Fun for Free!

This Summer, I'm giving myself a little goal. I hope to hit up two free activities a week. Living in New York makes this really easy. Not only are there a lot of recession-friendly deals, but the city has lots of Summer-time sponsored events at museums and in the parks.

On Saturday, Evan, Megan, and I hit up the Bronx Zoo. We each got in free with our cards from Bank of America. Every first Saturday of the month, BOA sponsors free admission to 100 venues across the U.S. So if you have a credit or debit card or whatever, check out where you can get in for free!

At the Bronx Zoo, the must-see exhibit is the one with the gorillas. In addition to the cost of admission, it's $3. Not a bad deal when you get in for free!

I loved the gorillas so much. There were about 10 gorillas in all, including three toddlers chasing each other and an old silverback who was lounging around.

I wanted this one gorilla to fall in love with me and run away with me King Kong style... and then I found out it was a girl.

Hm.

Then last night was the annual Museum Mile. The museums on the east side were all free and open late. We wanted to see the Guggenheim.

Evan and I planned to meet up on the west side before heading over. And he ran into our friend Mitzi who was heading to meet her fiance, Tony! What luck! Tony had been waiting in the long line for the Guggenheim, so luckily we got in without having to wait.

It was so cool inside! I loved the Frank Lloyd Wright architecture. He designed it so that it was conical, which allowed us to take the elevator to the top and just walk the spiraling ramp to the bottom.

I was excited that the museum was filled with art from my two favorite eras: Impressionism and Modern. So much fun... for free!

My First Fondant

I always wanted an EasyBake Oven.

Instead, I pretended our kitchen was a restaurant and made up menus listing the few items I could make: hot dogs, toast, peanut butter and jelly sandwiches... the classics. I can't remember how much I charged, but I'm pretty sure that I was willing to negotiate for nothing.

I inherited my sweet tooth from both sides of my family, and although cooking meals has yet to come naturally, my love for baking desserts seems to just keep growing. I guess I just figure there's a lot of intimidating science involved with the accuracy in cooking. But baking seems harder to mess up... (Although the infamous "Salt-for-Sugar Swap" of '85 in our brownies was a baking benchmark for me and my friend, Jenny).

I have since learned to be a little more patient with myself. A little. In the past I've spent time teaching myself how to create yummy cookies, cupcakes, and pies. More recently I've been wanting to become a little better at making cakes. Recently, I finally took a stab at making a cake with fondant on top. Allison (quite the savvy cake-maker) gave us some advice. It was followed by a last-minute phone call for help to Michal, who might be one of the best cooks I know.

Okay, so here's what we made. A four-layer chocolate cake with raspberry and whipped cream, plus buttercream with fondant on top.


The marshmallow fondant was quite the adventure to work with. I guess the big thing that we quickly learned was to grease the countertop before working with the fondant. We ended up making it work, but it was just a little messier to clean up than it would have been had we greased the counter.


We dyed some fondant and used the Spring colors to make a Spring-themed cake.
Look! Pretty flowers...

Evan added a butterfly... and a sun with - of course - sunglasses. (I'm sure there's something existential about that). Oh... and I made some grass with a lil' bunny hiding.

And Megan was kind enough to add a ladybug (cute!) and a caterpillar.

It was not only the cutest cake ever but also one of the yummiest! :)