Cheesecake!!

OK, finally, the recipe that yielded the best cheesecake I've ever made! And that is saying a lot, since I make an inordinately large number of cheesecakes. Jake's favorite desserts are cheesecake and pumpkin pie, so I make a lot of cheesecakes, pumpkin pies and the occasional pumpkin cheesecake.

My normal 'go to' recipe is a very old sour cream cheesecake from Bon Appetit. I have a photocopied version from my mom's print magazine, which is good because the recipe isn't online. It's from like a 1986 magazine, so I guess their recipe archives don't go that far back online. Problem with that recipe is that you have to bake it three times - once to crisp the crust (don't want to skip with this recipe, because you put nuts in the crust with the grahm crackers), one to bake the cake, and one to bake the sour cream topping. I was getting a late start as it was, and the timeline for that was just too long. I considered the Philly Cream Cheese recipe, but I only had 2 lbs of cream cheese and that recipe needs 2.5lbs. I was torn. I really wanted cheesecake but I was recipe-less. I checked out Alton Brown's recipe, he's one I trust to just go by recipe on, but his cooking was even longer than the Bon Appetit (really, Alton, 2 hours?!) and in my experience every cheesecake takes longer to bake than the recipe says anyway.

I have a huge collection of cookbooks, but no real motivation to flip through them all, so I pulled out my two favorites - How to Cook Everything and the Joy of Cooking. I struck out with Mark Bittman - his recipe needed 2.5lbs, too, but I found the gem in Joy of Cooking - it only needed 2 lbs of cream cheese and was from a trusted source, so off to the kitchen I went, making just a few modifications of my own.

Carly's Creamy Cheesecake
(The original is 'Creamy Water-Bath Cheesecake' on page 980 of the 1997 printing of Joy of Cooking)
Ingredients:
2lbs cream cheese
1-1/3 c sugar
4 large eggs
1/4 c heavy cream
1/4 c sour cream
1/2 t. pure lemon extract (really, don't use the imitation!!)
2-4 t. vanilla (2 if you are using pure extract purchased, closer to 4 if using homemade vanilla - recipe follows)

Preheat oven to 325F, Fill a tea kettle with water and set to boil. (If you have time, set out eggs & cream cheese to come to room temperature, I didn't and it certainy didn't hurt the finished product!)

Make any cheesecake crust you like - shortbread or graham cracker (the Joy recipe makes this crustless). Press crust into the bottom of a 9" springform pan. I used a basic graham cracker crust with a little bit of sugar and nutmeg mixed in. I did not toast the crust.

In large bowl, beat 2lbs of cream cheese until smooth. I went about 90 seconds with the paddle set to 6 on my KitchenAid - obviously this will take longer with a hand mixer.

Add sugar and beat another 1-2 minutes until creamy and lightened.

Add eggs 1 at a time, mixing just until incorporated (I did this on speed 3 on the mixer) and scraping the bowl after each egg.

Add the balance of the ingredients and beat on low speed until fully mixed (again I did this on speed 3).

Spread the filling into the springform.

If you have a less-than tight springform, wrap the bottom and sides of the springform with aluminum foil. (My springform is nice and tight, so I skipped this.) Place the springform in a large roasting pan (or any pan at least as deep as the springform and sufficiently wide). Place roasting pan in the oven, then pour water from the kettle into the baking pan until it is 1/2 way up the side of the springform. BE CAREFUL when you push the oven rack back in so as not to splash water from the pan onto the top of the cheesecake!!

Bake until the edges of the cheesecake are set but center is still 'slightly' jiggly. I really hate that type of instruction, because how jiggly is 'slightly' jiggly?! In my case, I baked until only about a 2" ring in the center jiggled when shaken and the rest of the cake was set - about 1h20min. Turn off the oven, prop the oven door open (use a wooden spoon if your oven door doesn't have a partially open setting) and let the cake sit in the oven for another 30 minutes (the recipe says 1 hour, but I was tired and 30 minutes was the best I could do before needed to go to bed!) Remove from the waterbath and cool completely on a rack. When cool, cover tightly and refrigerate at least 6 hours before cutting and enjoying!

I promise you, this is the smoothest, creamiest cheesecake you'll ever have, while still having a nice density to it - I'm not a fan of the really fluffy cheesecakes, myself!

We made both a blueberry and a raspberry sauce to serve with the cheesecake, though the raspberry was the clear winner :)

Our easy sauce is in a 1.5qt saucepan, place a few tablespoons of sugar, 1c or so of frozen berries and ~1/4 c liquer (for the raspberry sauce we used Couintreau, for the blueberry we used black currant liqour). Bring to a boil and let cook at a rolling boil for ~10 minutes, let cool before refrigerating.

