But everything I’ve read or been told agrees on one thing: especially if you are a novice candy-maker (which I am), a good quality candy thermometer is an absolute necessity. Yes, I have made fudge before, but it has always been the kind that uses marshmallow creme, which is pretty difficult to ruin. You can burn it – one can burn anything, with sufficient talent – but short of that you can’t get large crunchy sugar crystals no matter what you do.

Not so the kind of fudge I’m trying to make now. This stuff could be used to teach a lesson in physical chemistry. And the key is contolling the temperature, both in the cooking and in cooling it before you start beating it. My Aunt Judy might be able to judge by eye when to take the pot off the heat, and by a hand on the side of the pot when it’s time to start beating, but she’s been making fudge for more than 40 years. I haven’t had reason to try doing it the hard way before this.

So I have taken the first necessary baby-step, and acquired a really good candy thermometer. I ordered it online from a store with the delightful name of Kitchen Kaboodle. It was in today’s mail. Next will be a trip to the grocery for cream, which I don’t normally keep on hand. For the first batch (or 2 or 3) I’ll use the regular recipe, until I have the hang of it. Then I’ll start modifying, one variable at a time.

I foresee a lot of fudge in my future. Fortunately for our waistlines, I seldom have trouble giving such things away.

I took this as a challenge. What purpose, I wondered, does corn syrup serve? It turned out to involve the chemistry of sugar crystslization. Corn syrup is an interfering agent, keeping the sugar from crystalizing too quickly and forming large clumps. That was something I could work with. There are other invert sugars, among them brown rice syrup and Golden syrup. First substitution determined.

Onward…what does the milk do? It provides a certain sort of protein, which almond milk also contains. I like the flavor of almond with chocolate, so I don’t care if my fudge has an almomd undertone so long as the texture is right. Second substitution found.

The last one was the easiest. If I use a recipe with unsweetened chocolate instead of semi-sweet, I don’t have to worry about lecithin. It will be somewhat tirckier than fudge made with marshmallow fluff and the best bittersweet or dark chocolate I can find, but that’s okay.

I found rice syrup at the grocery today. Next up will be acquisition of an instant-read digital candy thermometer, and then the ultimate test of whether theory survives first contact with reality. I’m looking forward to the experiment!

So last week I set out to make cookies to take to Hebrew School. I give them out to my kids at the end of class if they’ve mostly paid attention and worked through the lesson. Bribery works wonders. This time I had a lot of trouble getting the sugar and butter creamed, because the brown sugar was kind of hard and I hadn’t time to let it soften overnight.* So I let the mixer beat the mixture longer than usual, until the brown sugar lumps gave up and crumbled into the butter. Then I went on with flavorings, eggs and flour. All as usual….I thought. The dough was a bit soft, but I attributed that to much beating of the butter-sugar mixture in the beginning.

First tray went in the oven. When it came out, the cookies had melted and spread into a thin lacy layer on the parchment. I blinked, checked the oven temperature and turned it up, moved the entire thing on its parchment sheet onto the cooling rack, and put in the next tray.

Same thing, except that with the higher temperature they were even more crisp. Hmm. It was getting late, so I put them in the refrigerator to let the butter harden up again and took my frustrated and puzzled self to bed. Come Sunday morning, I got up early and baked another tray.

Chilling hadn’t helped. They still spread out into a single large crispy sheet. It was a yummy buttery crispy sheet, but not a thing I could transport with any ease. My husband helped destroy the evidence, commenting later that it had been more like chocolate chip brittle than cookies. When we got home, I looked at that blob, trying to figure it out, and finally did. Focused on getting the sugar to blend in, I’d managed to put in one cup of flour instead of two, thus effectively doubling the butter-to-flour ratio.

But it fell to our son to give the accidental invention its name. He stood there looking at the brown chocolate-studded sheet spread out on the plate, looked up at me told me “Those aren’t cookies. You should call them Chocolate Chip Melt Downs!”

