Summer Pleasures

It has always seemed to me that summer really starts sometime around July 1st. Maybe because it's Canada Day on July 1st (that's Canada's birthday--147 years young!) and a public holiday in most places in Canada. It's also my birthday today! By this time of year, the school year feels far behind the girls. The garden is lush and the weather is hot and humid.

Some summer pleasures that I am thankful for today:

♥●•٠·˙ I love being able to walk out the front door and pick a huge number of beautiful serviceberries from one of our shrubs. They are at their peak right now. Meeko accompanied me while I was picking and got the occasional berry (he loves them!) for his companionship. Look at those beauties! For those of you who haven't tried a serviceberry, they look very much like a blueberry but are redder in tone and slightly sweeter in taste. We have several serviceberry bushes and trees in our yard and share the harvest with the birds.

♥●•٠·˙ Last night, Emma and Chloé had tickets to see a live version of the satirical radio show Welcome to Night Vale. My husband and I drove them downtown and decided to have a pre-birthday dinner together while we waited for them. We had a restaurant in mind but it was full so we walked a few minutes and ended up in an area called 'The Village'. Several blocks of the main road are reserved as a pedestrian mall in the summer. It is lined with terraces and decorated with garlands of pink balls (les boules roses). So beautiful. It is a diverse, lively, colourful neighbourhood of Montreal. We live in the suburbs and don't get downtown enough. It made my heart happy to be there.

The pink ball garlands or 'boules roses' kind of remind me of serviceberries. 

♥●•٠·˙ I received some lovely, thoughtful gifts from my family today--many of them from fellow Etsy shop owners. Some of the purchases are still in transit so I will be enjoying an extended birthday when I check the mailbox each day in the next week.

♥●•٠·˙ I am thankful that we have a pool in the backyard. Did you know that Quebec has more pools per capita than almost anywhere else in North America? Odd when you consider how short our summers are. But when the temperature is 32 degrees C (89.6 F) with a humidex of 42 C (107.6 F) like it is today, it is a very nice thing to have. Meeko also is thankful for our pool. He is an avid swimmer. (This is a video of him swimming in my in-laws' pool this past weekend.)

♥●•٠·˙I am thankful that there is a delicious looking chocolate layer cake waiting for me on the kitchen counter that was made by Emma. We will eat it after my birthday dinner which will be cooked by my husband Jocelyn.

I hope that, wherever you are, you are enjoying time with friends, family as well as the pleasures of the season.

Here's a watercolour I did of a serviceberry branch last year. I have it available as a print here.

Birthday Cake

This past Sunday, it was Emma's 19th birthday. This was the cake I made for her. I have made this sour cream chocolate cake for special occasions for the past 30 years or so. It has been kitchen tested over and over again.

When Emma was a baby, she had a severe egg allergy. Because I couldn't include eggs in recipes, her first cakes were quite flat. I think I cried when I made her cake for her first birthday. So silly of me, but it didn't match in my head what my first cake for my little girl would be. By the time she was three, she was no longer allergic (it is one of the rare food allergies that children can grow out of) and I was able to make traditional birthday cakes for her.

What can I say? I am a birthday cake person. If I don't have a traditional layer cake, I don't feel like I've had my birthday.

I can't remember how many times I've made this cake for family occasions but the splattered state of my recipe cards tell a tale.

For those who love a dense, moist, not-too-sweet chocolate cake, here is the recipe:

Chocolate Fudge Cake

Set oven at 350 degrees F

3 1-ounce squares of unsweetened chocolate
2 1/4 cups sifted cake flour
2 teaspoons baking soda
1/2 teaspoon salt
1/2 cup butter or margarine
2 1/4 cups light brown sugar
3 eggs
1 1/2 teaspoons vanilla
1 cup sour cream
1 cup boiling water

Melt chocolate in a small bowl over hot water (or carefully in the microwave). Cool. Grease and flour two 9" round cake pans or line them with parchment paper. Sift flour, baking soda and salt into a bowl or on wax paper. Beat the butter until it is soft in a large bowl. (I use my KitchenAid mixer.) Add the brown sugar and eggs. Beat at high speed until light and fluffy--about five minutes. Beat in vanilla and the cooled, melted chocolate. Stir in the dry ingredients alternately with the sour cream (about a third at a time, ending with the sour cream). Incorporate well after each addition and mix until batter is smooth. This next part breaks your heart a little bit as you will see your lovely thick mixture become quite thin but, trust me, it works. Stir in the cup of boiling water and mix carefully. Pour into the cake pans and bake for 35 minutes.

Chocolate Fudge Icing

4 1-ounce squares of unsweetened chocolate
1/2 cup butter
1 pound of icing/confectioners' sugar
2 teaspoons vanilla
1/2 to 3/4 cups milk

Combine the chocolate and butter in a heavy saucepan over low heat (or heat carefully in a microwave). Remove and let cool. Combine the icing sugar, milk and vanilla in a medium size bowl. Stir until smooth. (I use my KitchenAid mixer on low speed.) Add the chocolate mixture and mix well. Let it sit for a while and it will thicken. If you are in a hurry, you can put the bowl in the refrigerator and check it every now and then to see if it is thick enough to spread.

❤  ❤  ❤

We also went through a few years of making Nigella Lawson's Buttermilk Birthday Cake (from 'How to Be a Domestic Goddess')--also a winner. My recipe book falls open to that page. Do you have a favourite recipe for birthday cakes?