Raccoon and Lobster

Happy Slapsgiving Thanksgiving!

Did you remember to make your paw turkeys today?

You can see all of the pictures in slideshow form in large size here.

When last we left the story, your intrepid blogger was engaged in a literal race against the sun. For elevating a quest to truly epic, legendary status, there is really nothing like declaring war upon the celestial giant at the very center of the Solar System. Do you read a lot of ancient myths? This kind of thing never ends well. The best I could hope for was that Phaëton would be at the reins for the day and his amateur attempts to steer would buy me the time to reach my destination before he set the Earth ablaze.

Sorry. I was momentarily carried away by the immense grandeur of my rivalry. Besides, everyone knows the sun is rolled across the sky by a giant scarab beetle.

Beetle or chariot, that luminous bastard could really move, and as the sky brightened, the needle on the speedometer climbed to new heights of insanity. Finally, a large lake appeared to my right on the highway, which I believed to be Mono Lake, but my attempts to locate a path to the waterfront were in vain. Minutes later, I saw the road signs for Lee Vining, the town located at the edge of Mono Lake. Fortunately, a population of just under 400 people  did not appear to be sufficient to field a traffic authority to patrol the highway for reckless speeders like myself. A few miles later, I turned onto the road that led me to the completely deserted Mono Lake Visitor’s Center. I grabbed my camera and ran out of the car. It was 6:25. From the parking lot, I could see the tufa towers clustered in the water at a point not too far down the grassy slope. All I had to do was navigate down to the water. A few minutes, no more.

I located the beginning of the trail that was pointed towards the water and began to jog. The path was covered in snow and dotted with animal tracks. A few feet down the hill, I spotted the fluffy white tail of a bunny scamper away underneath some bushes. As I ran, the trail narrowed, and soon I was dodging brambles left and right. Many minutes later, covered in a light layer of sweat despite the below-freezing temperatures, I realized that I was only halfway to the shore. What had appeared from the top of the rise to be just a short jog was now looking more like a mile of uneven snow-covered terrain. My trail had almost disappeared and I was now darting between the clumps of bushes. I took a few quick snapshots and thanked the Fates for the foresight to do the Couch to 5k program. I gripped my camera tightly and began to run, my breath fogging up the air.

Soon, the ground leveled out and the bushes turned to tall grass, and I found a new trail. With the sun still stuck behind the hills I had just descended, I made it to the tufa structures, feeling like a hero.

When the last of the vegetation disappeared and was replaced by mineral deposits, frost, and frozen ground, it truly began to feel like an alien moonscape.

This strange beauty was what I had come for, and as I took my pictures, I gradually moved further and further out onto the frozen banks.

As the sun finally made its way over the rim of the valley, I switched my focus to the scenery nearby.

Oh, how gross! Some of the ground had thawed as the sun came up and and a misstep left me with a hiking boot caked with mud. I resolved to be more careful with my steps.

Occasional inconvenient mud puddle aside, I was surrounded by beauty.

The water was incredibly still, and there was no noise except the wind and the sound of my own breathing.

After an hour of photos, I figured that it was time to head back. After all, it was starting to get warm and more and more patches of ice were beginning to thaw. Staying any longer might be inviting trouble.

Oh. Shit. When I lost my left leg up to the shin, I knew I had overstayed my welcome. My mind was filled with images of me holding my camera desperately above my head as I slowly sank into the mud. The Sun God would get his revenge for my insolence as the thawing mud puddles consumed me and my pesky camera. Part of me was tempted to document the process of extricating myself, but having already won a narrow victory, I was not in the mood to tempt fate. I shoved my camera safely into my bag and tried to plan my escape.

The only way out of the puddle and onto safe ground was two large steps in the direction I was facing. I planted my right leg on the most stable patch of ice I could find and stepped. A moment later, my right leg was buried up to the knee. There is actually a mild relief that happens when you realize things can’t get too much worse. Once you pass a certain threshold of being covered in foul smelling lake mud, a few more inches or feet of coverage are no longer as big of a deal. As long as I could keep my head and my camera bag above the mud, it mattered very little how much dirtier I got. Resigning myself to my fate, I forged through the mud, taking several more steps before I was finally on dry ground and able to take a picture for you to enjoy.

