The Name Game

“How do you feel about the name Milton?”

“Do you hate that kid?” Chris replied.

“Maybe I would,” I retorted.

“Then Milton would be a great name.”

Any time I suggest a name to Chris, this is pretty much how the conversation goes. I tend to like old-fashioned names, like Wilford or Madge. Or names that have literary significance, like Seymour (from J.D. Salinger’s Glass family) or Finnegan (James Joyce). Or ones that do both, like Ezra (Pound) or Virginia (Woolf).

But then Chris likes really boring names. Like Peter or Jane.

For now, it’s a fun game. But I have the feeling that some day my husband is going to pay off some doctor to put me under long enough to change the kid’s name to something more innocuous than Ernest. You know, like pretty much any name out there.

Nonetheless, there are a few names we’ve managed to agree on. Here they are:

Male:
Seth
Liam
Peter

Female:
Leila
Jean
Kalina (Lina for short)

Also, this is tangential, but what is up with parents giving their kids long names with the intention of shortening them? If you want a kid called Cal, name him Cal, not freaking Callahan. Want an Emmy? How’s about just naming your daughter Emmy instead of Emeline?

Now, if it’s a family name and then you shorten it or something like that, that’s fine. Whatever. But the rest of you parents, cut it out.

Don’t burden your kid with the name Gertrude if she’s just gonna end up being Trudy. In fact, don’t name her Gertrude at all. Even I can agree that that’s cruel.

German Chocolate Frosting

I’m not cake’s biggest fan. In the world of dessert-calorie-currency, I’d simply rather spend mine on other desserts. Like apple or banana cream pie, maybe some coconut cheescake, or any flavor of Ben & Jerry’s.

I revealed this fact to Chris during our courtship, and his reaction was complete and total devastation. No, really though. He’s the proverbial fat kid who loves the proverbial cake. It was almost a deal breaker. Somehow, we pulled through those dark days with our mutual love of frozen custard.

For a little “Hurrah!” to mark making it past the two-month mark of matrimonial bliss, I decided to bake Chris a cake. But being the selfish gal that I am, I chose a flavor I prefer: German chocolate cake. It’s smothered in coconut and pecans and a lot of butter. What more could a gal ask for?

I found a recipe on Rachel Ray’s site that looked promising—fairly simple but with real ingredients (butter, mmm…). But since it’s the frosting I really love, and less the cake, I chose a box mix for the cake. The recipe includes the cake and the icing, but I figured, let’s walk before we run, yes?

The Recipe:

For the coconut frosting:
▪ 1 cup sugar
▪ 4 medium egg yolks
▪ 1 cup evaporated milk
▪ 1/2 cup (1 stick) butter
▪ 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
▪ 10 ounces fresh or frozen and thawed grated coconut
▪ 1 1/2 cups finely ground pecans, walnuts, or almonds
▪ 1/4 cup warm milk

To make the frosting, combine the sugar, egg yolks, and evaporated milk in the top of a double boiler. Stir with a wire whisk until the yolks are fully incorporated. Add the butter. Place over simmering water and bring to a boil (see Note below). Simmer for 12-15 minutes longer, stirring constantly, until the mixture thickens. Add the vanilla, coconut, and nuts. Cool.

Whoah, double-take: what is a double boiler? After a quick image search, I surmised it to be a hole-less version of a vegetable steamer, with no match to anything in my pot collection; I shrugged and carried on with a small nonstick pot.

After mixing up the batter and throwing a couple cake pans in the oven, I started off. I decided to one-and-a-half the icing recipe, since a can of evaporated milk is 1.5 cups, and who’s really going to keep that extra half-cup around?

The stirring was an agonizingly boring ten minutes, but I made it through. I dumped in the vanilla, coconut (I chose shaved for some texture) and blender-ground walnuts and pecans.
It was only after I’d completed the frosting and was putting away ingredients and ran into my unopened half-gal of 2% that I realized I’d forgotten that .25 cups of warm milk. Oops.

Taking the cakes out of the pans, one fell apart (of course). I pasted the pieces back together with frosting, slathered its top up, slapped the other layer on top.

I frosted the top, and tried to frost the side but the icing was still warm. It was a mess, and all over that lovely pink Williams-Sonoma cake platter I got as a bridal shower gift (which may have been the real motive behind this cake caper).

I put the icing back in the freezer to cool some more while I enjoyed some Indian food that my husband had been kind enough to bring home (coconut vegetable curry, delish). When I pulled it out, it was pleasantly cool and spread like a dream.

The Result:

For a first attempt, I think it went swimmingly. Although I did scald the milk and was afraid it might turn out grainy, this recipe is robust enough to survive my rookie mistakes.

Taste Tester (Chris) says: “That cakes tastes like straight sugar and butter and coconut. And by that I mean it was awesome.”

So it couldn’t be that bad.

Menu Mondays

Chris and I decided to make some goals for the rest of the year. Because making goals once a year is for people who only want to feel like failures in February. But me and Chris? We like to fail often and with style.

In any case, one of the goals I made was to try one new recipe a week—dinner, dessert, appetizer, side dish, hor d’ourves—whatever. I tend to get in a cooking rut, as I’m sure many other designated family chefs do. Mine tend to be particularly bad, however, because following recipes bores me. I tend to just make things that don’t require a recipe—you know, spaghetti out of a box with sauce from a can, or salad, or enchiladas.

Also, when I cook? It’s a complete mess. And I do mean complete. Chris describes my cooking methods as “kamikaze,” “inventive” and “unorthodox.” Cooking tried-and-true recipes is tempting fate. Trying new ones is mooning her while laughing in her face. How could she not take a swat?

But I’m sticking my derriere out in the wind and making a tradition of “Menu Mondays.” Every Monday, I’ll try a new recipe, let you know how it went, post some scary pictures and a how-to.

Look forward to the first, which will be German chocolate cake.