Eat, Read, and Be Mommy

Seriously, folks. Monday was already a weird holiday, since my older girls were with cousins all day until after our dinner guest left, and then PTA stuff and chores ate Tuesday, Wednesday was the big snow day, and yesterday ended up being a second snow day, given that neighborhood plowing was still pretty sketchy in the morning. I went to the temple at noon and then spent the afternoon schlepping kids and picking up library books, and then last night my hubby and I stayed up way too late finishing the puzzle we were “just going to work on for a while.” Today was a more normal Friday, to be sure, but still.

Anyway. I did make a cake this week that I’ve been meaning to try for weeks; I found the recipe in an old Taste of Home magazine and thought it sounded tasty. The thing is, while the cake was moist and lovely (sans the pecans, because I prefer my oldest child alive), the sauce was–believe it or not–too lemony. (Have I EVER said that before?!) Not that it tasted bad, because it was really a delightful sauce, but when you see “Apple Cider Sauce,” don’t you expect it to taste like apple cider? On the other hand, when a recipe calls for 2/3 C apple cider AND 1/3 C lemon juice, we all know that’s not going to happen. And so I went looking for the recipe online, to see if there was a typo in the physical magazine, and while I couldn’t find it on Taste of Home’s website (because now it wants you to log in before you can search), I did find this recipe for Nutmeg Pear Cake that’s identical to the one I made–EXCEPT that the lemon juice is listed as (mostly) optional. (It says to use at least one tablespoon.) So, while I used a Taste of Home recipe, you should absolutely use the one I’ve linked to instead. On the other hand, the sauce with the full amount of lemon juice would be great with a strawberry or raspberry cake. Let me know if you try it!