Plodding along with my boots squishy with mud, I made my way back through the grass, and up into the bushes.

The outstretched branches of the bushes managed to clean a large amount of the mud off of my legs, but I still reeked of lake muck.

It was at the start of the trail, near where I saw the cottontail rabbit on my way in, that I spied the tracks. Enormous tracks of a giant beast, much larger than any I had seen so far. Each step was spaced far away from the others and the tracks were nearly of a size to my own. While the other rabbit tracks were about 2 inches in length, these tracks were the size of entire rabbits. What sort of monster lagomorph was this? These tracks could come from no ordinary hare. Surely, I was in the presence of the Omega Rabbit, destroyer of worlds. I peered about cautiously, looking for more signs of him, but he eluded me at every turn. Thoroughly spooked, I hastily made my way to the parking lot, where the open space would allow me to see a man-sized demon bunny approaching.

Safely away from demon rabbit stomping grounds, I ate the most delicious half-frozen apple of my life and savored the joy of a successful morning. Sacrificing a jacket as a makeshift seat cover and floor mat, I carefully moved my mud-covered body into Alan’s (clean! well-cared for! expensive!) car and headed back south on the freeway towards Mammoth Lakes and my mule ride.

A few minutes later, I saw a sign pointing to the South Tufa of Mono Lake. South Tufa was the area that I had been planning to go to, the area with the largest tufa structures, which I thought was near the Mono Lake Visitor’s Center. In my haste to beat the sun, I had misinterpreted the sign and missed the turn off. I took the road and went to see what I had missed. Oh, cruel fate! The path to the shore at South Tufa was wide and covered in wooden planks. The water’s edge was 30 seconds away from the parking lot, and the shore was firm and stable, with not a single mud puddle for someone to fall into. Had I realized my mistake, I could have been at the lakeside minutes earlier, saved myself the long run through the brush, dodged almost drowning in treacherous mud puddles, and avoided incurring the wrath of the Omega Rabbit. Come to think of it, je ne regrette rien!

As I finished up round two of my alien moonscape photos and walked out into the parking lot, I saw a familiar red car pull up, carrying my rock climbing buddies. We greeted each other warmly and I briefly filled them in on my exploits before abandoning them yet again to do my own thing. I had an appointment with a mule, and no fortuitous chance encounter was going to distract me from it.

Unfortunately, Mammoth Lakes is populated by wimpy, frost-averse mules, and it turned out that despite a lack of warnings on the brochure or the website, the pack rides were shut down in their entirety for the winter. Bereft, I decided to see the Devil’s Postpile as a consolation, which mgp had recommended as another local geological oddity. Again, I was foiled by the seasons.

I continued following the only road into town and eventually came across the Mammoth Lakes Visitors Center, where a kindly gentlemen directed me to a highly recommended hike to Crystal Lake. He handed me a map and sent me on my way. The road I was on soon narrowed and began to wind upwards into the mountains, and in short order, I began to cross over small patches of packed snow. Soon, the road was completely snowed over, and while the SUVs and trucks cheerfully forged on, I began to lose my confidence. When the road ended in a parking lot leading to a different trail, I settled for seeing whatever mundane sights it had to offer instead of trying to locate Crystal Lake.

The gentleman at the visitor’s center had said there might be a little snow, but there was more snow here than I had seen in years. It helped remove some of the lingering mud.

And while I did not find Crystal Lake, I guess the tranquil mountain vista that greeted me was not so shabby after all.

Not too shabby at all.

I mean, it would have been better on mule-back, but then, what experiences in life wouldn’t be?

After getting my fill of the crisp, clean mountain air and beautiful scenery, I declared the official end of my photographic adventure and drove down the snowy mountainside and back to Bishop to reconvene with my friends. Alan asked me to drive for part of the way back to Los Angeles as he had broken his glasses while climbing. When we arrived, he commented offhandedly that I had been driving too cautiously, like an old lady. I hid my smirk. Don’t tell him the truth.