And so they are. I’m still not sure whether they should be considered cookies or candy. I might make them again, though – on purpose.

*To soften brown sugar, put it in an airtight container. Put a damp paper towel in a small plastic bag, leave the top of the little bag open, and put it on top of the brown sugar so that the paper towel doesn’t actually touch the sugar. Seal the larger container and leave it overnight. Hey-presto, nice soft brown sugar!

But as we strolled through the crowd, we went into a tent with pottery on display. I love pottery to begin with, but this was some of the most beautiful I’d ever seen. There was one bowl in particular I kept going back to look at. It was huge (I’ve since measured; it holds six quarts), and commensurately expensive, and I knew I’d no business spending the money – but it was lovely. Mom looked at it and asked what on earth I would do with a bowl that big.

That was easy. Use it for bread baking. It was the perfect shape, and big enough to raise as large a batch as I was likely to make at one time. I looked at it and looked at it, and finally turned away.

Next thing I knew, mom bought it for me as a gift. The artist wrapped it up with a smile, and I carried it off in my arms. It was large, and awkward, and I was in seventh heaven. I brought it home and put it on a display nook in our entertainment center. I like it there; it’s safe from feline depredation, but it’s out where I can see it instead of hidden away in a cabinet. It makes me happy.

And tonight I determined that indeed, it is a perfect bread bowl. My usual bread bowl is a 4 quart bright blue pyrex bowl that came as part of a set we got as a wedding gift. (Yes, I have hung onto my pyrex bowls for 22 years without breakage.) I pulled it out as usual this afternoon, discovering as I did so that big as it is, a four-loaf batch of challah is bigger. I realized as I put the kneaded, oiled dough in the bowl for rising that it was three-quarters full already. When you want the dough to double in size, that doesn’t quite work.

So out came the beautiful pottery bowl. I washed it out and put my monster lump of dough in. It filled it just half way – perfect! I love it when something is as useful as it is beautiful. It’s washed out and back in its safe nook, and the last two loaves are in the oven. They should be coming out in a few minutes, and then I’ll go to bed. And I’ll enjoy looking at my lovely bowl until the next time I bake. And the next time, and the time after that. I’ll probably be using that bowl and taking pleasure in its beauty for however many years I keep baking. That is, after all, what it’s for.

If my modifications are minor, then I tend to consider it a variant on the original. But there comes a point when I say that it is a new recipe, one that is worthy of its own place and that I am entitled to claim. This apple honey cake falls into that category.

I started with the Fresh Apple Cake from the Fannie Farmer Baking Book, and some things remain unchanged. The finely chopped fresh apples, leavening, butter, eggs and walnuts remain the same, as does the amount of flour. The mixing technique is also the same. Then the variations began. Instead of all white flour, I used a combination of white and wheat. I doubled the vanilla and added almond extract. The original contains cinnamon, nutmeg, cloves and allspice. I left out the cinnamon or nutmeg, then added ginger, cardamom and mace. Raisins became a combination of Sultanas and dried cherries. White sugar became a combination of dark brown sugar and honey.

Butter, flour and sugar don’t define a cake, or there would only be one cake recipe. Since there’s no way you could even mostly follow the original recipe and come up with something such as the one I made, the Honey Apple cake is now mine. I’m planning to make it for Yom Kippur this year.

Honey Apple Cake

2 cups unpeeled fresh apple, cored and finely chopped. (One large Granny Smith apple did it for me.)
6 Tbsp unsalted butter (3/4 stick), softened
1/3 cup dark brown sugar, packed
2/3 cup light honey
2 eggs
2 tsp vanilla extract (or 1 tsp vanilla powder)
1 cup unbleached all purpose flour (I don’t like bleached flour; it has a chemical aftertaste to me.)
1/2 cup whole wheat flour
1 tsp baking powder
1 tsp baking soda
1 tsp salt
2 tsp ground ginger
1/2 tsp allspice
1/4 tsp clove
1/2 tsp cardamom
1/8 tsp mace
1 tsp ground lemon peel
1/2 cup Sultana raisins
1/2 cup dried cherries
1/2 cup chopped walnuts

Preheat oven to 350^o F. Grease and flour (or spray with non-stick spray and flour) an 8 inch square baking pan. Set aside.

