The Cake That Was Not Meant To Be Photographed

Today I’m taking the vintage quest to New Mexico.  I have a copy of a cook book named New Mexico Cookin’,  published in 1976.  Notice the cost was $1.29.  I challenge you to find a new cookbook for so little money.  This book came from the collection of my hubby’s great-aunt Esther.  She was a very good cook, traveled about the U.S. and Mexico with her husband Clyde, wore false eyelashes, hats of all kinds, and flamboyant costume jewelry.  She wore bling before bling was bling!  She passed away last year at the ripe age of 97, two months short of her 98th birthday.  She was something else and I’m honored to be the owner of this book as well as a few kitchen items that belonged to her.

This isn’t my oldest cook book, but aged none the less and full of great recipes.  The recipes in this book are a little more similar to what we read in cook books nowadays.  I chose to bake Artesia Sour Cream Coffee Cake today.  It sounds old-fashioned, I had all the ingredients and it’ll be the perfect accompaniment to a hot cup of French Press tomorrow morning.
 I haven’t talked about the bees lately but today I have a story for you.  Bees can be affected by pests, beetles, mites and moths to name the most prominent.  Yesterday I went to inspect my hives and discovered Queen Heidi’s hive to be infested with wax moths.  Oh dear, these pests create a mess in a hive.  Quite a few bees were still hanging on trying to take care of the hive but Queen Heidi is no where in sight, neither were brood or honey.  The only thing to do was remove the entire hive, which had a hive body and 4 other stories on top.  I replaced it with a fresh bottom, body and top and brushed and shook off as many bees as possible from the plagued frames.  If I don’t see evidence of a queen soon I’ll need to use that newspaper trick and incorporate them with a smaller hive.  This is my first big disaster with the bees, but I feel lucky they weren’t all gone.  You can’t see wax moths until they hatch and begin taking over.  Not so long ago when checking the hives I hadn’t seen moths or their worms inside the hive but had noticed what seemed like too many drone (boy bee) cells.  This could have been a sign that the queen was not producing as needed, producing a weak hive, thus able to be taken over by the nasty moths.  I’m hopeful that I”ll save the girls still in the fresh hive.  Time will tell…stay tuned.

I need to share something with you – I shouldn’t have baked my coffee cake in a loaf pan!  I should have put it in a cake pan.  The cake is tender, creamy and delicious.  The streusel is full of nuts, cinnamon and brown sugar and adds a crunchy, flavorful topping and filling.  As I began to slice the cake for a photo I realized it was a mistake to bake it in the loaf pan.  It took several slices to get one to hold together good enough for a photo.  Look at it this way, I won’t need to slice any tomorrow morning, it’s ready to go with that hot cup of joe!

Enjoy!