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I continue to cook and bake like a madwoman now that the cool weather is here. Tonight I made a pumpkin cheesecake, which is cooling in its bain marie in the kitchen. The house smells wonderful — of cinnamon, ginger, and cloves. Mmmm. Unfortunately, the top of cheesecake cracked a bit because the water in my bain marie got too low. Oh well. I’m confident it’ll still taste yummy. I plan to bring the cake to a friend’s house tomorrow and will serve it with whipped cream flavored with bourbon. Mmmmm.

Right now I’m making veal stock. Six pounds of bones are roasting in the oven, and when they’re done I’ll dump them in a 12-qt. stockpot on top of the celery, carrots, and onions I cut up earlier. Then I’ll fill the pot with cold water, and let it come up to a simmer. It’ll burble all night on the back burner; tomorrow morning before we leave for our friend’s place, I’ll strain and cool — when we come home, I’ll skim off any fat, then reduce to demi-glace. This is the last of my stockmaking for the year; I’ve made enough chicken and beef stock to get me through the soups, risottos, and braises in upcoming weeks. I’ve also got a couple quarts of lobster “essence” made from a big lobster meal we had in September. This I can use for a base for lobster bisque or perhaps a chowder.

I’ve been making lots of bread. Right now I’m baking from Julia’s “Baking With Julia.” Every recipe is wonderful — DH and Oliver love the white bread, which is lovely and soft and billows in the oven. Closer to the holidays I’ll make more enriched breads, perhaps Swedish limpa or rye for Oliver.

That thing you see above is one of culinary vices. I love puddings and desserts that wiggle. This is something called lemon honeycomb mold, which if you’ve read Laurie Colwin, the speaks of in Home Cooking. It’s made of lemon, obviously, and cream, sugar, egg whites, and gelatin. As it cools in the mold, the dessert separates into three layers — the top layer is a thin layer of clear yellow jello, the second layer is creamy lemon pudding, and the thin bottom layer is the “honeycomb,” which makes this crinkly feeling on your teeth. I love this dessert, and make it with different juices - pomegranate, orange, lime, etc.

I’ve been working on a few kitchen projects, nothing worth photographing. This weekend is DH’s birthday, so I’ll probably bake some kind of cake for him, nothing that screams “birthday cake!” Perhaps a ginger cake? Or pumpkin bread?

Last week I bought the most fantastic cookbook. It’s called The Cook’s Book, put out by Dorling Kindersley, edited by Jill Norman. Each chapter focuses on a course like vegetables or dessert. There’s even a chapter on foams. But the best thing about the chapters is that they’re written by chef renowned for those kinds of dishes. For example, Chicago’s Charlie Trotter does vegetables and fish, while Ferran Adria does the foams and Pierre Herme handles desserts. Each chapter includes clear, color photographs of both basic and advanced techniques. Honestly, I haven’t spent much time cooking from it — I’ve mostly been glancing through it to perfect a technique here and there. For example, this weekend we had guests, so I read over the section on mayonaisse. I’ve always made my mayo with cold yolks — naughty, naughty. I ended up turning out a fabulous mayo to spread on sandwiches, as well as to use in a tarragon chicken salad. Now the bad news: it weights a freaking ton and it’s expensive. It lists for $50, but I got my copy for $38 locally, no tax, no shipping. I’m hoping it will be worth every penny.

The black cake is going well. The fruits have been marinating in their Kosher wine/rum bath for a couple weeks, and whenever I open up the crock to stir stuff around, I get this overwhelming urge to stick my head in there and start drinking.

I’m also working on a levain for sourdough bread. Details TK.

Hey, it has been quiet here. I’ve been cooking and baking like a maniac since the weather has turned: a few weeks ago, I made 12-qts. each of beef and chicken stock, which I’ve since used to make pot roast and assorted soups. And then there’s the baking.

Now I am pulling ingredients together for a Christmas fruitcake, which I plan to serve for holiday dessert to my lucky family. You do know I am being utterly facetious? They are probably reading this and thinking, “Oh sweet Lord, please let us get a better invite for the holidays so we don’t have to suffer through a cake that tastes like sawdust, Jujubes, and booze.” The last time I made a cake that included fruit, it ended up being tossed to my father’s crows. The cake sat like a tombstone in his backyard, because even the crows wouldn’t eat it. One of my brothers reported that a bird had actually shit on it. Truthfully, the cake did suck pretty bad.

This new adventure comes courtesy of Laurie Colwin’s last essay in Home Cooking, in which she rapturously describes something called Black Cake: “Black cake, like truffles and vintage Burgundy, is deep, complicated and intense. It has taste and aftertaste. It demands to be eaten in a slow, meditative way. The texture is complicated, too — dense and light at the same time.” I can’t resist a cake that makes me think.

I’m not using Colwin’s recipe. I did a bit of research on some of my favorite online communities (gGullet, KA’s Baking Circle) and read a few complaints about the cake turning out inedible. Instead, I’m using a recipe someone at The Baking Circle tweaked and tweaked until he reached Black Cake perfection. As I start creating the cake, I’ll post bits of the recipe.

Today, my order of candied fruits from King Arthur Flour arrived: containers each of citron, orange, and lemon peel, and another container glace cherries. Then I stopped over at Whole Foods this afternoon and bought my prunes, dates, raisins, and currants. The Kosher wine’s waiting in the pantry, but a bit more rum must be procured before the fruits can start a’soaking.

Let the adventure begin!