a Better Bubble™
Adapted, just barely, from Melissa Clark at the New York Times, who adapted it from Molly Killeen at the Park Slope Farmers’ Market
About the baking vessel: The recipe says to use a 9×13 baking dish (often glass or ceramic). I used a 9×13 cake pan (which was metal) and ended up with something that browned a bit more than I would have liked. I’d use a “dish” next time, which I believe will brown the bottom less aggressively.
About the baking time: My cake, in a thinner, metal baking pan, was also finished 15 minutes sooner than estimated, and was already a little past the “goo” stage. I chalk this up to the pan. However, I put baking times in a wide range; if you’re using a metal baking pan (though, again, I’d recommend a glass or ceramic dish), err on the cautious side. Eh, err on the cautious side either way. Always. Better safe than sorry.
Yields 16 to 20 servings, but I cut mine into 24 and may or may not know 10 people who polished off every one of them after dinner
IngredientsMake the cake dough: In a small bowl, mix milk with 2 tablespoons warm water. Add yeast and whisk gently until it dissolves. Mixture should foam slightly. (Very slightly in my case.)
Using an electric mixer with paddle attachment, cream butter, sugar and salt. Scrape down sides of bowl and beat in the egg. Alternately add flour and the milk mixture, scraping down sides of bowl between each addition. Clark doesn’t say to do this, but I switched to a dough hook at this point to beat dough on medium speed until it formed a smooth mass and pulled away (just a little, my dough was still very soft) from sides of bowl, 7 to 10 minutes.
Press, stretch and nudge dough into an ungreased (original recipe suggests this; I found that my topping stuck a lot and I really had to cut around it with a sharp knife; I will grease mine next time) 9-by 13-inch baking dish (see Note above about baking dishes) at least 2 inches deep. Cover dish with plastic wrap or clean tea towel, put in a warm place, and allow to rise until doubled, 2 1/2 to 3 hours.
Make the gooey topping: Heat oven to 350 degrees. To prepare topping, in a small bowl, whisk corn syrup with 2 tablespoons water and the vanilla. Using an electric mixer with paddle attachment, cream butter, sugar and salt until light and fluffy, 5 to 7 minutes. Scrape down sides of bowl and beat in the egg. Alternately add flour and corn syrup mixture, scraping down sides of bowl between each addition.
Spoon topping in large dollops over risen cake and use an offset spatula to gently spread it in an even layer. Bake for 30 to 45 minutes (see Note above about wide range); cake will rise and fall in waves and have a golden brown top, but will still be liquid in center when done. Allow to cool in pan before sprinkling with confectioners’ sugar for serving.
Source URL
smittenkitchen.com
Author
Deb Perelman
Source
Reddit
I've been banging on a bit lately about the importance of video game preservation as a matter of art preservation. It's not entirely clear to me how much buy in there is out there in general on this concept, but it's a challenge in this specific industry because much of the control over what can be preserved or not sits in the hands of game publishers and platforms compared with other forms of art. Books have libraries, films have the academies and museums, and music is decently preserved all over the place. But for gaming, even organizations like the Video Game History Foundation have to rely on publishers and platforms to let them do their work, or risk art being lost entirely to the digital ether or lawsuits over copyright. We've talked in the past about how copyright law is far too often used in a way that results in a loss of our own cultural history, and digital-only video games are particularly vulnerable to that.
We just discussed Nintendo's forthcoming shutdown of the 3DS and Wii U stores, and what that meant for digital games that Nintendo indicates it is not planning on selling anywhere else. Well, the Video Game History Foundation released a statement on that action and, well, hoo-boy...
While it is unfortunate that people won’t be able to purchase digital 3DS or Wii U games anymore, we understand the business reality that went into this decision. What we don’t understand is what path Nintendo expects its fans to take, should they wish to play these games in the future. As a paying member of the Entertainment Software Association, Nintendo actively funds lobbying that prevents even libraries from being able to provide legal access to these games. Not providing commercial access is understandable, but preventing institutional work to preserve these titles on top of that is actively destructive to video game history. We encourage ESA members like Nintendo to rethink their position on this issue and work with existing institutions to find a solution.
Accusing Nintendo of being "actively destructive to video game history" is a hell of a charge, but point out where it's wrong. I'll wait.
The problem here is that video games are still seen, both by the public and producers, as something less than the kind of artistic output of literature, paintings, sculptures, or movies. Imagine a world where someone took the collective works of Monet or Bach, shutdown the venue in which you could pay to see them, and then also indicated that nobody else was allowed to display them for commercial benefit or not. Nobody would accept such a situation. That is culture and it belongs, in at least some small ways, to all of us.
Either because the history of video games is much more recent, or due to stodgy hand-waiving about how these games are not "real art", far less fur is raised over Nintendo taking these actions without any guarantee, or in some cases hostility, to preservation efforts. Yes, Nintendo has directly produced many of these games and it has rights for them due to that. But those games are also part of our shared cultural history, and no individual or company is, or should be, afforded the right to determine how we document that cultural history.
If nothing else, that certainly isn't the purpose of copyright law.
stLouIST
