Tom and I had birthdays in late October that included awesome food at Russell's (the owner being the chef we saw at Airfield Winery this summer). We shopped together for our gifts; Tom getting a Seattle weather worthy jacket he really wanted and me getting some long sought after boots! On Tom's birthday I had the day off, so I decided to make a whole bunch of food to celebrate (and to procrastinate from online modules I was supposed to be doing for my residency). I made a cinnamon roll cake that I found on stumbleupon for breakfast, a delicious chicken with red wine vinegar sauce dish from skinnytaste for lunch (Tom was working 2nd shift so left home at 12:30p), and went all over-the-top housewife on him and made a come-home-from-work-at-11pm snack of pizza bread and cheesecake. The cake, chicken, and cheesecake were good. Pizza bread? Well, the yeast didn't work or something. Let's not talk about that. I could make a dramatic story out of it, but the cinnamon cake is more worthy of that. It deserves its own paragraph (after the food picture break).
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| Carpaccio appetizer from Russell's |
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| My salmon and pan fried gnocchi |
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| Tom's roasted duck and risotto |
This cake I speak of was one of those "really good but please don't make me eat it for a week" type of cakes. I, therefore, decided that the nice single mother with two little kids we live next to would be a great person to pass off some cake. Now, if you can picture it, I started feeling all neighborly and let my imagination flow. I thought in my head about what the cake hand off would be like and it went a little bit like this: I would skip over to her door with a beautifully packaged portion of cake, she opens the door and gushes over the niceness of such a gift. We hug, we smile, she keeps it in mind and gives me some of her great cooking sometime in the future. Cut scene.
Now, I can't tell you it was all her fault that this did not play out so well. I may or may not have had beautiful packaging to beautifully package the cake, and may have slapped a slab of it on a plastic orange plate, put a couple layers of saran wrap over it, and called it good. I DID, however, have a skip in my step as I put a great big smile on my face and knocked on the door to deliver my fare. At first I heard the young kids running around. That made me chuckle a little bit and think "oh what feisty young kids." Yet, the mom did not open the door. I knocked again thinking maybe the mom is in the bathroom? I then heard some muffled yelling, from which I got out "ask who it is." My smile was drooping a bit at this point. -- I should leave. I should just run back to my apartment and pretend it wasn't me. But what about this cake? I don't want it sitting around! -- Then I hear a little kid voice "who is it?" "It's Emily your neighbor", I say with a sweet ring and the big smile from before (because maybe someone is looking through the peep hole?). A minute more of scuffling later (I know, I should have left), the door opens. A scrubby looking guy with crazy hair I've never seen before opens it with no smile and a suspicious look. "UH, HI I'M EMILY I LIVE IN THE APARTMENT NEXT DOOR. I MADE SOME CAKE AND THOUGHT YOU WOULD LIKE SOME. HERE," I say a little louder than necessary with a fake smile and wide eyes. I hand him the plastic plate with the saran wrap halo around it. He looks down, doesn't smile, looks at me like I'm ridiculous (I am), maybe whispers thanks? I'm not exactly sure what he said. I was in the process of melting internally with embarrassment. I didn't even get to say what I was rehearsing, my mothers usual line to explain away something delicious that doesn't look so hot, "it doesn't have to look good to taste good." I spent the next couple weeks ducking into our apartment trying to avoid anyone who came out of that apartment. We did eventually see our neighbor who very nicely complemented the cake and mentioned nothing of my staying way too long in front of her door or of my sadly presented offering. So all is right in the world...but I really don't think that will be repeated.
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| Photo from the Cinnamon Roll Cake recipe...mine kind of looked like that minus the nicely sliced part |
Why, you ask, would I make such a big deal out of Tom's birthday when he actually doesn't care about his birthday at all? Why, to guilt him to make a big deal out of my birthday, of course! And it worked! He made me eggs benedict the morning of my birthday, and he left work to go out to dinner with me that night. Yesssss. We had a little get together the weekend after our birthdays with Jason, Caitlin, Andrew, and Megan that included mulled wine and fun games, and the yearly birthday celebration was done.
Have a hankerin' for my famous cinnamon roll cake and only want to visit so you can get some? WELL YOU AREN'T GOING TO GET IT! My cinnamon roll cake days are over. BUT that doesn't mean your Washington visit needs to be canceled! I'm bound to try some unknown good recipe that I find on the internet, and eventually do something just as awkward as the cake incident for your entertainment. So, go northWEST YOUNG PEOPLE (and young people at heart)!
Birthdays are yummy and cake delivering is awkward washINgton!
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