Chop apple and set aside. It doesn’t matter in the least if it turns brown.

In a large mixing bowl, beat the butter until it’s light, smooth and creamy. Gradually add the sugar and blend in, then add the honey and beat until creamy and well blended. Add the eggs and vanilla and beat well. Combine the flour, baking powder, soda, salt, spices and peel in a bowl and blend together. Add them to the butter mixture. Beat until smooth; the mixture will be very stiff. Add the apple, Sultanas, cherries and walnuts and beat well.

Spread evenly in the prepared pan. Bake for 30-35 minutes, or until it passes the toothpick test. Remove from oven and cool on a rack. This is incredibly good by itself, but if you are into lily-gilding, add a drift of whipped cream, some vanilla ice cream, or a little creme anglais (aka vanilla boiled custard).

Okay, the honey cake I came up with wouldn’t be recognized as a fruitcake in the “soak it in brandy and keep if forever” sense. But it’s what I think of when I think about fruit cake – rich and spicy, moist with fresh apple and flavorful with dried fruit. It came out well enough that I think I’ll start making it for the High Holy Days, when apples and honey are combined in the wish for a sweet and prosperous year.

APPLE HONEY CAKE

1 cup white sugar
1 cup vegetable oil
2 eggs
3/4 cup honey (Use a dark flavorful honey if you have access to one.)
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
2 1/2 cups all-purpose flour
1 teaspoon baking powder
1 teaspoon baking soda
1 teaspoon salt
1 1/2 teaspoon ground cinnamon
1 teaspoon ground ginger
1/4 tsp ground clove
3 cups peeled, finely chopped apples
3/4 cup golden raisins
3/4 cup dark raisins
1/2 cup dried cherries
3/4 cup chopped walnuts (optional)

Preheat oven to 325^o F. Grease and flour an 11×13 inch cake pan or 9 inch bundt pan.

In a large bowl, stir together the sugar and oil. Beat in the eggs until light, then stir in the honey and vanilla. Combine the flour, baking powder, baking soda, salt, cinnamon, ginger and clove; stir into the batter just until moistened. Fold in the apples, both kinds of raisins, dried cherries and nuts.

Pour into prepared pan. Bake 60 minutes, or until a toothpick inserted in the cake comes out clean. If baked in the bundt pan, let stand in pan for 15 minutes before turning out on a wire rack to cool.

Enjoy.

Oh, and the poppy seed wafers? Those didn’t come out so well (kind of tasteless), so I’m not posting that recipe quite yet.

Last year I offered to bake, and ended up bringing brownies, fudge, and two or three kinds of cookies. This year, once we received our invitations, I offered to do it again, and was taken up with great enthusiasm. There’s a theme, sort of: Germanic and/ or monster-inspired foods. So I’ve spent the last week or two baking, with no sign of slowing down.

I also bought a freezer. I’ve wanted one for quite awhile, but it took some doing to figure out where we could put it. And since I knew I’d be baking like this, I saw no reason to delay the acquisition. We’ve certainly got a use for it, but its getting its first usage on my goody-making spree. It currently contains several loaves of rye bread, a large challah, 4 dozen brownies, 6 pounds of fudge, 3 pounds of penuche (brown sugar-butterscotch fudge), 4 dozen almond butter cookies, and 7 dozen oatmeal peanut butter cookies. Dough for mohn (poppy seed) wafers is chilling in the fridge. (Yes, I came up with another recipe.) I’ve kind of lost track of how much butter I’ve gone through, but I know I’ve completely used up 1 1/2 bags of sugar, 5 pounds of chocolate and 10 pounds of flour. And I’m not done yet. I’m making an apple-honey cake and a poppy seed sour cream cake. My son has plans to turn them into monster-cakes, with marzipan tentacles coming up at the base and twining round the cake, and I don’t know what all else. Those will get done tomorrow and Tuesday, so that we have time to freeze and then decorate them.

