That's What Friends Are For...

“True friends are the ones who never leave your heart,
even if they leave your life for awhile.” –Author Unknown

The year was 1971, and I was just graduating from high school and heading to Roosevelt Hospital School of Nursing. I would be living away from home (of course, not if my father had anything to do with it, lol...he's comment was "Italian girls leave home in a wedding dress or a coffin." My mother however, was far more progressive, and let my father think he made the decision to allow me to go (he was such a pushover.)

My first day in the dorm, and I met a few girls who would become my dear friends, Kathy Skelly (Sullivan) Tina Terenzi, Diane Kobert (Hochman), Cathy McClenin, Leslie Staub, and Bernadette Walsh. We all lived on the same floor and we all hung out together.

After nursing school, some of us drifted apart, but I stayed in touch with Kathy and Tina through the years. We stayed in touch through marriages, divorces, babies, children serving in Iraqi, and now grandchildren. I was talking to Kathy and asked if she ever heard from Diane. It seemed like Diane had fallen off the face of the earth. I decided to join Facebook and put in my information, including nursing school, and a few weeks after this conversation, Diane found me on Facebook. Now, she Kathy, Tina, and I are all in touch once again.

Tina with grandson Peyton Morales

Kathy Skelly Sullivan has more grandchildren than I can count :)

Diane and her family

Diane and I seemed to have a lot of parallels in our lives, one of them being that we love to cook, and we both have a food blog. She is currently redoing her blog and when it is up, I'll post the link here. We were talking about recipes and she told me she had a great cake recipe and would I be interested in it. I sure was, I love all recipes. She sent me the recipe and a picture of the beautiful cake.

Although the format is not step by step, I think you will enjoy making this beautiful cake that Diane was kind enough to let me print here. After all, that's what friends are for :)


White Chocolate Cake
Diane Kobert Hochman


Original Recipe from Better Homes and Gardens, 2002 (I have edited the recipe to make it mine)

Ingredients:

2 cups butter (divided 1 1/2 cups and 1/2 cup)
3/4 cup water
8 ounces white chocolate chopped (divided 4 ounces and 4 ounces)
1 1/2 cups buttermilk
4 slightly beaten eggs
1/4 teaspoon coconut extract (note: the original called for rum extract)
3 1/2 cups all-purpose flour
2 1/2 cups sugar
1 (7 ounce) packages flaked coconut (reserve 1/2 cup for cake batter)
1 teaspoon baking soda
1 teaspoon baking powder
1 (8 ounce) package cream cheese, softened
1 (3 ounce) package cream cheese, softened
6 cups sifted, powdered sugar
1/4 cup powdered sugar
edible flowers (optional)

Remove 1/2 cup butter and all cream cheese from the refrigerator to soften.

Pre-heat oven to 325°F.

Place coconut (minus 1/2 cup) in a plastic bag. Add 1/4 cup powdered sugar and shake to coat.
Arrange coconut on a baking sheet so that it lies flat. Toast for 12-15 minutes or until tinted brown. Remove from oven and move to a plate. Set aside.

Increase oven temp to 350°. (Note: if you are using dark, non-stick pans, do not increase oven temperature.

Grease and flour 2 9-inch round cake pans (Baker's Joy works just fine). Set aside.

In a large saucepan, bring butter and water to a boil. Remove from heat. Add 4 ounces white chocolate and stir till melted. Whisk in the buttermilk. Temper ( add a little of the of mixture to the eggs, whisking quickly so the eggs don't cook) the eggs with the butter mixture then add eggs to saucepan. Add in the coconut extract.

In an extra large bowl, mix the flour, sugar, baking soda, and baking powder. Stir in the egg mixture. Divide batter between the prepared pans.

Bake at 350° for 25-30 minutes or until a wooden toothpick inserted near the center comes out clean. Cool in pans on wire rack for at least 10 minutes. Remove cakes from pans and cool on wire rack.

While the cakes are cooling, make frosting:

Melt 4 ounces white chocolate (over a double boiler or in the microwave in 30 second increments - even though it may not look melted, stir it and add more time in 15 second increments) , let cool 10 minutes.

Beat 1/2 cup softened butter and the 11 ounces of cream cheese with an electric mixer on medium speed until combined and smooth. Beat in the white chocolate.
Gradually add 6 cups powdered sugar, beating until smooth. Reserve 1 cup for decorating.

When the cakes are cooled, level the tops of the cakes. Place strips of waxed paper under what will be the bottom layer. Using an offset spatula, frost the top of the bottom layer, leaving 1/4-inch unfrosted. Place the second layer on top. Starting with the sides, fill in the gap between the layers, then put a light coat around the sides of the cake. Frost the top. Go back and re-frost with a heavier layer of frosting, until all of the frosting is used up. Swirl the frosting around making a consistent pattern all over the cake. Remove waxed paper strips.

If using, place flowers around cake. Carefully place coconut on top of cake. Using either a pastry bag and star tip, or decorating tool of your choice, strategically decorate between the flowers with the reserved frosting.

Refrigerate until ready to use.

All Good Things Must Come to an End

I am a pack-rat, I collect cookbooks, elephants, friends, memories, and information. I subscribe to several Google news alerts in the food industry and for the past several days, I have been following the story of the Rainbow Room. For those of you who may not be aware, the Rainbow Room is one of the most famous restaurants in New York City. Long before there were the Twin Towers with their restaurant overlooking Manhattan, there was the Rainbow Room.

