She Wore Red Velvet

Hey, kids! The zines are flying off my shelves! I'll be open for more FREE orders until Thursday. Also, a special note to people who are outside the U.S.--the offer stands for you too! Have postage and customs forms, will send! I'd also love to hear people's shout outs if they got one!

I made my great grandmother's recipe for red velvet cake this weekend--something I've only done one other time, about 13 years ago. The TWO bottles of red food coloring is enough to make anyone pause, but ever since I moved to New York, the recipe has been whispering to me. This weekend I said ENOUGH! It's time to revisit Anna Eliza Oliver's moist red delight.

It turns out that New York may have 24 dry cleaning service, but a large bottle of food coloring is a RARE find. It took me FOUR stores before I finally found the two bottles I needed. When I poured the cocoa and red paste (which resembled a potluck dish from Freddy Kruger), into the white, virgin batter, it occurred to me that I better NOT SPILL A DROP. This is a batter that is playing for keeps, people. If you spill it on something, you just might have it on that something FOREVER. It kind of makes you wonder what your insides look like after you eat a big piece.

I found out this morning that the red velvet cake came from the Waldorf Astoria, but somehow eked its way through the country, morphing in content in a grassroots sort of way. I walk by the Waldorf Astoria every day I go to work. Today, I am remembering how years ago I went to the farm where my grandfather was born in rural Indiana. My great grandmother Anna Eliza raised three children, ran a farm, was a quilter, and a cook of some legend. She never went to New York City, and yet she had this cake recipe, and it was known as HERS. Did she ever imagine who would come after her, anymore than I do? And yet, almost 100 years later, here I am in close proximity to the origins of this cake, but its the green pastures of the Midwest I feel more than anything.

I have to tell you, there are worse things in the world than spending an afternoon alone in a sunny kitchen, with a ruby red cake baking in the oven, making the place smell like a bakery. There are worse things than having cake for no good reason other than its Saturday and its springtime. There are FAR worse things than opening the refrigerator the following days and being greeted by such an ART PIECE, and bringing it into work with you as a treat for lunch. When Graham paused, his fork in mid air, and asked, "Is this red okay to eat?" I am reminded how my great grandmother lived into her 80's. "To your health." I say and we ate it up and ate some more.