What's this about a root beer cake?

I've always had a thing for root beer. When I was little, my sister and I took tap lessons at a dance studio that happened to be near an A&W. Sometimes after class my mom would take us there for a treat.  We preferred A&W to other fast food places because they made baby burgers for kids, perfectly sized for little paws.

"What would you like to order, Hungry Dog?" my mother would ask.

"A baby burger," I'd reply, not missing a beat, "and a root beer float."

Remember those days? When you'd order a root beer float...as a beverage? Ah, the decadence of being a kid in the 70's, before the obesity epidemic and trans fat frenzy. We thought nothing, and neither did our parents, of consuming red meat and processed foods at each meal. We didn't think twice of saying, "I'll have a cheeseburger and a root beer float, and I'll take a sundae for dessert."

Those post-dance class floats--served in frosty mugs and made not with ice cream but vanilla soft serve--remain one of my happiest memories. While I haven't made it to an A&W in decades, I still love root beer and I do enjoy a good float, although now I like it with Henry Weinhard root beer and Haagen Daaz vanilla. And root beer floats are one of my favorite desserts to serve to guests. I have the perfect float glasses and special spoons that double as straws.

I've never played around with root beer much, though, baking-wise. So when I came across this recipe for root beer cake, I just about lost my mind. Immediately, I began wondering where I could buy a bundt pan on the way home from work. I mentally poured over the pantry. Did I have the right kind of cocoa? Dark brown sugar? Was there root beer in the house? I became obsessed. I even mentioned root beer cake in a facebook status.

Apparently, I'm not the only one who can get behind a root beer cake. Within moments of posting my status, several people made comments. The husband wanted to know when he could expect to see this cake. Desiree wanted the recipe. Cynthia reported that she currently had a root beer sitting on her desk and wanted to know what else she needed to turn it into a cake.

The cake was gaining momentum. It wanted me to make it. So I did.

The cake was simple to put together and didn't take long to bake. Once I'd removed the cake from the oven, I admired it in its attractive green bundt shell.

A little bit later, I popped it out and frosted it with root beer fudge icing.

"Hey, Hungry Dog, what's that sprinkled on top of the cake?" you're wondering.

Oh yeah. The cake is sprinkled with sea salt. SEA SALT. Genius.

The cake was delicious and moist, more of a chocolate cake reminiscent of root beer than a straight-up root beer cake. But that's probably just as well. A cake that tastes like a can of soda might be a bit much.  But a cake that has cocoa and dark chocolate and coarse sea salt, a grown up version of that favorite dessert you had as a kid, well that's just about perfect.

Rubik's Cube risotto

On Saturday, the husband and I spun around town crossing things off our list. Boring things, mostly. Picking up medicine for the dog at the vet. Getting an oil change. Grocery shopping. I'd jotted down the ingredients for a recipe I wanted to try, fillet of sole wrapped in prosciutto and served with roasted butternut squash and parsnips.

But the day ended up being so busy that when it came time to make dinner, I didn't feel like fussing with all the root vegetables, which always require a bit of attention. I felt more interested in drinking a beer and watching "Mythbusters" with the husband than painstakingly peeling and chopping, and fretting over a new recipe. So I scrapped the original plan and instead pan-fried the fish with lemon and parsley, and served it alongside potatoes and steamed broccoli. A dinner straight out of my childhood.

The next night, I felt prepared to take on the vegetables, but I had no fish. Time to wing it, Hungry Dog style. I had the parsnips, which are homely on the outside but once peeled, reveal themselves to be a beautiful, snowy white. And I had a little butternut squash, the cutest thing you ever saw, about five inches tall and three inches wide at its, um, hips. Ridiculous. And I had some beets that had been waiting patiently in the vegetable bin for a few weeks. I began to envision a bright autumn risotto, with little squares of color running through the pale rice.

I peeled, diced, and roasted the veggies, and got started on the risotto. Usually I add white wine but all I could find was vermouth (where did that come from?) which did the trick. And I minced up some fresh rosemary to give it a woodsy flavor.

When the risotto was nearly done, I folded in the vegetables, which looked like teeny Rubik's Cube squares. The rice did not remain pristine white as I had hoped; once the beets and squash made their way in, it turned startling shade of pinkish orange. But it was still pretty, and it tasted good. Perhaps most importantly, it fit the mood I was in. Sometimes you feel like sticking to the plan and sometimes you don't. Often the best discoveries happen when you're short an ingredient, can't remember the exact measurements, or when, out of laziness, you divide one recipe into two.

Bouillabaisse, rouille, and homemade crackers

As you know, I'm a fan of Ina Garten. I like her show and I like her cookbooks. I find her husband irresistible. And, although I make fun of her recipes, which usually begin "Combine 1 pound of butter and 1 pound of sugar" and end with "Douse with cognac and stir in 2 cups of cream," I completely trust her recipes. She may be shortening my life with each one, but they are usually worth it. So, I decided to purchase her new cookbook, Back to Basics.

The first thing I made was her chicken bouillabaisse with rouille. I was intrigued by rouille ever since I read Croque-Camille's post about it a little while ago. Rouille is a garlicky saffron mayonnaise. Croque-Camille's contained potato to stabilize it. Ina's recipe did not call for potato, simply egg yolk, lemon, garlic, saffron, salt, and olive oil. After making Ina's rouille, I think potato might have been a good idea.

The rouille was a total bust. Although I tried to be careful, slowly dripping the olive oil through the food processor tube, the rouille broke and instead of a smooth, creamy aioli, it turned out curdled and thin. The flavor was also off--too garlicky even if I'd gotten the consistency right.

The bouillabaisse turned out strangely, too. The tomato puree made it weirdly thick and the whole dish was very salty, although I did not add any additional salt. And, it took way longer--nearly 45 minutes extra-- for the potatoes to cook than Ina indicated.

I should disclose that I did stray from the recipe in one small regard which may have impacted the flavor-- it called for Pernod, which I did not have. I actually went to the store to purchase it and nearly had a heart attack when I saw the price. Although I can be extravagant in most ways when it comes to cooking, I can also really cheap out. When I saw that a bottle of Pernod was $31, I immediately eliminated it from the recipe. It probably would have added some lovely depth of flavor, but I am a non-profit drone who has been furloughed since February; Pernod is a luxury I can live without, especially when I only need 3 tablespoons.

So the rouille broke, the bouillabaisse ended up salty, and the little potatoes took f-o-r-e-v-e-r. As the husband summed up, "Not a bestseller." This is something my dad used to say when he would try new recipes that nobody ended up liking.

Because everything took so damn long, by the time dinner was ready, it was too dark to take any photos, which is a shame, since in spite of tasting kind of crummy, the deep orange chicken and bright yellow rouille made for a striking dish.

I decided to give Ina another chance a couple of days later and make her parmesan thyme crackers, although I used rosemary instead. They were simple and elegant, which I think encapsulates the Barefoot Contessa's cooking philosophy.

You just mix up some softened butter with parmesan, flour, a little salt, and the fresh herb, forming a nice crumbly dough. Then you shape it into a log, chill it, and half an hour later you can slice the crackers and bake them off. They were absolutely delicious as a little snack before dinner, which you know I am inclined to have on occasion.  The crackers quickly disappeared. Next time I'll double the recipe and freeze half so I can enjoy homemade crackers on a whim. They went very nicely with a glass of wine, but what doesn't?

So, one failure and one bestseller from the Barefoot Contessa. I guess no one gets it right every time!