grapefruit Archives | The Vanilla Bean Blog

Citrus Bundt Cake

Sarah Kieffer — Mon, 06 Mar 2017 04:11:49 +0000

‘What we call the beginning is often the endAnd to make an end is to make a beginning.The end is where we start from.’ – TS Eliot, Four Quartets Somehow we’re back to blood oranges. A year ago I made doughnuts with them, and quick bread. I’m not quite sure where the time went – months have flown by, with so many changes, yet somehow it is all a blur. This citrus Bundt cake is adapted from Yossy’s beautiful book (affiliate link) Sweeter Off the Vine (the doughnuts mentioned above are found among its pages, too). I find myself taking far too many trips to the refrigerator to sneak another sliver; the sweet, tart flavors and pieces of citrus flesh scattered throughout the cake (Yossy describes them as ‘jammy pockets’) are worth any extra indulgence on my part. If you don’t have Sweeter Off the Vine, I highly recommend it. It’s a stunning collection of recipes and photographs, and everything turns out delicious. NOTE: My changes from Yossy’s cake were to use blood oranges instead of Meyer lemons in the cake. I also added 2 teaspoons vanilla extract (not noted in the recipe here). I store this in the fridge because I […]

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Hemingway’s Daiquiri

Sarah Kieffer — Mon, 29 Sep 2014 15:51:19 +0000

The Sun Also Rises was the first Hemingway novel I read. His short stories made a brief appearance in my high school career but were instantly shelved; the subject matter was a too dark for a 16-year old ray of sunshine who secretly still read Nancy Drew mysteries. The Sun Also Rises is rather bleak as well, but there was no choice about reading as a five page paper was required to go along with it. I read the book in an entire day (that pesky paper was due the following morning), and found myself equally loving and hating Hemingway. He is genius about throwing in the most brilliant sentence or two just when you least see it coming. He sneaks it in so well, weaving it into conversation or description so quickly and quietly in his unpretentious prose. It will derail you in a put-the-book-down-for-just-a-minute-I’m-having-an-ah!-moment kind of way, and then you’re back, half caring about characters and storyline, mildly depressed and needing a drink. My brother-in-law Dave came over recently and made Hemingway’s daiquiri. There’s nothing sweet or slushy about his version, but I think that’s appropriate. Grapefruit juice, lime juice, rum, and maraschino liqueur are all shaken together […]

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cream scones + grapefruit curd

Sarah Kieffer — Thu, 10 Jan 2013 03:18:00 +0000

I have found it is never a good idea to make New Year resolutions. Because while I have such good intentions of so many things, a mere three weeks later they are forgotten, or I have moved on in guilt. Still, this January, I made one anyway. It came about after another night of pinning and tweeting and emailing on my little rectangular device. In between checking apps I would pick up a book, read three sentences, and set it down – I had absolutely no attention span. I realized, staring at my greasy little screen, my forefingers burning from scrolling and my elbow slowly going numb, that the longer I had owned my itouch, the less I had been reading [and writing! and knitting! and sewing!] and the harder it was for me to keep focused on something I had always deemed so important. So my one resolution is to read – to spend most these winter nights curled up with a book: old or new, long or short, and waste my time in words. For don’t you remember? All the secrets of the world are contained in books. Read at your own risk.* *Lemony Snicket For some […]

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