Sarah wanted to know about homemade vanilla extract, and it's pretty simple. We tried it once when we had two open bottles of vodka at the house. Simply use 1 vanilla bean per 200mL of vodka you are using (approximately 1/4 of a fifth of vodka). Split the bean(s), but don't scrape the insides and drop the beans into the bottle of vodka (I use FRIS). Store in a cool dark place until the vodka is brown - and there is your homemade vanilla! When I make it, it always ends up less concentrated than store bought (you can tell by the color) no matter how long I let it 'steep', so I just use a little more when I cook with it.

Sorry I don't have pretty step by step photos like over at the cooking blogs. . . I had no idea the recipe would be share-worthy (and even if I did, did I mention that I was very tired? never start a cheesecake at 9:30pm!) Let me know if you try it!!

I'm on fire!

I am knitting up a storm. I feel very accomplished. . . lots of FOs recently :) And somehow laundry and dishes are still getting cleaned and dinner is being cooked. I wish it was always like this!

I finished two projects this weekend. First, my Woolgirl June Sock Club yarn became socks. Even though it's not a color I love, I liked knitting them up and the colorway did grow on me. They'll get a lot more 'in boots' wear than anything else. . . they were in shoes because I was going to a knitting group :) And, I have to say, with just a bit showing, they're not as overwhelming.
And, I adore my Frye shoes, so any excuse to wear them, you know :)

It's been unusually cold and so I decided I needed a better hat, too. My Dizzy barely covers the ears. I bought some Chunky Malabrigo almost a year ago to make a Clara hat for me, but never got around to it. Saturday night I wound up the yarn and Sunday morning I had a new hat. With all the yarn overs, I'm not sure how warm it'll be, but I like it anyway. Perhaps Koolhaus will be my 'warm' hat when I get around to it!

Knitting aside, is everyone Turkey'd out yet? I am, and we still have a ton left! I made stock Saturday and soup Sunday. The carcass made a lot more stock than usual, though, so I have plent to freeze to use later. I made a tukey shepherd's pie (because I made 10lbs of mashed potatoes!) that was marginal. I've never had shepherd's pie, so I don't have anything to compare to, but it definitely needed more seasoning (I used this recipie).

I had such a nice 4 days away from work, it's going to be TOUGH to get up tomorrow morning, that's for sure!

Baking Queen? Not Quite.

I came home from Knitting this afternoon to make No-Knead Bread. I got the suggestion from a Rav member in the Cooking group as a fabulous use of my fancy Le Creuset dutch oven. It has to rest for 18 hours, but I thought it was 24, so I had to kick around a bit to have it ready at a reasonable hour so I didn't have to wake up super early tomorrow to bake it. I'm a tad concerned about the dough, as it's supposed to be 'shaggy & sticky'. While I have no idea what 'shaggy' would refer to in dough, I do know sticky and this didn't seem all that sticky. I fear I may have a bit too much water, or used flour I shouldn't have. So, the possibility of it not turning out, coupled with having a ton of yeast leftover, I decided to try another bread recipe I've had sitting around the house for a while for Honey Whole Wheat bread. (Sorry, no linky, it's not online!) I have never had the best luck with bread (except for the monkey bread last Christmas), so it was a nice surprise that it turned out edible. I don't think it's exactly right because it's quite dense, which I think means I should have let it rise more. But turned out well enough that I'll try again in the future. We'll see tomorrow how the no knead turns out.

Rainy Election Day

I was going to go to the polls right at 6AM, until I saw on the news people were lined up outside in the rain waiting for polls to open. Really, I'm not that dedicated! I've never not voted in an election, and worst case I'll just go when Jake votes after work so at least I'm not waiting alone, but I'm amazed that they found some guy on the news who went to the middle school he votes at at 2:30AM to wait for them to open. Insane? I think so! All I can say is I'm darn glad today is the last day of election phone calls and TV ads.