So that’s what I’ve been busy with. And I’m having a fabulous time!

The cold does have one very practical benefit, though. I can use my car as an auxiliary freezer. It doesn’t matter if that gallon of stock is still boiling hot; I’m not going to strain a compressor or thaw something else by virtue of proximity. It might raise the temperature inside a car a degree or two temporarily, but when the current outside ambient is significantly below freezing, that’s sort of irrelevant.

So that’s what I’ve done. I have a gallon of stock from the bones of the turkey we had at my in-laws, cheerfully chilling in the back of my minivan where there’s a nice flat surface. In the meantime, I don’t have to stay up until it’s cooled down enough to refrigerate. I’ll bring it in tomorrow, scrape off the frozen fat, and put the rest in the refrigerator. Over the next little while, it will become soup, or stew, or whatever else my imagination can come up with. I still have a quart of turkey meat picked off the bones before I dumped them in water, which is rejoicing in the freezer. I’d say that’s pretty good, overall.

This requires a 9″ glass or ceramic pie pan for heat-holding qualities.  Metal doesn’t work as well.

So without further ado….

Vanishing Macademia Nut Cheesecake

4 oz (about 1/2 cup) chopped Macademia nuts
2 tsp butter, softened (if your butter is cold, just cut off a small pat and let it stand in the pie plate while you gather the remaining ingredients.)

2 8 oz packages neufchatel cream cheese, room temperature (yes, it has a pound of cream cheese. Deal.)
1 Tbsp vanilla
1/2 tsp almond extract
1/4 tsp grtaed lemon or orange peel (optional)

4 egg whites (separate and save the yolks for whatever you use egg yolks for. I made eggnog.)
1/3 – 1/2 cup sugar, depending on your sweet tooth.

Topping:
1 cup sour cream (low fat works. Fat free doesn’t.)
1 Tbsp sugar
1 1/2 tsp vanilla

preheat oven to 325^o F.

Use your fingers to smear the butter around the pie plate. Sprinkle Macademia nuts across the bottom of the pie pan. Make sure they’re fairly evenly spread, since this is your crust.

Whip cream cheese in a large mixing bowl until light and fluffy. I use the whisk attachment on a Kitchenaid mixer. Beat in flavorings. Set aside. Wash the whisk attachment well – adhering fat will keep the egg whites from beating up properly.

In a second bowl, beat egg whites on medium-high speed until it starts to look soft and billowy. Gradually add sugar, continuing to beat until the whites hold a stiff peak or one that only curls over a little, but are still shiny. A little under beaten is better than over beaten, so err on the side of caution.

Pour about a quarter of the meringue mixture into the bowl with the cheese mixture. Fold in as gently as possible. Add half the remaining meringue; fold in. Add the final portion of meringue and fold in, making sure cheese and meringue are thoroughly blended. Pour into the prepared pie pan.

Bake for 30-25 minutes; top should look set, and will very likely split. Don’t worry; that’s what the topping is for.

A few minutes before the cake is ready, blend topping ingredients. When cake is ready, remove from oven. Turn oven up to 425⁰ F. Spread topping mixture over hot cake; replace in oven. Bake for about 5 more minutes, until the topping looks set.

Cool enough to put in the refrigerator. Serve chilled with sliced strawberries.

So I did a little hunting, and e-mailed her a bunch of Sukkot recipes. There’s a vegetable stew, and roast chicken with root vegetables, and a barley bread with dried fruit, and eggplant stuffed with mushrooms and barley. Best source I could think of for harvest-festival recipes, y’know?