And…we’re done. The final bundt was an adaptation of Kiss My Bundt’s Red Velvet Bundt, as published in the LA Times and found via The Food Librarian’s epic Thirty Days of Bundt.

As I am apparently in a storytelling mood, here are a few random factoids before we get to the recipe.

Numero uno: I am, and always will be, against food coloring for the sake of food coloring. So, no dye.

Item II: It used to be the case that Devil’s Food Cake and Red Velvet were the same thing. The names used to reflect the ginger color that resulted from a reaction between (alkalized) cocoa powder and acidic buttermilk. Then at some point they diverged and Devil’s Food Cake meant chocolate cake and Red Velvet was cake with red food coloring and eventually there was not so much chocolate in the Red Velvet cake, and plenty of red dye instead.

C) There is no C.

Four. Funny story about Dutch processed cocoa, aka alkalized cocoa. When I made my first batch of Red-Headed Stepchild Velvet Cupcakes, I used non-alkalized fancy cocoa powder, because The Boyfriend is a chocolate snob. When I offered him a warm cupcake fresh out of the oven, he said “It’s good,  I can still taste the baking powder.” Well, you can clearly see from the recipe that there is no baking powder, so I retorted hotly that in the course of running errands that day, I had run out of time to travel to the nega dimension to buy nega baking powder to counteract the complete absence of baking powder. Later, I realized he was tasting the tang of buttermilk (which, by the way, tastes nothing like baking powder) and I switched to alkalized cocoa. Thus ended his Monday-morning backseat guessing of the cupcakes.

Extra Chocolatey Not-Red Velvet Bundt Cake adapted from Kiss My Bundt recipe

I upped the cocoa powder in this recipe quite a bit and ended up with a rich chocolate cake. You can adjust back down to one tablespoon of cocoa for the original recipe or split the difference and go with two.

1¼ cups vegetable oil
1 cup buttermilk
2 eggs, room temperature
1 teaspoon white vinegar
1 teaspoon vanilla
2½ cups flour (I used 11.5 oz)
1¾ cups sugar
1 teaspoon baking soda
¾ teaspoon fine salt
3 tablespoons high-fat cocoa powder (I used Valrhona)

Preheat oven to 350°F. Grease and set aside 10 cup bundt pan. Combine oil, buttermilk, eggs, vinegar, and vanilla and beat well. In a separate bowl, whisk together remaining ingredients. Gradually add the dry ingredients to the wet mixture, stirring until just combined. Pour into bundt pan and bake until a tester comes out clean, about 45 minutes. Cool in pan for 10 minutes before inverting. Let cool at least one hour before frosting.

Cream Cheese Frosting

8 ounces cream cheese, softened
4 ounces unsalted butter, softened
½ teaspoon vanilla extract
1½ cups powdered sugar, sifted

Beat the cream cheese, butter, and vanilla until well combined. Gradually add the powdered sugar and beat until well combined and frosting is light and fluffy. Apply frosting. Let me know if you figure out how to do this on a bundt shape without looking like a hot mess.

The break in the endless baking of cakes and washing of cake pans and measuring cups and cake stands and bowls and whisks and spatulas has allowed me to finally get back to the write up of my trip last weekend. Fair warning: this sucker is long.

So, anyways, back to the story! Giant rabbits! Mules! Alien moonscapes! Err…actually, let’s backtrack a little bit first.

Exactly one month ago, on October 22, my internet browsing brought to my attention a list, created by WebEcoist.com, of the world’s ten most amazing lakes. When I realized that the most hauntingly beautiful entry on the list, Mono Lake, was right here in California, I realized I had to visit. And soon.

Fortunately for me, right around that time a group of friends were planning a rock climbing trip up to Bishop, CA, conveniently located about an hour away 60 miles away from Mono Lake. It was the perfect opportunity for me to hitch a ride and play photographer for the day. Communication difficulties meant that I shoehorned myself in to the trip at the very last minute and forced the use of two cars and two hotel rooms. Later, I would end up commandeering one of each for my personal use. It turns out that my social graces go right out the window when alien moonscapes are involved.