The Rainbow Room sits on the 65th floor of 30 Rockefeller Plaza, the tallest building in the complex that was built by John D. Rockefeller in 1934. The Rainbow Room opened in October of that same year. In 1974, David Rockefeller undertook at 25 million dollar restoration of the building to restore it's opulence.

In 1998, the Cipriani Family were approached to take the restaurant over. Owning several prominent restaurants both in New York City, Venice, London, and Hong Kong they took the challenge adding this gem to their crown of their New York City Restaurants.

When I was very young, my Aunt Fifi used to work with a very close family friend, our Aunt Dottie at Royal Globe Insurance in Manhattan. They, along with a group of women from their office, would go out every few months to the theater and dinner. They were allowed to bring guests along, and usually it was a close family member or friend. In my Aunt's case, it was always my mother and I.

L: Aunt Fifi, My Mother, (Katherine) and Me

I must have been about eight or nine, when the group was going to the Rainbow Room for dinner as part of their pre-theater dinner plans. I remember my mother telling me that we had to get dressed up for this special occasion and since I was going to be with all the grown-ups that I had to behave myself. I anxiously awaited the day, or rather evening, with bated breath.



It didn't disappoint...the thrill of riding the elevator to the 65th floor, and the view from the walls of windows was mesmerizing to a young girl. I don't remember what we saw later that night, but I will never forget, the view from the restaurant, the lights, the magic. When Uncle Jimmy who was Aunt Dottie's husband picked us up that night after the show, I was still talking about the lights of the city.

Uncle Jimmy and Aunt Dottie

In later years, I was living in Manhattan, as a nursing student at Roosevelt Hospital and I again had the opportunity to return to the Rainbow Room...it hadn't lost a single drop of it's magic!!

I imagine that many New Yorkers in particular, and visitors to the city have their own memories of the special time they may have spent in the Rainbow Room, I bet there were more marriage proposals done in that restaurant than in any other...

But. like all things, we are living in tumultuous times, our economy is in the toilet, and the Rainbow Room, on January 12th of this year will become another tragedy in the collection that is growing day by day. The landlord of the building wants to up the rent to 8+ million dollars a year, and with people cocooning, the feasibility of keeping the doors open is no long feasible.

Such a sad ending for such a romantic, and majestic jewel in the Cipriani crown of restaurants. By to those of us who had the pleasure of dining there, we will never forget the memories that we have stored in our hearts. We bid the Rainbow Room a fond farewell, and hope that maybe one day, when we rebound, it will once again take it's place at the top of Rockefeller Center.

As for the starring players in the theater outings, sadly, my mother is no longer with us, Aunt Fifi is in a nursing home, (I spent the afternoon with her today, as I do most days), and Dottie and Jimmy are living in Albany, both in their 90's and they are great!

I like to keep my friends close to the heart. I have friends
since kindergarten that I still keep in touch with

This photo was taken at my friend David's wedding
(we've known each other since kindergarten)
and the rest of us in the photo have been together
since elementary school, through junior high school, and high school.

We try to meet at least once a year, usually in NYC (this was taken there)

we keep in touch by e-mail after reconnecting

My friend Kurt and his family

My friend Debbie on the left with the clarinet


is now a grandmother (with baby Olivia)


My friend Carol (found me by
finding my cookbook on line)
our daughters were lab partners
in Cornell we
found out later

As I took this trip down memory lane that started
yesterday, I got to thinking about some of my
other groups of friends. I belong to a birthday club
that has been meeting for almost 20 years

and to top it off, this morning I got an e-mail from
my friend Kathy who went to nursing school
with me. She is now awaiting the birth of
three more grandchildren, making her total 7
(shown with her children)

and my friend Tina, also from nursing school
(shown below is her son Mike, recently back from Iraq)
I remember visiting them in the hospital when Mike was born!!!!

Where is this all leading...back to yesterday's cookbook post.
I got to thinking that Cooking with Love was
not my first cookbook. When Kathy, Tina, and
I were in Nursing School, we put together a cookbook
with our classmates. So of course,
I had to go find it and thumb through it
this is after all a food blog, LOL

There were some great recipes in there, and some great memories as well. There were only 5 men in our class, the poor things, they were outnumbered. We had some wonderful instructors,
Delia De Santis, Miss Foti (who would invite us to her house in New Jersey for dinner), and a host of others. So today in there honor, I flipped to a page in the cookbook, and I am reprinting one of the recipes. It happened to be from of the men, Ron Liburdi, and it was for Lentil Soup
which in this weather, seems quite fitting. I must confess, I never tried it, and picked it out at random, but it sounds awfully good.

Ron Liburdi's Lentil Soup:

2 cups dried lentils
2 1/2 quarts of water
1/4 cup diced salt pork
3/4 cup chopped carrots
3/4 cup chopped onions
3/4 cup chopped celery
1 clove garlic, minced
1 ham bone
1 bay leaf
2 whole cloves
1 1/2 teaspoons salt
1/4 teaspoon freshly ground black pepper

Combine the lentils and water in a kettle. Saute the pork five minutes. Add the garlic and the vegetables, cook 10 minutes. Add to the lentils, add the ham bone, bay leaves, and cloves (which have been tied in a cheesecloth), salt and pepper and bring to a boil. Reduce the heat and simmer gently for about 2 hours. Discard the cheesecloth. Force the mixture through a food mill, adding meat from the bone.Reheat and adjust seasonings.

To all of you who provide me with old memories, and new memories, this post is for you!