Lesson learned: prepare the night before

We had a little bit of a breakdown yesterday and paid for it this morning.  For whatever reason - probably just an accumulation of too much non-stop work and the anxiety of doing something new - we were both exhausted last night:  didn't go to Illumination Night, didn't even have dinner.  And, most important, did not do one thing to prepare for this morning's breakfast.

Plus we somehow failed to take into account the fact that, duh!, today is graduation and parents need to be up and at 'em to get decent seats.  So we were really scrambling to get everything ready and on the table without looking too sweaty and harried.  I think we pulled it off...but if we did, it was mainly because everyone was focused on something else - like graduation.

Despite everything, Dom made these adorable quiches in our new ramekins and they were quite possibly the best quiches he's ever made.  And the table did indeed look beautiful with all our new things.

Anyway, the take-away from all this was this:  no matter how late it is, no matter how tired we are, we simply must get the room ready the night before and start the preparations (or at least have a game plan) for breakfast.

Culinary disasters

Commencement weekend is generally going great, helped in large measure by some very nice guests.  But both Dom and I have had some big failures in the kitchen.

For whatever reason, Dom's quiche yesterday morning simply did not want to come out of the pan.  He's made how many quiches?  But even though it wasn't picture perfect, it was presentable and tasted great.

Mine, on the other hand, was a true disaster.  One of our guests didn't tolerate gluten, so I decided to try my hand at a quick bread made from brown rice flour and potato flour.  As usual, I forgot to read the directions all the way through, so although I mixed up the wet and dry ingredients separately the night before to save time, I didn't take into account the 10 minutes it had to sit before being taken out of the pan, much less the 30 minutes it needed to cool before cutting.  Plus it needed to bake 45 minutes or more.  The "or more" was the key.

The cooling part ending up not mattering very much, because in turning it out of the pan the bread fell completely apart.  Part of the problem was that it probably didn't bake long enough; part of it was that I didn't realize how fragile a bread without gluten actually is.  The upshot was that it stayed in the kitchen, and my attempt at being a super-host failed spectacularly.  Sigh.

To be fair, it tasted pretty good and I think I know how to do it better next time, starting with making it the night before.  We bought some strawberries at the farmer's market this morning and I think it will make a great shortcake.