Restless (Or, A Year In Pictures)

3 more days til the year is over.
i was BORN ready for the year to be over. This year i have moved 4 times, had 7 different jobs (i was a tempt, what can i say?)have been accepted to culinary school (who knew?) and have found my sea legs to survive in this mad mad mad mad mad world. One is asked to find a silver lining in every less than desirable situation, and I supose if i dig deep enough and scour the gray and looming cloud that was this year i can see one. sometimes i have to squint to see this lining, and sometimrs it is even brighter than the cloud itself. Right now i am squinting, but it is this:
I have found a direction I want to take my life in and I know that i can do it. I want to travel and I want to be the best pastry chef this mad mad mad mad mad world has ever seen. and, well, if i can't achieve that, knowing i have tried my best and have stopped at nothing will suffice.
I am a more independent version of my former self and this is both scary and refreshing. like diving into a pool of water off of a cliff. something i have never done (HA!) but i think you can all grasp the analogy.
and now, i present to you, The Sunny Robot, a year in pictures:
January-March

Taken in January, Lindenhurst NY. Listening to : Joy Division and Bob Dylan.

working at Intralogic Solutions, spending days in the basement, and evenings on this couch, doing this.

March-May

Taken in March. Living in Astoria with Brother bear and Missy. Being a temp, feeling like this:

Listening to :Bright Eyes and Belle and Sebastian
Discovering my love for something sweeter....



May-November
I moved again! a few blocks away from Jeremy and Missy's.

I begin to understand the challenge of baking in "kitchens" in New York apartments.
Kristen and I end up here, and many other adventures ensue.

and i baked and baked and baked.....
Listening to : Islands, Ashlee Simpson, and still Bright Eyes.....

November - Present:

I got into Culinary School!!

a brief stint in Brooklyn....Listening to Iggy Pop, David Bowie and New Order.

And many many others...but this trip down Nostalgia blvd. must come to an end, because A) i have too many damn pictures and B) i must cleanse my palate for the upcoming year and the adventures it no doubt holds.

Snowflake Cake

A few weeks back my two favorite sous chefs, a friend near and dear to me, my brother and his beautiful wife, shmoops, Molly and the rest of the gang all came together to celebrate the holidays and winter, and of course, food. Trying to do the exact of opposite of what we did for the end of the summer party, the execs (me and shmoops) tried to keep it simple. and for the most part, we succeeded beautifully. The main course was a tuscan white bean soup, and florentine rolls which rocked all the socks at the party off. The dessert menu was decided by yours truly, and what better way to celebrate winter and the grisly weather it brings than with a Snowflake Cake!

A white layer cake with sugar sugary white frosting sprinkled with delicate white chocolate snowflakes.

this part was so cool! ok. Go grab a bowl of hot (not boiling) water. got it? cool. put white chocolate in a ziploc baggie. set baggie in hot water, and wait about....6 minutes. (in this time you can: feed your dog 2 hot dogs, go to the bathroom and wash your hands for 15 seconds and maybe straighten your hair right quick, or sit on the couch, take a few sip of your Miller Lite and be socialble, but only for about 6 minutes, because then you better get your ass back in the kitchen!!) so.

once the white chocolate has melted, snip a tiny hole in the corner of the baggie and sqeeze out the snowflakes on a baking sheet covereed with aluminium foil. then politely ask your sous chef to put sprinkles on the points of each snowflake. then pour her a drink and thank her profusely because that part is a pain in the ass.

Place the baking sheets of snowflakes in the freezer until the absolute last minute you need them because they melt maaad fast.
So, once the cake has baked, you have mixed the 2 pounds of sugar together to make the frosting, and frosted the two layers together and then covered the 2 cakes to make one, i call in my second sous chef to do the tricky task of pulling the frozen white chocolate snoflakes off the baking sheet and giving them to me to place in the cake.
(did i mention they melt maaad fast? it was worth mentioning again)

isn't she lovely!!
(oh what am i going to do in pastry school when i don't have kristen and micaela around and I am the one who has to do all this silly work?)

finished product. kiss kiss.

My little cousin claimed the cake was "too good". which goes to show you, you can't please them all.