Time warp to Saturday evening, talking in the hotel after dinner. The itinerary for the next day mostly involved more rock climbing for everyone else, and they wanted to know how I planned on spending my time. When it became clear that I was determined to see Mono Lake before we headed back home, they volunteered to take a detour in the morning for me to take a few snapshots. It was a lovely thing to offer, but I not-so-secretly longed for more time, and specifically, time during twilight, when the alien beauty of the tufa would be at its peak. Asking four tired climbers to get up before sunrise was simply too much to ask, and it was similarly obnoxious to ask everyone to stop climbing early in order to drive me there for sunset and wait around, bored out of their minds, while I took pictures.

In a fit of generosity that I absolutely did not deserve, Alan volunteered his (clean! well-cared for! expensive!) car for me to use. I would make my way to Mono Lake in the morning and follow up the afternoon with a guided trail ride on mule-back to Panorama Dome, which I hoped would offer me even more photographic opportunities. I had found the brochure on a rack at the pizza parlor where we had our dinner and decided that the opportunity to ride a mule was not to be passed up. Horseback rides are everywhere. But a mule! The Boyfriend tried to dissuade me when I told him of my plans, describing riding a mule as sitting on a slow-moving, stubborn, couch. I’m not sure he realized how utterly delightful he was making it all sound. I was now thoroughly convinced. This was going to be awesome. I willed myself asleep at 9:30, eager for the day ahead.

My sleep was plagued with nightmares of oversleeping and missing the sunrise, so it came as no surprise that I woke up at 4:45, a good 45 minutes before my alarm was set to go off. Groggy and cold, I ate my breakfast and dressed for the below-freezing weather outside. After waking up the poor woman who worked the reception desk, I checked out of the hotel and was on the road to Mono Lake by 5:15. Sunrise was at 6:30, and I was 65 miles away.

My delight at being ahead of schedule soon turned to alarm when the sky became to lighten not ten minutes after I was on the road. I realized I had made a grievous error. At night, twilight lasts for about an hour after the sun sets, but in the morning, twilight is not the hour after the sun comes up, but the hour before. I was late. Getting there at 6:30 would mean arriving just in time to see the gorgeous red and orange hues that were appearing in my rear view mirror disappear.

———ALAN, DO NOT READ ANY FURTHER!———

I cursed my stupidity and floored the gas. What else could I do? At this point, so much time and energy had been dedicated to making it to Mono Lake that I was willing to swallow the inevitable speeding ticket just to reach my goal. Seriously Alan, do not read this segment. Please. Stop reading. Thank you. So, on a winding 2 lane road, in below freezing weather, in someone else’s (clean! well-cared for! expensive!) car, with deer crossing signs just about everywhere, I began to drive well over the speed limit. Past the cut-off for a reckless driving ticket. Well past. Even though the roads were completely clear, and the curves were well marked, and there was plenty of light thanks to the impending dawn, I realized there were so many ways this could have gone horribly, horribly wrong. I prayed that the local four-legged fauna were all supporters of the arts and kept driving…

Three whole weeks without a puppy post. For shame. Feel free to look askance at me. Rocky is.

I’ve been meaning to make these for a while now, I keep coming across the recipe on various blogs. I don’t know how he got 10 ribs to come out to 3 pounds when I bought 6 ribs that came out to just over 5 pounds but the recipe scales well and the end product did  not disappoint.

Braised Hoisin Beer Short Ribs via Dave Lieberman

5 lbs beef short ribs
salt and freshly ground pepper
vegetable oil
12 garlic cloves, mashed
1 inch piece ginger, sliced into 1/4 inch slices
18 ounces good ale (feel free to drink the excess while you cook)
5 tablespoons rice wine vinegar
1½ cup hoisin sauce

Season ribs with salt and pepper. In a large dutch oven on high heat, sear the ribs on all sides in a drizzle of olive oil. Remove the ribs and pour out all but two tablespoons of the drippings.

Cook the garlic and ginger in the pan over medium heat until soft, about 3 minutes. Return the ribs to the pan and add the beer and rice wine vinegar. Cover and simmer for 2½ hours.

