Good Things by David

Golden cakes that are light as a feather with a tender and delicate crumb are what these layers are all about.  With the familiar vanilla flavor everyone loves, my cakes are given a note of almond extract to complement and enhance every bite.  The recipe is a variation of the tried & true 1-2-3-4 cake, which is yet another variation of the good old-fashioned poundcake that's been around for a couple of hundred years.  I love using cake flour for my batter because the layers bake into marvelous tall cakes that are superior in texture and flavor.  To this, one adds the basics found in most cakes: sweet unsalted butter, pure cane sugar, the freshest eggs and wholesome milk.  These ingredients in the right proportions give excellent results every single time when using the creaming method.  This method is nothing more than beating the butter and sugar until very light, then adding eggs until completely emulsified to create volume,...

Everyone who bakes, whether it's occasionally or on a regular basis, should have a quick go-to frosting that's prepared in minutes with a minimum of fuss.  This simple vanilla icing is instantly familiar to most of us who grew up spreading home style frostings onto baked goods from those little tubs found in the supermarkets right next to the cake mixes.  You know the ones!  With only a handful of ingredients from one's pantry a homey vanilla frosting can be made in no time to be used for tender cupcakes or on a favorite cake.  The icing is delicious on a red velvet cake, a classic yellow cake, a chocolate cake, a perfect white cake or even a carrot cake.  One can make this frosting several days in advance as long as it's properly sealed in the refrigerator, but since it is so simple to make, I personally find it best to prepare it the moment I want to frost something delicious.  There's nothing ne...

Marble is beautiful to own and it's wonderful to use in one's home.  Luminous and cool to the touch, it is a stone composed of calcium carbonate metamorphosed from limestone.  Used by homeowners for kitchen countertops, kitchen sinks, backsplashes (tile or slab), floors, bathrooms (some people opt for cultured marble in this area of the home), cocktail tabletops, sideboards, mantels and fireplace trims, it is a surface that is suitable in many homes.  Whether it's an ultra modern high rise apartment, an old colonial, a French country manor or even a quaint bungalow, marble will greatly enhance many spaces.  Sourced from several countries around the world, the color & type will depend entirely on where it was quarried; there are many colors, striations and beautiful qualities available to the consumer that make each slab unique.  Whatever style you end up with in your home if you choose to go with this surface, marble shoul...

If you're someone like me who has to have an egg salad sandwich every now and then, you'll agree that flavor & texture are very important.  Egg salad can be used any number of ways, from topping little melba toast for a simple snack, served alongside a salad of mixed greens if one is watching their carbohydrate intake or it can even be enjoyed in a wrap.  For most of us, though, egg salad is best eaten in a sandwich made for work lunches, school lunches or for picnics with the family.  The type of bread used to make this sandwich will completely depend on one's preferences.  Some like good, white bread many of us grew up eating, lightly toasted or not, while others prefer egg salad on whole wheat or multigrain bread (you can also use a gluten-free bread).  A rustic loaf from a favorite bakery will work just as well. In order to get a good tasting egg salad, one must start with the best eggs, hard boiled at home.  I always use ca...

Hard boiled eggs are delicious and satisfying to have on their own sprinkled with a bit of fine sea salt and some freshly cracked pepper.  They're also great in salade niçoise , egg salad sandwiches, potato salads, deviled eggs, scotch eggs, cobb salads, chef's salads and even in tuna salads; I've come across several old-fashioned cookie recipes which call for them too.  Cooking hard boiled eggs to perfection is very easy and it's a basic task every home cook ought to know how to do.  Once you see how simple it is to make a good egg in this manner, you will find yourself enjoying them more often in your home. I make hard boiled eggs several times a month, because we love to snack on them during weekend brunches, but if I want to use them during the week for other recipes, I make several ahead of time and keep them refrigerated until needed.  It's preferable to use eggs that are at least a few days old rather than...

Everybody responds to color.  It is something which confronts us every single day whether we're conscious of it or not.  Our feelings toward color are very personal and many of us reflect our preferences in our choice of wardrobes, home color schemes and in the living accoutrements we surround ourselves with.  Color can either soothe and put one in a harmonious mood or it can jar one's senses and make us uncomfortable;  those are the extreme ends of how we view color.  In the middle are the colors which make us take note and draw us in for a closer look because we simply cannot turn away.  Those are the colors that make each one of us happy.  We tend to call them our favorite colors and no one can be forced into liking a color or color palette.  They either meet with our approval or they do not. One of my favorite color palettes comes from the discontinued line of paints hand picked by Martha Stewart and her team of e...