Fireworks in the kitchen

My neighborhood was full of the pops, booms, and crackles of fireworks tonight as people celebrated the 4th of July holiday. I only heard them distantly because I was scurrying about in the kitchen. Whenever I have a day off, I almost always plan a huge cooking or baking spree. Today was Cook’s Illustrated Strawberry cream cake, plus Greg’s scrunchy cigars from SUQAR by Greg and Lucy Malouf.

Reading the title of the post, you probably thought this would be about things that you flambé or foods that pop and crackle. Au contraire mon frère, the title refers to what happens when things do not go according to plan – and when the recipe includes phyllo dough, that’s almost a guarantee. My husband was lounging in the kitchen, watching me assemble the phyllo cigars filled with ground nuts and spices. He made a quick exit after my first attempt, muttering “must be time for me to leave.” It might have had something to do with the string of expletives coming out of my mouth. Those are the fireworks I was referring to and there were plenty of them today.

I tell people that diving into a baking project is my way to relax, but that is not exactly true. I do enjoy it immensely as a creative outlet, but it seldom happens that the process is leisurely and easy. Rolling up cylinders of fragile phyllo is treacherous, especially when the clarified butter is starting to solidify. There were tears (of the dough) and almost a few tears (of frustration), but come tomorrow, no one will notice a few raggedy bits when they bite into the crisp shell redolent of cinnamon and orange blossom water.

The strawberry cream cake seemed almost effortless after the cigars, but that is only because it was the second time I had made it in a week. The first time things went slightly awry as I overprocessed the strawberries and turned them soupy. I had to scramble to find some gelatin to help them firm up or the layers would have slid around. My cake was a tad flat, too, probably because I slightly under-beat the meringue. There were fireworks in the kitchen that day, too, although it was low-key: think sparklers, not Roman candles. What causes you to have fireworks when you’re cooking or baking?