Inspired by the soup I made last week. . . my first totally ad hoc, no reference to a recipe at all, I trolled my fridge and pantry last night and decided I would make pasta with spinach and cannellini beans. I couldn't figure out a good sauce to go with it, though, so I just googled the ingredients and came up with this one. I used whole wheat fusilli rather than bowties and I had less spinach on hand, but it was quite tasty. The only thing I can't figure out is their nutritional information:
NUTRITIONAL INFORMATION
(based on individual servings)
Calories: 545
Total Fat: 7 g
Saturated Fat: 1 g
Cholesterol: 5 mg
Sodium: 925 mg
Carbohydrates: 99 g
Fiber: g
Protein: 24 g

Where in the hell do they get 7g of Fat PER SERVING?! I'm totally confused, since the only things with fat are the tiny bit of olive oil you cook the onions in and the cheese you may sprinkle on top! I'm convinced someone mixed this up with another recipe! (Yes, I know beans have fat, but it's negligible. The brand I used has 1g in the entire can, so for 4 servings that is .25g) It was a simple and easy dinner, with lots of protein and fiber so I think it will stay in my rotation.

I hope your poll lines aren't as long as I anticipate mine to be, but do be sure you go out and

I'm rolling in green

Yarn, that is, not so much the cash :)

My Knitpicks order came in with the yarn for Jake's sweater and his slippers. 19 balls of Mainline, 7 of Wool of the Andes. And, uh, mainline, REALLY? 82 friggin' yards? Couldn't make some meatier balls? That's a WHOLE lot of ends in a sweater, which may force me to learn how to effectively do a Russian Join! I'm trying to work up the motivation to swatch ASAP because he really wants the sweater and will pester me whenever I work on something else now that the yarn is here.

Sticking with green, I started working with the Malabrigo lace I wound up on my fancy new nostepinne. The color is Vaa and it's becoming a Leaf Lace Scarf, which will be for me :) It's a super simple pattern and is going along pretty well so far. I'm trying to work on my backward knitting to avoid the purling back - recently my right elbow has been sore while I knit and avoiding purls helps it not hurt. Unfortunately, no matter how many times I trace my purl steps and repeat them on the knit side of the fabric, I keep getting the stitch oriented wrong. It's driving me bananas! I am pleased with myself for re-training my knit stitch to be fully left handed so I can keep my right hand/elbow stationary. I think it's even possible I'm a tad faster that way!

All this green needs to not distract me from my Dog Days Socks, though. I REALLY want to finish the pair before the next woolgirl shipment going out 10/13! The 2nd sock is fully knit, I just need to do the lace cuff, but I HATED the lace cuff on the first sock - a whole lot of fiddliness for not much visual effect IMO (you can't much see the flower lace in the varigated yarn!). Jake is going away fishing this weekend, so maybe I can force myself to do that rather than clean while he's gone!

My gift cowl is complete, but not blocked. It's Oh so pretty :)

Along with a box from Knitpicks, the mailman braved the downpour (literally, it was too much for the box so he had to bring it up to the house!) to bring me my Amazon order, too. Jake & I both got a book for reading, and I got Sensual Knits. I've been wanting it for ages since I saw the Transparency Sweater. Unfortunately, it appears even the cheapest yarn to make it will cost me over $60 (to keep it silk/mohair - elann has a nylon/mohair). So it will have to wait, but I really love the book. There are a lot of really pretty patterns. They all are a bit crazy on the yarn, though. I mean, who is going to use 16-23 balls of this Cashmere to make a sweater?!

Tomorrow is Jake's birthday, so today is officially his last day of his 2nd decade on the Earth. (I'm being technical here, he's turning 29, but that means he's starting his 30th year on the planet). He has requested white cake with chocolate frosting. The frosting will be homemade, the cake will be from a mix :) He also requested the cake be decorated with a chainsaw - no joke! It's his gift from his parents, my mom & I (who knew one could cost so much!) and not a surprise. We'll see how my artistic skills work! I'm also making spicy Chicken Parm (spicy sauce from this recipe) for dinner with a few of his friends coming over. Should be a nice day! I'm taking the afternoon off of work to clean the house and shop. Unfortunately for me, I'm not the cleanest baker, so I suspect additional cleaning will be required after the cake is done :)

Tofu - Take 1

In my quest for finding yummy non-meat dinners, I have branched out into tofu. This is partially because I think Jake would rather eat his own hand than eat black beans YET AGAIN, even though I'm pretty sure I could eat them every day an not be sick of them. I make stir fry a lot, so I figured swapping out the usual chicken for some tofu in the mushroom & broccoli stir fry should be pretty simple. With the aide of my trusty 'How to Cook Everything Vegetarian' (gotta love Mark Bittman!) I learned what kind of tofu to buy (Extra Firm) and some fun gals in the Cooking group on Rav told me how to prep it and I was off!
It was a LOT of tofu. . . it nearly took up my whole stir fry pan!
Then the veggies went back in.
And voilà! Finished stir fry.
And I actually liked it. Jake really liked it, but that's no surprise because he on occasion has ordered tofu out. I, on the other hand, am more skeptical. I'd only eaten it once, and didn't love it, but given this stir fry I'll give it a few more shots. Next time I'll try to crisp the outside of the tofu more. I kept it still in the pan as long as I could without burning the garlic in the hot oil, bu t then I had to stir to make sure I didn't ruin the whole dish!

