demosthenes42

Yesterday, I made both these and these lemon cupcakes. I did both with a whisk and I liked that they didn't require the stand mixer.

The first ones were quite different than a typical lemon cupcake recipe - they had ricotta and honey in them, and I used this fancy lemon honey I had and I think that was a mistake. The cupcakes domed brilliantly, but had a weird aftertaste I did not like and the only thing I can think that could cause it was that honey. I otherwise used sour cream instead of creme fraiche, and olive oil for vegetable oil, but neither of those things should have caused the weird aftertaste. So maybe I'll eventually work my way back to that recipe (chosen because I have ricotta in my fridge that needs using up) and use clover honey and see how they are.

I think the second recipe is going to be my go-to for lemon for now. The batter is a super weird texture - it looked like curdled custard, or maybe bad cafeteria scrambled eggs - but the cupcakes are moist and lemony, though I guess the real test will be how they taste tomorrow, since if I'm taking them to work, I'll bake them on Sunday and bring them to the office on Tuesday, so they have to be good for that long. I made this strawberry cream cheese frosting this afternoon, but it wasn't stiff enough to pipe (not a euphemism) since I only used 2 cups of powdered sugar (and still think it is pretty sweet), so I just dipped the cupcakes into it. (I also did not make strawberry puree, I used 3 tbsps of seedless strawberry jam instead.) The tang of the cream cheese goes well with lemon and also helps cut through the sweetness of the frosting, so it worked pretty well, I thought. Next week, though, I plan to make strawberry Swiss meringue buttercream, which is much less sweet. We'll see how it goes.

I also tried to make homemade bbq sauce but I did not like how it tasted at all, so I didn't use it. Next time maybe I will try something that has no tomato base at all. Regardless, I cooked both racks of ribs and they were delicious and I will be eating ribs all week. I also made my own cole slaw dressing again, and this time I liked it better because I added onion and garlic powder - it is mind-boggling to me that the recipe doesn't include that and the first time around I just let it go but come on. Season your food!

So this weekend was delicious but so fucking messy - I ended up with egg yolk, bbq sauce, frosting, lemonade, and hot pork juice (not a euphemism!!! the ribs cook for 3 hours wrapped in foil and then for the last hour you take the foil off and it is a precarious situation!) on my shirt, but not all at the same time, thankfully.

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Wednesday reading on a Thursday:

what I've just finished
Saint Death's Daughter and Saint Death's Herald by CSE Cooney, which I enjoyed. The first book is A Lot in terms of both worldbuilding and plot, but it's a fun ride and Lanie Stones is a fantastic character - a necromancer who has an allergy to violence. Her growth as a necromancer is really well done, especially when set against the various members of her family she tells you about over the course of the books. The second book is a lot more straightforward in terms of plot, which I found less enthralling, but the character work and worldbuilding remain fascinating. I couldn't find any info about whether there's going to be a third book, but I would read it if there were!

what I'm reading now
The Last Contract of Isako, the new book by Fonda Lee. I'm only 20 pages in so I can't say much about it one way or another yet, but Isako is a middle-aged lady contractor (possibly also an assassin?) in a far future world. I imagine this is going to be a "one last job" kind of thing? I don't remember the blurb, but I found Lee's Green Bone trilogy* excellent so I have high hopes for this.

*Second world East Asian-style mob story where the made men have what basically amount to Force powers. Very violent and most of the characters are morally gray at best, but I enjoyed it a lot.

what I'm reading next
Dungeon Crawler Carl book 8: Parade of Horribles. Tuesday! I AM EXCITE!

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Hey, I have actually read a couple of books!

what I just finished
First Witches Club by Maisey Yates, which was cute and fast but relentlessly heterosexual. It's about 3 women whose husbands have left them coming together to learn that magic is real. The community building is nice. This is kind of a beach/airplane read, but it was the first new-to-me book I was able to stick with in a while.

The Teller of Small Fortunes by Julie Leong, which I enjoyed quite a bit. It's kind of a picaresque about Tao, the titular fortune-teller, and the friends she meets along the way. It's pretty cozy, but things do happen in it.

what I'm reading now
Saint Death's Daughter by CSE Cooney, which I am enjoying. It's as if The Locked Tomb and Flora Segunda had a sunshiny necromantic daughter. I wouldn't have thought you could make necromancy twee, but Cooney sure does try.

what I'm reading next
Likely Saint Death's Herald, the sequel to the above. And then in just over a week, Parade of Horribles comes out and I will be reading that immediately.

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So I haven't written anything fictional since about January 2024 and mostly haven't even had any ideas, and then one morning last week (maybe the week before? I'm not sure - what even is time?), I woke up and was like, I could write a short DCC story set pre-collapse where Carl posts to AITA about breaking up with Bea and potentially stealing Donut. I told angelgazing about it and she was of course, very encouraging, and all, you should totally write that! But alas, I did not, though I did think about it longer than most ~ideas~ I've had over the last 2 years.

This morning, she texted me a link and someone wrote it! In a brief post on Threads of all places, but it was exactly that. And she was like, I only recognized it because you'd already told me about it! And I was like, see, I don't even have to write it because someone else already did!

Nice to know that even without writing anything, I am still tapped into the fannish hive mind. *wry*

In other fannish news: Ted Lasso season 4 trailer!!!! August 5th!!! I AM EXCITE!!!

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Today's poem:

Bright Wings

I was walking in the garden looking for the intermediaries
between me and the clear light. I had left the hose running
much too long. Something was eating holes in the ear-soft
leaves of the morning glories. I saw for the first time
that the neighbor was growing corn - the yellow shocks
were leaning just above the cinder-block fence, and they
looked delicate and scruffy, like city corn, like alien corn,
and suddenly there was so much to be done, so much to
put in order, not the ordinary business of loving and dying,
but the ordinary business that comes bundled with them:
Sunlight behaved perfectly in every corner, the shadows breathed
in their one direction and told stories, our cat crouched in the flower bed
aching to kill something: How do you explain being so convinced,
so utterly taken by the idea that beauty is somehow moral?
I mean in this day and age? I mean now when no one can even get
that equation to hold up? But the ants have formed a black
ribbon that leads to a dead snail. But the Pipers and Cessnas
and Beechcraft are circling and banking for the airport with
so much color and precision. But the dogs two houses down
have heard the mail-carrier's foot, and they have erupted.
This is not the argument I'm looking for. And I have been lazy.
Tangerines and lemons have swollen and dropped from their
impatient branches. They lie among the fern and the vine, bruised
and mushy. They are being swarmed. They are being devoured.

--Frank X. Gaspar

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Today's poem:

And Then It Was Less Bleak Because We Said So
by Wendy Xu

Today there has been so much talk of things exploding
into other things, so much that we all become curious, that we
all run outside into the hot streets
and hug. Romance is a grotto of eager stones
anticipating light, or a girl whose teeth
you can always see. With more sparkle and pop
is the only way to live. Your confetti tongue explodes
into acid jazz. Small typewriters
that other people keep in their eyes
click away at all our farewell parties. It is hard
to pack for the rest of your life. Someone is always
eating cold cucumber noodles. Someone will drop by later
to help dismantle some furniture. A lot can go wrong
if you sleep or think, but the trees go on waving
their broken little hands.

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