Looted Treasure and Lemon Cake
all the components of my weekend
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I have not been married such a very long while (coming up on two years in March - does that make us toddlers?), but I know this: in the context of a well-balanced marriage, alone-time and quality-time are sisters.
Of course, you need more quality time than you do alone time. This isn’t a “separate bedrooms are the answer!” advice column. I am a quality-time person and if we don’t have enough of it together, I’m miserable. We love doing things together, and make a huge effort to spent 97% of our time (not at work) with each other. But as early as a month into marriage, we identified that when you are sharing everything from a bed to a shower to a calendar, there comes a time when you’re both in need of a free period; some hours at some point when you’re free to roam.
Andrew and I have found that we are in need of a morning to ourselves once a month or so. On these occasions we spend the time however we want. Andrew, ever the extrovert, nearly always spends his with a friend or family member. Maybe he’s at a baseball card show and I am out for brunch. Maybe he’s on a film shoot, or playing a new game, and I’m happily circulating around a swank grocery store, or installed with a book at a coffee shop, phone on silent. Sometimes I stay home. Sometimes I go out. Sometimes I just want to float around Target by myself without answering questions, or get a pedicure, or take a walk in a favorite neighborhood to absorb the glamor. I - ever a thinker and dreamer - need time to put my mind out to pasture without having to communicate its complexities to another human. I like to free-range and be unplanned and instinctive and curious and come back later to show Andrew the treasures I found. I guess I am more of an introvert than younger me realized.
Because they’re pre-set, we enjoy these periods without feeling guilt over using “our time” on individual fun. And we come back together fully ready to share everything again. I am sure many couples have different rhythms that work well for their relationships, but this is a favorite one in ours. It works for us, and leaves us fulfilled in a personal and partnered up way. And, having no kids yet, it’s an easily achievable goal for us.
He and I each enjoy a hobby or two that the other person (respectively) just doesn’t get. His: sports-card collecting, fantasy teams, and games. Mine: nature-curiosity, huge stacks of books, and long, somewhat aimless walks. And there is nothing less fun than dragging someone who doesn’t get this thing you love through the motions of doing the thing with you; you’re worried they’re not having fun; you’re sad they’re not having fun; you’re kind of annoyed they’re not having fun; you compare all the fun you mustered for their hobby last weekend and feel cheated when the level of visible interest on their end doesn’t match what you imagine you put out when it was your turn…and so it goes.
At some point, we looked at each other and laughed at how we were setting ourselves up to fail in this. It’s absolutely okay to not match on every single idea of what you find fun. Diversity is its own special sauce. We spend the majority of our free times sharing things we find mutually enjoyable. Then we respect each other’s enjoyment of those outlying categories that feel slightly incomprehensible to the other person. In our marriage, a working knowledge of, and topical interest in, those categories is requested, but we’ve annexed the expectation to match levels of excitement. In the words of my friend Shannon, “He doesn’t have to enjoy reading - that’s what you have friends for!”
It’s now one piece of advice I give when asked what I’ve learned so far in marriage: acknowledge it’s okay to have some differing interests, then make occasional time to enjoy those things.
This weekend was one of those weekends! Having had some good quality time lately, we were both excited to execute the solo things we had been stashing up for a month. Andrew had arranged to rent a table and sell baseball cards with a friend at the Field House. Knowing he had to get up by 5:30, I planned to sleep in. But as soon as I heard him getting dressed, my brain started insisting I answer a question about the Kingdom of Benin, and I couldn’t sleep till I’d settled my curiosity. I’d been reading a really great book (Africa Is Not A Country: Notes On A Bright Continent by Dipo Faloyin) and had the continent in general and the Benin kingdom in particular on the brain.
Of course at this point I was not headed back to sleep and, because I’m taking a break from social media for Lent, had no scrolling to do. Instead, I flipped through snapshots of my 2018 trip to Ireland and remembered a house I’ve been obsessed with since walking past it in Howth. Through some snazzy Street View work on Apple Maps, managed to find it again, then look up its listing online. I drooled over Tara Hall (which is now a boutique hotel) and decided that, if I had $5 million Euro, I’d throw it all at owning this bluff-top paradise near the Howth cliff walks. Then I laid sleepily in bed and imagined I was mistress of Howth’s Tara Hall and all the things I would wear in this alternate life where a buttoned linen shirt suits me and I keep a Thoroughbred at a farm on the upland heath. If this all sounds a bit much for 6:30 AM on a Saturday morning, it absolutely is. My brain is freed in erratic and genius ways when I’m first off a social media diet.
I was due for a 9:00 walk in Norfolk with my friend. I lazily got dressed, had a bit of breakfast, stuffed a baseball cap onto my head (in Andrew’s honor), and drove into town. I love coming over the Berkley Bridge early in the day and seeing the little boats bobbing in the bright Elizabeth River while the sun flashes on the windows of Norfolk’s tallest buildings. Except of course it was cloudy Saturday morning and no sun flashed and the only boats at work were a couple tugs pushing empty barges past the shipyard.
After grabbing cups of coffee to go, Christen and I took the walk described in Be The Leading Lady which (once we got to the bridge over the Hague and parked on a bench), was nearly a three miler. We were beset by seagulls, a chill, and the beginnings of a rainstorm so called it quits. Then, because this was my morning and I felt like doing a bit of detective work, I drove around the bend in the Hague to the Chrysler Museum of Art for a bit of nonchalant poking around.
