Mystery Ingredient Monday: Lemons

Finally got one cake out of the oven.  

What?  You think I should have prepared better for this Monday's post?  I'm looking at you, Anne.

You have no idea.

I chose to make the tried and true Lemon Buttermilk Sheet Cake that is out of this world.

It's from Cook's Country, per usual.  

Yesterday, I sent Peter into the store to pick up lemons, buttermilk, and those disposable 9x13 baking pans.  I am making two of these bad boys, and then cryogenically storing them in order to transport them up to Michigan next week.

See, my mother-in-law thinks it would be great if the entire family reunion ate dinner together every night.  That's 37 relatives plus our Spaniard.  Five or six different family units are each assigned a night to cook and a (different, praise God) night to clean up.  We get to choose our own "themes."   

We are cooking a Ron Swanson themed meal next Monday.

In addition to beef and whiskey, we are going to offer a dessert.  Enter the Lemon Buttermilk Sheet Cake. A little femininity to go with the testosterone heavy food, this cake is light and lemony, covered with a powdered sugar glaze, then topped with a lemon-sugar crystal concoction.  The cousin frenzy should reach maximum volume about 9pm, EST.

One done, one in the oven.

You can read the recipe here, and see some much better photography.

The recipe calls for cake flour, which brought my efforts to a screeching halt until The Happy Mother reminded me via Instagram that I can make my own.  

Enter fractions.  I do love me some fractions.

In the midst of this process, I replied to numerous texts from Spain-side Susan, let in the plumber, approved his estimate, paid mucho dolares for hairball removal from the girls' shower drain, sent the girls angry texts about that, let the Chef know that I just blew through another pile of his hard-earned money, forgot whether or not I put in the salt already, and ran out of powdered sugar for the glaze.

At some point, I realized, "I'm going to need a bigger bowl."

I also made the classic blunder of juicing my lemons before harvesting the zest.  Don't text and cook, people.  That's how I lost my fingerprints.

There's a right way and a ridiculous way to do just about anything.

Once complete, the finished products will look like this, but with the addition of a decorative garnish of freshly picked Michigan blueberries.

So what about next week?  

I'm breaking away from plant products and choosing......

..................................

..................

MUSTARD!

or mus-turd.

Actually, we have quite a collection of mustards around here.  Jalapeno, hot and sweet, country-style, Dijon.

Mustard is great on pork chops, in a cream sauce, in a vinaigrette, on a bratwurst, with a big, soft, pretzel and and ice cold beer.

I double dog dare you to come up with a dessert for this one, Tasha.

See you next week for FUN with MUSTARD!

Don't forget to visit Anne and Tasha, Anne's our hostess this week.

I look forward to reading your complaints about this week's ingredient in my combox.