The recipe, if you're interested (pretty basic stir fry - my own twist on the tofu & peppers recipe!).
2 blocks extra firm tofu - squeezed dry & cut into 1-inch cubes
1 bunch broccoli, cut to stir fry sized pieces (use the stem too! just peel the outside before chopping!)
1 lb mushrooms (I used baby bellas)
2 cloves minced garlic
1 Tbs chopped fresh ginger
~3/4 c stock (I used chicken)
~3/4 c white wine (nothing too sweet)
2 scallions - chopped
Soy Sauce
1 Tbs cornstarch + 1 Tbs water mixed to remove any lumps
Oil (I used plain vegetable oil)

Heat some oil (1-2Tbs) in a large pan on high heat. Add broccoli and cook until slightly soft (~5 minutes) stirring frequently and adding more oil if necessary to keep the pan from going dry. Add mushrooms and cook 1-2 more minutes, or until veggies are just under desired doneness. Remove veggies from pan and set aside. Heat more oil (another 1-2Tbs) in the pan and add garlic and ginger, stir, and QUICKLY add tofu (don't let the garlic burn, but do let the garlic and ginger have a bit of time before the tofu comes in). Let the tofu brown on all sides (7-8 minutes in the pan). Add wine & stock to the pan, turn heat to high and let the liquid reduce to half. Add veggies back to the pan and stir to combine. Add soy sauce (to taste, I used ~1/4c) and scallions, stir quickly and then push aside the stir fry to have a small spot in the liquid without chunks. Add the cornstarch/water mixture to the liquid and stir. Allow to thicken for 1 minute and then serve over rice!

Thanksgiving Bellyache

So this year was my first 'official', traditional Thanksgiving dinner. All in all, it turned out quite well. I didn't burn the pie crust for once. . . my pumpkin creme brulee is a new favorite. This good showing is despite Reynolds Cooking Bags TOTALLY lying to me. They told me for my turkey size, with stuffing, the bird should take 3.5-4 hours. WRONG! Thank goodness for my fabulous electronic meat thermometer. . . because less than 3 hours in, my meat registered done. I was quite confused, and debated if the thermometer was lying. Hoping it was lying, actually, as I hadn't started the potatoes to boil yet. Luckily, I have a 15,000BTU power burner on my cooktop, so I was able to rush cook the potatoes. We have an insane amount of leftovers, though. . . I hope I have the motivation to make turkey soup tomorrow. I also hope I can brave the K-Mart crowd. . . they have a 6-foot folding table on sale. . . just what I've been looking for to put in my sewing room, and I can't pass up the price. Wish me luck!

Hope you had a fabulous day, and that your belly aches less than mine!

Will Work for Kitchen Ware

I don't write about it often, but I love to cook. I love food, in general. I love going out for a great meal, but I love making it at home more. Jake likes to cook, too (don't tell him I admit it, but he's better than me at a lot of things!), so we have fun in the kitchen. As much as I love to cook, I love to shop and as such, I own a LOT of gadgets from Williams-Sonoma. I know it's overpriced and a bit pretentious, but I don't care. I adore the store. I also adore this cookware. I have coveted it for quite some time, but am too practical (and a little bit cheap) to spend that much on some pots and pans. My plan was always to register for it, but then I realized no one in their right mind would buy it for us, so it would just serve as fodder to certain family members to complain. So my solution? I am now a temporary Christmas employee at Williams-Sonoma! I have the official green apron and everything. I had thought about doing it earlier this year, I figured 6 weeks of retail hell was worth a 40% (YES! It's a 40% employee discount!) discount on my pans. However, since I rarely go to the mall the store is in, I never really followed up. Yesterday, I had to go there to return a shirt I bought Jake, so I stopped in. . . wearing no make up, ratty jeans and a fleece. I asked if they were still hiring for Christmas and could I have an application. The response was 'can you stay for 15 minutes so we can interview you?'. I looked down and said 'Well, I'm not really dressed for it, I just expected to get an application.' 'That's not a problem'. Umm, OK. So I fill out my application and wait.

