Strawberry, Thyme and Peach Buttermilk Cake with Mascarpone Whipped Cream

Life’s funny sometimes. You plan and you plan and you plan, and then you realize your plans melt into your other plans and you try to figure out a way to make it all work, and somehow it does, but in the end all that working and planning and thinking and fretting just makes you oh so unbelievably tired. Does that make sense? I don’t know. Lately I’ve felt like my mind’s a giant black hole, just sucking everything in so fast that I can’t even decipher what it all was in the first place. I answer questions while my mind is thinking about something entirely different, completely unaware of the words tumbling out of my mouth. I have a wonderful husband who is very kind and patient, and I can’t help but feel awful about the number of times over the past month he’s been talking to me about something and I’ve completely spaced out in the middle of the conversation. Or I’ll be so deep into writing that I don’t even hear that someone’s spoken to me until a good 30 seconds goes by, and by that time they kinda hate me (I’ve done this to an unfortunate number of baristas in the Portland metro area, and I feel terrible). But I guess that’s part of writing a book, you just give yourself over to it at a certain point, and it becomes your whole life.

As of right now, my book is due in less than a week and I am so, so beyond excited to turn it in. I know it is going to be incredible and full of delicious food and beautiful images, but I’m also just excited to have my life back again. I was traveling a lot this spring, and between my freelance photography work, the cookbook, and the home remodeling, there hasn’t been much time to do fun life things, like go on a hike with my husband, or take my mom out for lunch, or spend an entire glorious weekend out in the garden with a beer in one hand and a trowel in the other. Soon. Wonderfully, fantastically soon. But until that time, I’m breaking up my bouts of writing with little sweet things, and because of the increased lengths of my writing bouts, I decided to increase the little sweet things to big sweet things, and I made this decadent cake as my own beautiful band aid.

To start the cake, I stirred fresh thyme, peaches, and strawberries into the buttermilk batter. The smell while it baked away in the oven was comforting enough, but then I layered fresh peaches and strawberries with a homemade mascarpone whipped cream between each layer, and tasted it. It was probably the closest to heaven I’ll ever get, and every bite made my troubles feel a little less terrifying and a little more approachable. And now that I have only a few days left, I’m feeling really good about it. I do think I’m genuinely getting better at managing my own anxieties, so I’ll credit this new sense of calm to my own will power…and maybe a little bit to the cheesecake I made after this. To cake, and all its wondrous healing powers.

And on a side note, there’s a few spaces left at our Sweden workshop this summer, you can read more about it here and join us lakeside. We’d love to have you 🙂