Preheat the oven to 325°F. Pour the hoisin sauce over the ribs and move the pot to the oven. Cook with the lid off for 30 minutes. Remove the ribs and cover to keep warm. Skim the fat off the liquid and bring a cup of the sauce to a boil and let it thicken. Pour over ribs and serve.

Friends, our long national fatmare nightmare of gluttony is almost at an end. No longer shall our lives be filled with the delectable scent of freshly baked cakes, no more shall our stomachs strain against the unrelenting tyranny of a waistband. Freedom is coming, friends. But not today. Today, we eat.

Brown Sugar and Chocolate Chip Pound Bundt with Maple Glaze via Epicurious, with thanks to the Food Librian.

12 ounces semisweet chocolate chips
3 cups all purpose flour (I used 13.8 oz)
2 teaspoons baking soda
1 teaspoon baking powder
3/4 teaspoon salt
1 cup unsalted butter, room temperature
1½ cups packed brown sugar (I used about half dark and half light)
2½ teaspoons vanilla extract
1 teaspoon maple extract (omitted in this cake)
4 large eggs
1 cup buttermilk

Preheat oven to 325°F and grease your bundt pan. Mix chocolate chips with a dusting of flour and set aside. This helps prevent them from sinking in the batter. Whisk together the flour with baking soda, baking powder, and salt and set aside.

Beat the butter and brown sugar together until light and fluffy. Have you noticed how there really is very little variation in technique between the cakes? Add the vanilla and maple extracts and then the eggs, one at the time, beating well. Gradually add the buttermilk, alternating with the flour mixture, beating until just combined. Stir in the chocolate chips and pour into your bundt pan. Bake until a cake tester comes out clean, about 55 minutes.

Cool for 10 minutes in the pan before inverting and then drizzle with

Maple Glaze

1 cup powdered sugar
3 tablespoons maple syrup
2 tablespoons whipping cream
1½ teaspoons instant espresso powder (omitted in this cake)
milk

Combine all ingredients in a small bowl and whisk until smooth. Add milk by ½ teaspoon increments to adjust the thickness of the glaze if necessary. Remember that the glaze will become more liquid when it comes in contact with the warm cake.

Normally a fifth wheel is considered a bad thing, but when we are talking about wheels of cake, it’s a different matter completely. I’m really proud of how this cake came out, it’s one of my favorites so far. The Boyfriend had inquired about the possibility of a lemon-flavored cake, and so I went out in search of Meyer lemons. It took a few tries, but I finally located a stash and I needed a recipe that would put them in their best light. The last citrus cake acquired most of its flavor via the syrup drizzled on it, and I wanted bigger and better things for my hard-sought lemons.

When I considered making a lemon curd to go with the cake, it was Stacy who suggested using the curd as a filling. I wasn’t sure if the curd would survive an hour in the oven without getting soaked into the cake, but the allure of a warm, gooey punch of lemon was too much to resist.

As for the cake, the final recipe was sort of a hodge-podge. Google introduced me to a Lemon Poppy Seed Cake whose ingredient list looked very similar to the Orange Cream Cheese Pound Bundt I made on Monday. This cake had a little bit less butter, and some baking soda added for leavening, which made it a lighter variant. One might even call it a cousin to the previous pound bundt. I expanded on that and added more lemon flavor and switched out half of the sour cream for crème fraîche to make it even lighter. It’s pretty good by itself, but paired with the lemon curd filling it really turns into something special.

Is it bad form to post extremely flattering reviews of your own food? Granted, the person who wrote this has been bribed with warm cake for 5 days in a row, but I was still tickled pink when he said

There should be a warning about the lemon curd – it’s so awesome it could cause injury.

That’s a smart guy who will be getting more cakes in the future. And this is a cake that I’ll definitely be making again.

