour, baking powder, and salt. Rub in butter until mixture resembles fine breadcrumbs. Press half the mixture into a well-greased 20-cm square pan. Dissolve baking soda in milk; add egg and nutmeg and pour over remaining sugar and flour mixture. Mix well, then spoon into pan on top of pressed in mixture. Sprinkle walnuts over. Bake in preheated oven at 350F for 1 hour. Allow to stand 15 minutes before turning out onto a wire rack to cool.

A couple notes here... first 20 cm square is a 9" square pan - actually it is an 8", but I used a 9" pan.  Next when I made mine, I used soymilk, and I used pecans.  This cake turned out great.  It even got approval from my husband, which is always a good thing.  It is really great to stumble on a really good recipe now and then.  Hope you try it, and if you do, let me know whether you agree with my assessment.