Food Friday and problem solving across the board

The tallit bag and atara were being picked up today. The seemingly difficult part of the atara, doing the calligraphy was done with ease. the part that ought to be simple,edging the piece had me stumped.

One of the nice things about having a hard deadline is the piece just had to get finished. For a little while I just felt completely stuck and was unable to figure out how to edge the atara. Finally, I edged the piece with three rows of couched cording.

The result is both sturdy and pretty.
Elizabeth picked up the tallit bag and the tallit with the new atara. She was in a rush and ad requested that I just leave the work with my doorman. I did. For me my favorite part of working with the client is seeing their reaction when they first see a piece. Elizabeth was kind enough to come upstairs to look at my work with me.

I know it made a rushed day for her even more rushed, and I am grateful that she did. Elizabeth was really, really happy. I hope her husband will be pleased as well.
Tow of our friends are moving out of state. it is their last Shabbat in our community. Tomorrow’s kiddush is in their honor. One of our friends is really fond of my whities ( meringues in standard English). I had decided to make a batch and to make a cake out of the left over egg yolks to serve with tonight’s dinner.
We had a switch of dinner guests and tonight’s guest is glucose intolerant. That meant that I needed more whities for tonight and the cake would be served tomorrow.
Oh Hoshanah Rabba I had collected etrogim and my plan was to make a dessert to serve on Simchat Torah.  My cold foiled my dessert making plans. I had made candied etrog, but that was as far as I had gotten.
I made an extra big batch of whities with 6 egg whites.

Whities need goodies added to them, this batch had chunks of bittersweet chocolate and shredded coconut.
When the whities were baking, I began the etrog cake.

I beat the 6 egg yolks with a cup of sugar . When they were thick and pale yellow I added just over a cup of flour mixed with a teaspoon of baking powder and a pinch of salt. I minced a knob of ginger and maybe 1/2 a cup of the candied etrog slices. I tasted the batter and added a teaspoon of ginger liqueur, some orange juice( My mother would have described the volume of juice that I poured into the batter as a mouth full) and fresh orange peel. I put the mixture into a bunt pan and baked.
When I turned the cake out of the pan, I realized that some of the batter had slipped under the parchment paper that I had used to line the pan. That meant that some of the cake wasn’t appealingly brown , but was instead weirdly yellow.
I suppose that if I weren’t my mother’s daughter, I could have just served the cake and been done with it.  I thought about what I had on hand that might solve the ugly cake problem.  Melted apricot jam poured over the cake would be perfect, but I didn’t have quite enough. I did have some cherry jam. It wasn’t my first choice, but it was on hand. I heated both jams together, added some more of the ginger liqueur and poured it over the cake. A few slivered almonds do a bit more camouflage work and we can all pretend that this was exactly what I was planning all along.


Another cake--faked.
There is more to tonight’s dinner, sumac and paprika potatoes, zaatar chicken, soup and a yet unmade salad.

Shabbat Shalom!