devil dogs + cats

have i any childhood nostalgia for devil dogs, i would have led with some adorable story about how much i loved them, and how my mom never let me have them, and how as a adult i've rebelled by making this cake in homage to them, but i have none. my mom basically let me eat anything i wanted (thanks mom?), so devil dogs are blurred in my memory along with dunkaroos, hohos, and those disgustingly good fruit pies.

nevertheless, i think we can all agree that chocolate + marshmallow is a universally delicious combination, and we need no childhood excuse to recreate this treat in a slightly more acceptable form. this marshmallow icing is divine, btw, and so so easy to make. this isn't a suggestion or anything, but it seems like it would potentially be good over some chocolate ice cream maybe? with a banana and some hot fudge too?

devil dog cake, adapted from gourmet magazine

cake:
2 cups flour
3/4 cup unsweetened cocoa powder
1 1/4 teaspoons baking soda
3/4 teaspoon salt
2 sticks unsalted butter, softened
1 1/2 cups packed dark brown sugar
2 large eggs
2 teaspoons pure vanilla extract
1 1/3 cups milk

frosting:
2 large egg whites
1/2 cup sugar
1/4 cup light corn syrup
2 tablespoons water
1 teaspoon pure vanilla extract

make cake:
preheat oven to 350°F with rack in middle. Butter and flour an 8-inch square cake pan (2 inches deep), or a 9 inch round pan. whisk together flour, cocoa powder, baking soda, and salt.

beat together butter and brown sugar with an electric mixer until pale and fluffy. add eggs 1 at a time, beating well, then beat in vanilla. add flour mixture and milk alternately in batches, beginning and ending with flour mixture and mixing until just combined.

pour batter into cake pan and smooth top, then bake until a wooden pick inserted in center comes out clean, 45 to 55 minutes. cool in pan on a rack 1 hour.

make frosting:
combine frosting ingredients with a pinch of salt in a metal bowl set over a saucepan of simmering water and beat with a handheld electric mixer at high speed until frosting is thick and fluffy, 6 to 7 minutes. Remove bowl from heat and continue to beat until slightly cooled. mound frosting on top of cake.

turn broiler on high. stick the whole cake into the broiler for about 1 min. watch it closely- it can burn. remove cake when slightly bronzed. you'll get that lovely toasted marshmallow flavor on top.

cost:
this is a little tricky, b/c for me this is basically a pantry cake. i'm guessing it would cost you around $25 to buy all the ingredients for this in full quantities. honestly, you should just buy all the ingredients anyway so you have this cake at your disposal any time.

and because, really, this is a blog about my cats. don't they look like they're smiling in this picture?!

le grand meaulnes + le perroquet vert

update: by some other great stroke of luck, the house we rented with friends recently had this green parrot as the central feature of the living room! and remember all those other parrot links i put up like 6 months ago? am i being told by the fates to get a parrot?!

by some great stroke of luck i stumbled upon these two books in the past year; they've left such an impression on me, and are kindred spirits of sorts, that i just continue reading them over and over again. while i can't say they are 'happy' books, by any stretch, they are evocative of certain kind of childhood pleasure + wonder; one that is often, but not necessarily, lost in adulthood.

one of my favorite english classes in high school was called coming of age. we read "rich in love", josephine humphreys' sensitive novel about a 'precociously perceptive' 17 year old, faulkner's classic coming of age short story "the bear", and da-dum, the obvious choice of joyce's "a portrait of an artist as a young man". while all of these choices felt remarkably apt to my teenage self, in retrospect i wish we had also included "le grand meaulnes", primarily because i've never read a book that does a better job of showing, instead of just extrapolating on, the chasm that exists between childhood and adulthood. all the pieces i read in high school were self-consciously engaged in writing about the 'coming-of-age' process, "le grand meaulnes" only intention is to tell a simple, heart-aching, children's story through the adventure of a sheltered french schoolboy and his impulsive friend.

and yet, the irreparable way that expansive sense of wonder, possibility -magic even- you feel as a child dissolves into resignation and grief has never been told more poignantly. i don't know if i would have been able to appreciate this book as a teenager, but as someone well past the last gasps of childhood, i admire it's honesty, and am inspired to maintain some of that childhood wonder still. this lovely review does a great job summarizing the book's particular spell.

any book written by a princess is at least worth a first look; what compels someone so coddled to expose herself through the written word? certainly for princess marthe bibesco her circle of friends may have had something to do with it- proust, rilke, and gorki among them. "the green parrot", despite its innocuous name, is a book about loss, childhood innocence, and the redemptive power of love, sparsely told in three short sections. through the magic of google book search, you can actually read the book in its entirety online, but make sure you can at least curl up with the computer, brew a cup of tea, and use two cats as your blanket while reading. it makes the experience all the more pleasurable.

cat on a mat

okay, it's not really a mat- it's a kitchen towel. but it's definitely hilarious after you see the rest of floor space he so diligently avoided in order to sit on this very small square of fabric.