Undoubtedly there are those who will say that listening to holiday music before Thanksgiving is too early, but to those nay sayers I say, let me have my fun. Don't worry, the tree doesn't get decorated until closer to Thanksgiving. I know how to prolong the fun.
Mom and I decorating our Christmas tree a mere 49 years ago.
To be honest, Christmas day has always been a bit anticlimatical for me when I compare it to the rest of the preseason game. I feel much more in the "Christmas spirit" the month before the big day than I do even just one day after December 25th. So like the song goes, I say “We need a Little Christmas now!” I am ready to start embracing all the joy that leads up to the big day.
The build up to a most special events, whether it is a holiday or a special event such as a wedding is often an adventure that as much fun as the actual event. I liken the build up to the event to the frosting on a cake.
It starts with the frosting
Just as you first taste the frosting before you can the get to the cake inside, when you plan an event, you get to enjoy the all the great things leading up to the main event.
In the case of a wedding, there's the courtship, the engagement,
The Ring
the engagement ring, the parties, finding the wedding dress and all the plans that go into making the special day so very special.
My niece Danielle and her fiance Gary
My niece will soon marry her fiancé and the excitement is palpable. My niece keeps saying that she can’t wait to get married to her future husband, but in all reality, she already is married to him.
Gary and Danielle's engagement photo
That wedding commitment was made over a year ago when he asked her to marry him and she agreed to marry him.
The wedding ceremony is really just the public acknowledgment of their wedding. It will be their chance to demonstrate to their family, friends, congregation and the United States government that they are in fact wed. I could not be happier for them and I wish them a life full of love and happiness together.
Seven years ago, Jim and I had a wedding ceremony in France because it was not possible to marry in the United States. No family or friends were present at our ceremony. It was just the two of us accompanied by our mascots Bert and Ernie.
When we returned to the United States, we held a large wedding reception in our home that was attended by family and friends. That was our way of publicly announcing our wedding. By attending, our family and friends acknowledged our union.
Just as my niece and her fiancé have already wed, Jim and I were married to each other long before we boarded the plane to Paris to exchange wedding bands seven years ago. We made our commitment to each other more than two years earlier when he agreed to move in with me.
What we didn’t have was the legal acknowledgment of our government that we were in fact a married couple. So, seven years to the day after we first exchanged wedding bands, with my son Jack acting as our best man, Jim and I were legally wed in the United States in the District of Columbia. I like to call it our “Seven Year Hitch.”
As for the lead up to "the big day", there wasn’t an engagement party, there weren’t any shopping trips for new wedding clothes, there wasn’t a bachelor party or many of the things that are often involved with planning a wedding.
What we did have were years together raising kids, afternoons spent in the garden planting and weeding, weekday dinners in front of the TV and Sunday breakfasts in bed. We endured tropical storms, hurricanes, tornados and flooding. We made it through a locust invasion, a riot, a firestorm, several earthquakes, barking dogs, weight gain and (thankfully) weight loss. We enjoyed adventures in far off lands, visits with family and old friends, making house payments and doing home renovations. We welcomed new nieces nephews into the world, made new friends and watch our kids go off to college as they start forging lives of their own.
And I would not change a thing. Truly no frosting on a cake was ever sweeter.
Speaking of cake, I baked our wedding cake for our “Seven Year Hitch.” And that is the recipe I wanted to share with you today. While many wedding cakes are often flavored with almond or spice, I chose to make our cake lemon flavored. While not a tart or sour cake by any means, for some reason I found myself puckering up after I had my slice of cake. Perhaps I was just being traditional. After all, it is traditional that the married couple puckers up after eating wedding cake isn’t it?
John and Jim's Seven Year Hitch Lemon Wedding Cake
Ingredients:
7 Eggs
2 Sticks of softened Butter
½ Cup of Butter Flavored Crisco
Fresh Zest of one Lemon
Fresh Juice of one Lemon
3 Cups of Sugar
1 Cup of Milk
1 Tablespoon of Vanilla Extract
1 Tablespoon of Lemon Extract
3 Cups of Flour
1 Teaspoon of Baking Powder
½ Teaspoon Salt
Directions:
Preheat oven to 325. Grease and flour a pound cake tube pan or cake pans.
Cream together the softened butter, butter flavored Crisco, sugar and the lemon zest. Add in eggs, one at a time beating well. In a separate bowl, mix together the flour, baking powder, salt. Add the flour mixture into the wet mixture in small batches, alternating with the milk, vanilla extract and the lemon extract. Add the lemon juice once all ingredients have been thoroughly incorporated.
If using a pound cake tube pan, spoon the finished batter into the pan and bake in the 325-degree oven for 90 minutes. Allow the cake to cool in the pan for 15 minutes before removing the cake from the pan. Cool on a wire rack.
If you wish to make a more traditional round cake, measure the batter and divide equally between the same sized cake pans. Measuring the batter allows the layers to finish baking at the same time.
While a traditional pound cake baked in a tube pan will take 90 minutes to bake, using smaller layer cake pans will shorten the cooking time. I suggest checking the cake layers for doneness after 30 minutes and extending the baking time from that point as needed. Depending on your oven and the size of the pans, the baking time will vary.
For our wedding, I used two 6-inch pans and simply made a small cake. After filling the cake pans for our cake, I used the remaining batter to make a bundt cake. I baked the bundt cake once I had removed the cake layers from the oven.
As for the frosting, I chose a simple lemon flavored butter cream.
Lemon Butter Cream Frosting
Ingredients:
1 stick of Soften Butter
3 Cups of Confectioners’ Sugar
1 Teaspoon Lemon Extract
1 to 2 Tablespoon of Heavy Cream (or milk)
Directions:
Cream together the softened butter with 2 cups of the confectioners’ sugar until blended. Add in the lemon extract and 1 teaspoon of the cream. Slowly add in the remaining sugar until the frosting is the consistency you want for spreading. If the frosting becomes too dry or stiff, add in more cream.
I hope you will give my Lemon Wedding Cake a try whether it be for a wedding, an anniversary, a gathering with friends or just for an after dinner treat in front of the TV.
If you ever saw Marilyn Monroe’s famous subway scene from the movie “The Seven Year Itch”, you know what she would say about this cake:
"Isn't it delicious?!"
I'll say it is.
