August Birthday Extravaganza

Well another month is nearly half over and I don't know where the time has gone?! Last week flew by, although thanks to a busy weekend and some late nights cheering on the US of A in the Olympics, it felt dreadfully slow as I drug my half asleep self through it. On the bright side, it was my first week in my new job (it's not entirely new as I'm just on a different floor in the same building, but I do have a new team and a new project, both of which were much needed) and I'm already loving my new role 1000x more than the previous one! Because of the changes at work, I was busier during the day and incredibly exhausted in the evenings, causing me to take a brief hiatus from blogging. But, after several restful days over the weekend, and the return of my beloved work from home Mondays, I'm back!

August is birthday month! Sadly, my birthday isn't part of the festivities, but I have so much fun with everyone else's it sometimes feels like it's my birthday as well. Two weekends ago was our annual birthday crab feast. My Grandmom, sister, and dad's birthdays all fall in August. As such, we've made it a tradition over the past couple years to get our summer bushel of steamed crabs as part of the celebration and have one big joint birthday party. And because I believe everyone should get their dessert of choice on their birthday, we always have three cakes :)

Last year, I assumed my Grandmother's role of making sister's birthday cake. Since we were kids, sister has always requested that Grandmom make her a pineapple upside down cake for her birthday. Last year, however, Grandmom passed the reigns (and the recipe) onto me. I was scared, but I did it. This year, having become a budding cook/baker, I decided to take the recipe up a notch, making the cake from scratch (instead of the jazzed up boxed version Grandmom's recipe called for). It was tense. Never before have I so feared failure.

On top of that, I've been ensuring my dad spends each birthday with his beloved pound cake for as long as I can remember. It started many years ago with me purchasing a store made pound cake and progressed to me making a boxed cake, and then finally adopting a from scratch version last year. This year, wanting to jazz things up a bit (and use the new poppyseeds I got at the Amish market a few weeks ago), I whipped up a lemon poppyseed number. Very refreshing on a hot August day!

Despite my tensions with how my creations would turn out (sister had several friends in attendance as well, adding to my need to succeed at baking), my cakes were a hit! And, I ended up loving the yellow cake recipe I used for sister so much that I used it again to make cupcakes for Cait and Andrew's joint birthday fiesta this weekend. August birthdays runneth over in my life and the month isn't even complete yet!

Pineapple Upside Down Cake

Ingredients

• Yellow cake (I officially swear by Smitten Kitchen's version...and I'm a huge yellow cake fan/connoisseur) 
• 1 can sliced pineapples in pineapple juice (the syrup-laden ones creep me out)
• 6-8 fresh cherries (pitted and sliced in half)
• 1 cup brown sugar
• 1/4 cup butter or margarine 

Preparation

1. Preheat oven to 350F. Melt butter in the cake pan
2. Once butter is melted, dump brown sugar into cake pan and stir into butter until smooth
3. Lay pineapples on top of the brown sugar mixture
4. Mix cake according to recipe and then pour batter over pineapple/brown sugar mixture
5. Bake on 350 for 30-40 minutes or until a toothpick can be pulled out without dough attached
6. Let cake cool (I usually let it go over night just to be sure), then turn pan over to flip the cake out so the pineapples are on top
7. Place the cherry halves in pineapple holes and serve!

Lemon Poppyseed Cake

Ingredients

[Inspiration found here]

• 2 sticks (16 Tbsp) unsalted butter
• 1 ½ cups cake flour
• 1/3 cup poppy seeds
• 1 teaspoon baking powder
• 1/2 teaspoon table salt
• 1 ¼ cups granulated sugar
• 2 tablespoons grated lemon zest plus 2 teaspoons juice from 2 medium lemons
• 4 large eggs
• 1 1/2 teaspoons vanilla extract
• Powdered sugar for dusting (optional)

Preparation

1. Preheat oven to 350 F. Grease bottom and sides of one 9 x 5-inch loaf pans; dust with flour, tapping out excess
2. In a medium bowl, whisk together flour, baking powder, and salt; set aside
3. In a small bowl, toss 1 tablespoon of the flour mixture and poppy seeds together, set aside
4. In a microwave-safe bowl, microwave butter at full power until melted, about 1 to 2 minutes. Whisk melted butter thoroughly to reincorporate any separated milk solids
5. In mixing bowl, mix sugar and zest until combined, about 5 seconds. Add lemon juice, eggs, and vanilla; mix until combined, about 10 seconds. 
6. With mixer running, add melted butter in steady stream
7. Sift flour mixture over eggs in three steps, whisking gently after each addition until just combined. Fold poppy seed mixture into batter after flour is incorporated
8. Pour batter into prepared pan and bake 15 minutes. Reduce oven temperature to 325 degrees and continue to bake until deep golden brown and skewer inserted in center comes out clean, about 35 minutes, rotating pan halfway through baking time. Cool in pan for 10 minutes, then turn onto wire rack
9. Using a wire shifter, dust with powdered sugar prior to serving (the original recipe also included a nice recipe for a lemon glaze, but since papa doesn't care for icing of any sort, I always just stick to powdered sugar)

(Today is Papa's real birthday)

I was allowed to be an honorary birthday person (it was also my 5 month birthday) 

as my reward for all my hard work in the kitchen

And as referenced above, the yellow cake recipe was used again to make cupcakes for Cait and Andrew, complete with my favorite buttercream frosting, with a splash of cocoa powder...in measuring terms, about 1/3 cup :)