I’m not sure I succeeded in being nonchalant, actually. I felt very chalant, what with air-pods blasting Claude Debussy, my hands clenched in the pockets of my varsity jacket, and that baseball cap jammed onto my rain-frizzled hair. Usually at this museum I skip all the artifacts, sculpture-y things, and the sarcophagus, and head upstairs to enjoy my Impressionist buddies. But again, this was my day and I had some detective work to do, inspired by more percolating questions regarding Africa. You see, this book I’ve been reading got me thinking a lot about the “treasures” kept in museums around the world and which of them actually belong (legally) to the countries in which they’re kept. It’s no secret that the Benin Bronzes are only one well-known example of looted treasures being kept by people (the British Museum and NYC’s Met in this case) who had no business having them in the first place.
There are no Benin Bronzes kept in Norfolk, but I remembered the Chrysler has a small gallery of objects from Africa and I wanted to see whether they looked (to my untrained eye) like loot, or legitimate art purchases. So upon stepping into the Chrysler’s huge atrium, I scuttled around behind the double staircase and took my time in the African gallery, poking about whilst “Arabesque No. 1” played in my ears.
Of course, I didn’t know what I was looking at. I studied the objects in a way I never had taken the time to do before, reading each little plaque and thinking about the hands that shaped the items from clay, wood, bronze. Who were the people who made these? And when? What purpose did the items serve? Were the craftsmen friends? What did they talk about while forming the clay bellies of these gods?
By the end of the gallery, I felt a little comforted - or at least unalarmed. I like to think that none of the items are loot. (Of course I do, that’s easiest to settle with.) But really: the plaques seemed to state that these were items of a hundred years old or less, made in the tradition of much older pieces. In the end, I am no expert. In the end, I have no idea how to tell if something is looted or lent or otherwise. All I can say for that experiment is that I had a totally different experience with the art in that gallery (and then the art in the rest of the museum) because I was thinking about who made these items and what the workmanship told me about the makers and their stories. And I think that’s a very good thing to think about in a museum.
Later, I came home and made a cake. A lemon cake, perfectly punched with sharpness to cut the sweet. Later, I finished my book about Africa and started a Madeleine L’Engle title, happy with the way my brain felt after time with a friend, time away from Instagram, time in the rain, time with art, time with my thoughts. Later, Andrew came home and we reported about our days and felt happy and full, and took the cake for an hour’s ride to my family’s through a dark February drizzle. Warmth to warmth, light to light. A Saturday full of good things.
This recipe is from pastry chef Claire Saffitz. Her original recipe calls for using Meyer lemons but makes provision to use plain lemons. I used plain lemons and I could not have been more pleased with the results. Make and enjoy this cake for some February sunshine. It’s a special one: twice as lemony as any lemon cake I’ve ever had, and a beautiful yellow color from the olive oil and eggs used in the recipe.
Claire Saffitz’s Lemon Bundt Cake
Room temperature butter (about 3 to 4 tablespoons) and flour for the pan
3 cups all-purpose flour (I used organic einkorn)
2 1/2 teaspoons baking powder
1 teaspoon Diamond Crystal kosher salt
1/2 teaspoon baking soda
1 tablespoon finely grated lemon zest (from about 2 lemons)
1 3/4 cup sugar + 2/3 cup for the glaze
1/2 cup, plus 2 tablespoons fresh lemon juice, divided
1 cup whole milk, room temperature
2 teaspoons vanilla extract
4 large eggs, room temperature
1 1/3 cups extra-virgin olive oil
Instructions
Preheat the oven to 350. With a pastry brush, work the softened butter all around a 12-cup metal Bundt pan, especially in the grooves and around the tube. As pretty as the complex Bundt pans are, the simpler the design the more confident you can be that your cake won’t stick. However, I swear by a Nordic Ware pan regardless of design. When your pan is well-buttered, spoon a bit of flour and shake and tap the pan till totally floured. Tap out any excess flour. Set aside.
In a medium bowl, whisk together the flour, baking powder, salt, and baking soda. Set aside.
In the bowl of a stand mixer (or a large mixing bowl if using a hand-held mixer), pour sugar and add lemon zest. Use your fingers to rub the zest into the sugar until fragrant.
Now is the time to juice your lemons. Set aside half a cup for the glaze, then in a large glass measuring cup mix together 2 tablespoons of lemon juice with the milk and vanilla. Set aside.
Crack the eggs into the bowl with the sugar and the zest and beat with whisk attachment on medium speed until it looks thick, airy, and pale, about 3 minutes. In a very thin stream drizzle in the 1 1/3 cups of olive oil and beat until the mixture looks smooth, and emulsified.
Reduce the speed to low, add a third of the dry ingredients followed by one half of the milk mixture. Repeat with remaining third of flour, half of milk, and final third of flower until well-combined. Just shy of being fully mixed, remove from stand mixer and finish mixing by hand with a rubber spatula, making sure to scrape from the bottom of the bowl to combine everything.
Pour the batter into the Bundt pan and bake for 45 to 55 minutes until a toothpick comes out clean. Set aside to cool for a few minutes.
To make the glaze: whisk together the remaining 1/2 cup lemon juice, 2/3 cup granulated sugar, and 2 tablespoons olive oil. Whisk swiftly until most of the sugar is dissolved. Some sugar will remain solid - this is okay, and desirable, as it will achieve a “sparkly” effect on the cake.
While the cake is still warm and in the pan, use a wooden skewer to poke holes over the surface and brush it with some of the glaze. Then very carefully (running a small off-set spatula around edges and center tube) flip the Bundt cake onto a cooling rack set into a sheet tray. Poke more holes with the wooden skewer and brush all of the glaze into the cake, not forgetting the sides of the center hole and all outer sides and edges of the cake. Pick up rack and reapply any of the glaze that spilled into the sheet tray. Allow to cool completely before serving.
If covered, the cake should keep for up to a week and improve during that time. Enjoy!