Cindy, the manager, comes out, looks at the 'education' section of my application and says 'Well, you have a Master's. . . you realize you are overqualified?'. My response 'I really want the copper pots and so I want the discount to buy them.' Cindy's response 'Well, at least you're honest!'. Another 5 minutes of chatting about if I am good at gift wrapping and the job was mine. The best part (aside from the discount, of course) is that I'll be mostly gift wrapping, with some register work. No Sales!! So I get the perk of retail without really having to work with the annoying customers! Seriously, gift wrap is in the BACKROOM of the store, me and 3-4 other people, just wrapping away, no customers to be seen! I understand this means I will likely HATE the sight of gift wrap after this, but it's a small price to pay.

Really, it couldn't be more perfect. They only want me to work 15 hours or less each week, so I don't have to give up much in the way of personal (knitting) time. . . one-two weeknight shifts and one shift on Saturday or Sunday. And the rough math says the money I make working there (it will be sad little paychecks at $8/hr), combined with my discount, will pay for the pans with no out of pocket! I realize this equates to whoring myself out for 6 weeks for some French cookware. .. .but I'm OK with that :)

Birthday Present Overload!

As I've mentioned before, I LOVE presents! However, the older I get, the less I feel like I HAVE to have presents. It's not like when you're younger (read: poorer) and you can't just buy stuff you want when you want it and you really build up a list of stuff you're dying for. It gets harder for me to come up with ideas to give my family because if I want something bad enough, I buy it for myself, and my family is against money/gift cards for the most part. This year, the only thing I REALLY told my mom & dad is "Please don't buy me random yarn or knitting needles'. This stems from my mother, trying to be sweet, being totally suckered in by a LYS she went to and bought me Lantern Moon Size 8 straight needles. While they are lovely, I don't use straight needles. . . and I can imagine the other expensive things a store owner could easily talk an unknowing person into!

So, what did I get?

First, from mom. . . new seatbelt bag!

LOVE IT! I love my current bag, which I've had for 5 or so years now, but it's pretty big and thus I fill it with a lot of crap and it gets really heavy. This one is smaller and should help me avoid overload. And now I have a little purse family :)

Then, from Jake's parents, in humor you can only truly appreciate if you know them and Jake, I got a check. (They are not against cash gifts like my family). The humor of a check? The amount of the check was $.01 LESS than the check they sent Jake for his birthday. I thought it was $1.00 less, and I laughed so hard I started crying and gave the check to Jake. He pointed out it was $.01 less and I was laughing even harder.

What will these checks buy? Well, they conveniently pay for my cowboy boots :) And they will also cover the gifts I bought myself yesterday. . . One skein of Noro Silk Garden (bought yesterday on eBay. . . I finally broke down, I need to see what all the fuss is about), some awesome pink & brown sock yarn and some beautiful colored wool that I acquired from Carrie's destash. I'm going to find the perfect felted project, because I think the colors will blend so beautifully! (I'll post a pic when I get it!)

My dad called to tell me he didn't send me a gift, because I didn't give him any ideas, so he's combining at Christmas.

Then I opened my presents from Jake. . .didn't he do a nice job wrapping? All these presents I 'knew', as I went with him to point them out :) They are a 2'x3' cutting mat, straight edge and rotary cutter. I have no excuses to not work on my sewing now. There is also a pressing/blocking pad! Yay! And he did surprise me with a needle gauge :) Zosia enjoys gifts as much as I do, because she LOVEs to destroy the paper! And it NEVER gets boring to watch her open gifts for you :)


The next thing wasn't wrapped, but it was scribbled on a piece of notebook paper. . . . Mama Llama sock & shawl club memberships! VERY exciting! Both fall and spring :) I believe the fall yarn already went out, but Jake asked her to hold it, so now I have to contain myself until Catherine comes back from Brazil! I mentioned this in passing MONTHS ago, I'm impressed he remembered. So then Jake brought out my pie, and I thought that was it. After all, the yarn club was a pretty good surprise, not what I was guessing, but awesome nonetheless. See, I had guessed he had finally made me a yarn swift. . .as when I got home from Nashville I found lots of sawdust in the garage that was very poorly cleaned up. I asked Jake what he was building and he didn't give me a very convincing answer.

Our friend David was over for dessert, after a day of fishing. He told Jake he got a new pole and so they went outside to look at it. When they came back in, Jake asked me to go find a candle to light up his pumpkin for David to see it. I thought that was a bit odd, but obliged, and when I went outside to light the pumpkin, what did I find?