Holiday Baking

Christmas time *was* here!! snow fell, presents were bought and wrapped, and i ate and ate and ate.....
I went home last week to be with my family and my creatures, all were well. Christmas eve is a favorite day in my household, with the anticipation of the morning often taking precedence over the actual morning. the house is warm no matter the weather outside, christmas movies play on the telly all day (this year it was Die Hard!)and wrapping paper covers the living room floor. Shmoops invited the family over for dinner before heading off to church. I made a boxing day specialty; Sweet Onion and Apple Tart, found in a new cookbook : Holiday Baking.
the recipe called for a half cup of bleu cheese, and that took over the entire dish. i used a different crust than it called for it, and it stuck to the pie dish so badly that i served it with a ladel. but! enough of the trash talking.
the sunny robot cooks! the bottom of the tart crust is layered with sauteed Granny Smith apples. that's two type of cheese you see before you! 1 cup and 2 tablespoons of cheddar, 1/2 cup of bleu.
sauteeing red onions, and sobbing over the oven.
fin.

So, in conclusion, I wish the apples had come out a bit more, and that the crust had been, well, edible.
can't win 'em all!
Merry (belated) Christmas and a fantastic New Year.

xo

the day i barely got any work done

nahh, i kid. i'll get plenty done, but we all need a break from spreadsheets and phone calls and coffee runs. So, please turn your attention....the issue of New York that came out the day before I was born!! Completely self indulgent, yes. Utter procrastination, absolutely.

The streets were mean in 1985, but the day before yours truly was born, New York was sick and tired and taking the great city back!
and! the ads were funnier and the ladies looked like guys. and you could take a helictoper to the hamptons! (i'm sure you can now, but....it's cute.)
anyway, enjoy! and look up the day you were born and tell me your headlines!! Google Book Search now has all the issues available to view, so....goodluck getting anything done.
;)

the day my world fell apart

Yesterday I spent the chilly December day in the West Village. keeping my eyes peeled for an Olsen twin, i atempted to christmas shop. walking past mexican restaurants, Mediterranean specialty shops, cheesemongers and beautifully presented bakeries. One in particular caught my eye, Rocco's Pastry Shop. the shop was narrow, with tables along one side and an endless display case on the other. the atmosphere was manic, but i was in no hurry as i browsed over the rows and rows of pastries, drooling just a bit....I picked up a Lobster tail, Jamie got the ever classic eclair, and i decided to try something i had never had. i didn't know what was in it, but it looked like a high end Dunkin Donut Munchkin, with a cream in the middle and red dot (?) topping it off. i asked what it was and she said it was a rum ball, filled with cream. how could you go wrong?? watch the disintegration of my dreams:
Hopeful!
"too much rum! too much rum!""can't.even.deal."
"my whole world just fell apart."

So. head off to Rocco's Pasty & Espresso Cafe', and stick to what you know.

xo

December's frenzy

Good morning, I have filled the apartment with the aroma of Chocolate Caramel Ghiadelli Coffee, and i think everyone thanks me for it. You're welcome!
last night was the Edgewood Management holiday party, and it was pretty damn snazzy. It was held at Terrace Club, on a (you guessed it) terrace that was enclosed and warmed by giant heat lamps. think for huge lizards. we had a view of the Rockefeller Center tree and St. Patrick's loomed close by.The food was fair, the bar was open and the audience was floored when the newbies performed a skit that consisted of talking shit about everyone at the company. Now we are "in". It's good to be in.
so by 8, people were in pretty deep, talking family, talking shop, talking politics. My heart wasn't in it. What was my heart in? Bowie, David Bowie. Up to the DJ i shimmied, in an itty bitty black dress, and requested "Let's Dance". Everyone took the song literally, and I can say i single handedly got that party rocking. (Pats back). We danced, I think I learned the mambo, and then I went to meet my friends at my personal favorite bar, Company. It was packed, I switched to PBR, and requested "Let's Dance". had a nice long cab ride home, stopped at Popeye's for some chicken and potatoes, and fell asleep to the telly.
But no time to nurse this hangover(see below)

I'm off Christmas shopping!