Meyer Lemon Curd

1/4 cup Meyer lemon juice
zest from said lemons, about 1 tablespoon
1/4 cup granulated sugar
1 large egg
4 ounces butter, cut into 4 pieces

Heat a saucepan with about an inch water over medium high heat. In a metal bowl large enough to function as a double broiler, whisk together the juice, zest, sugar and egg. When the water is simmering, turn the heat down to low and place the metal bowl over the saucepan. Whisk the lemon mixture until it thickens about 5 to 6 minutes. You should be able to coat a spoon and draw a clean line on the back with a finger. Remove the bowl from the heat and stir in the butter one piece at a time, letting each piece get fully incorporated before adding the next. If you want, you can force the curd through a sieve to remove the zest, but I liked the extra flavor it added and the mixture was not lumpy, so I let it remain. Transfer the curd to a clean container and layer plastic wrap directly on the curd surface to prevent the formation of a skin. Keeps for up to 2 weeks.

Meyer Lemon Cake

3 cups flour (I used 13.8 oz)
1/4 teaspoon baking soda
1/8 teaspoon salt
1 cup butter, room temperature
3 cups sugar
2 teaspoons vanilla
6 large eggs
½ cup sour cream
½ cup crème fraîche
3 tablespoons Meyer lemon zest
1/4 cup Meyer lemon juice

Preheat oven to 325°F. Grease up a 12 cup bundt pan and set aside. Whisk the flour, baking soda, and salt together in a bowl. In a separate bowl, cream the butter and sugar together until light and fluffy and then add the vanilla and the eggs, one at a time. Whisk together the sour cream, crème fraîche, zest, and juice. Gradually add the flour mixture and the lemon mixture to the bowl, alternating between wet and dry ingredients and mixing only until just combined.

Pour most of the batter into the bundt pan, reserving roughly 2 cups worth. Using a piping bag or a freezer bag with a corner cut off, pipe the lemon curd in a circle on top of the batter, making sure to keep away from the inner and outer edges of the pan. Cover with the remainder of the batter and bake until a cake tester comes out clean, about 1 hour and 10 minutes.

My cake rose to be exactly level with the top of my 12 cup bundt pan. Slightly harrowing.

I also got a few small spots that stuck to the pan, so I dusted this cake with extra powdered sugar.

And if a little bit of the curd filling gets smooshed by the layer of batter on top and touches the edge of the pan, this is what happens. It’s not a big deal. Maybe use more powdered sugar concealer. No one will notice. Or care.

Even though there is about 3/4 of a cup of lemon curd filling, it looks like a lot less in the cross section. Rest assured, the lemon curd offers a sweet, tangy bite that will not disappoint. Just ask Joe.

When I asked for cake suggestions for the remaining cakes, I had no idea that someone would try to set me up as an unwitting accomplice to murder.

My “friend” Jackie asked for two cakes: a Pumpkin Chocolate Chip Bundt and a Monkey Bread Bundt. Innocent enough on the face of it. What you don’t know is that both of these recipes have walnuts as an ingredient. An ingredient that is conveniently not listed in the title. An ingredient that her boyfriend is conveniently deathly allergic to. An ingredient that an unwitting baker might cheerfully include in a recipe and serve to Jackie’s loving boyfriend and thus unknowingly become the agent that carries out her deadly plan. Of death.

mgp, if you are reading this, look out behind you. She will not be foiled so easily.

Pumpkin Chocolate Chip Bundt…of Death adapted from Epicurious

1 3/4 cups all purpose flour (I used 8 oz)
2 teaspoons pumpkin pie spice
1 teaspoon baking soda
1 teaspoon baking powder
3/4 teaspoon salt
½ cup unsalted butter, room temperature
1 1/4 cups sugar
3 large eggs
1½ cup canned pure pumpkin
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
1/3 cup whole milk
3/4 cup semisweet chocolate chips
3/4 cup chopped walnuts

Preheat oven to 350°F. Grease your bundt pan and set aside. Combine flour, spice, baking soda, baking powder, and salt in a bowl and whisk together. In a separate bowl, cream the butter and sugar together until light and fluffy. Add in eggs one at a time. Beat in pumpkin and vanilla. Gradually beat in the flour mixture, alternating with the milk. Fold in the chocolate chips and death walnuts.

Pour batter into bundt pan and bake until tester comes out clean, about 55 minutes. Let cool for 10 minutes before removing from pan. Dust with a mixture of powdered sugar and cinnamon. Serve.

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(prompted by this reader comment)