MY SWIFT! (picture obviously not outside!)

It's AWESOME. Quite an accomplishment given it was designed by two mechanical engineers with no real knowledge of yarn and why you use a swift! The design really is awesome, they definitely over-engineered it! It is made out of cedar, so it smells SOOOOOOOO lovely! Two of the legs slide and two have pegs, so it's infinitely adjustable to fit pretty much any skein (may be too big for some really small skeins, but those aren't a pain to wind off someone's hands, anyway). They were very proud of themselves, but a little disappointed when they watched me wind. They said it was 'built for speed' and that the bearing that allows it to spin really moves fast. Unfortunately, I don't need that speed for handwinding :) Maybe when I have a ball winder the speed aspect can be fully appreciated! I like hand winding, though, to feel the yarn while I wind it. (btw, that is me winding a skein of Malabrigo. .. . the green for Jake's hat that I feel compelled to cast on for right away out of appreciation!) The swift breaks down to be flat so it'll be easy to store.

They asked me if they did good, and I said VERY :) Their design is a lot nicer than most of the swifts I see. With a few minor tweaks, I told them they could consider selling them on etsy.

All in all, an AWESOME birthday! Thanks for all the wishes here and on Ravelry :) And if you're interested in a swift, let me know :)

Ooh, and I almost forgot. Dinner was AMAZING! Jake's beef stroganoff was better than mom's, even though it was mom's recipe (sorry mom!). The pie. . . even better! This is the recipe if anyone is interested!

Cake for Breakfast!

Happy Day ... . leftover birthday cake for breakfast :) Sparkpeople be damned! I couldn't help it. . the cake was out of a box, but the frosting was homemade. . . . and even though I forgot to add the vanilla it was DE-LISH-OUS!!

So no knitting has occurred since I got back from KC. . . too busy with Jake's birthday. He did decide yesterday he doesn't like the camo-effect of the hat, so I have to frog and decide what to do. I think new green yarn for stripes is in my future!

So, I forgot to tell you the strangest happening from KC. I can't figure out in my brain if there are really folks who are this naive, or just in denial. You be the judge. At the party I was introduced to a lady. Then I was introduced to her female roommate. Now remember, we are in the mid-West/Bible belt crossover area here. On the surface, really nothing unusual about having a roommate, until I was told 'Oh, yes, well she's just been around since we all can remember, I guess at least 20 years'. Hmm, I thought, that's interesting. .. then I noticed both the lady and the roommate are wearing rings on their right ring fingers. . . .but there are no husbands living in the house. Anyone else thinking 'roommate' is just a Missouri-acceptable euphemism? I mean, come on, who has a roommate who is just a roommate for TWENTY YEARS and, in conjunction, has never been married but wears a ring?!?!?!

So hope you have a good day :) Thanks for listening to my story. . .makes me chuckle to think about it. . . and makes me glad not to live there! (though you could argue VA isn't much more accepting of alternate lifestyles)

Which End is Up?

So I consider myself a pretty good cook. Jake is at least as good, if not better (though I'd never admit that to him. . . and no he doesn't read my blog!). I have roasted a chicken countless times in my life. I made a chicken for dinner yesterday. I stuffed the little guy with an onion and put it on the roasting rack. It looked odd. . . didn't lay right. 'Jacob, is this chicken upside down?' He looks, shrugs, says nothing. The chicken really doesn't look right. . . could I be that stupid that I can't tell where the breast is? Clearly it's upside down. I flip it over. It now lays nice and flat and looks right. I stick the meat thermometer in. Hmmm. . . . it's a little tough to push in, but whatever. Pop it in the oven, prepare to wait about an hour. After an hour, my thermometer is only reading about 130 degrees. . . (I have one of those fabulous digital thermometers that can stay in the oven while you cook. . . a la Alton Brown. . . LOVE IT!) I turn up the oven temp in an attempt to cook it faster. About 30min later the thermometer beeps to indicate I've reached 180 degrees. FINALLY! Chicken rests on the counter while I mash the potatoes and finish the gravy and finally Jake goes to carve it. NO BREAST! Well, we've had chickens that had little breast meat before, maybe that's it. UM, NOPE! He turned the chicken over, tried to carve, and there is the full breast! Not only did I cook the chicken upside down, it is UNDERCOOKED in the breast. We're entirely too hungry to put it back in the oven, so we just ate the dark meat. It was actually quite tasty. . .but I do believe in the culinary world I have lost many points for being unable to recognize the breast of a chicken. . . maybe opening that restaurant isn't a good idea!