Nastia's birthday and cake

Nasti’s birthday was this past Sunday, she turned 25. I could go on over several pages about how this just blows my mind. She and her sister have been here 14 years. To me it seems like just a couple of weeks. They have been out of high school, what, if Elena just turned 23 in August, then it’s five years for her, six for Nastia.

Sean and Nastia had big plans for her birthday. He had a surprise for her to get her nails done and they were going to go off to a casino Saturday night into Sunday the third, her birthday, with us being regulated to celebrating it on Friday night. I was a little put out and disappointed, but it’s her birthday and she should celebrate it how she wants. All the plans came crashing down when the week before her birthday Sean came down with something that looked vaguely like the flu. He

said he had pains in his belly about where his pancreas is. Teri thought it might be pancreatitis. I thought it was just the flu. After a few days he goes to the doctor and he has mononucleosis, which is spread by saliva. I thought Nastia should have it too, but she never did. For the next several days she slept with her sister. During this time Nastia is fretting that he will be sick on her birthday and they won’t be able to do anything. I tell her to take it day by day. They cancel everything around Wednesday. By Friday, Sean is well enough to go back to work and Nastia’s birthday dinner is rescheduled for Sunday late afternoon.

Teri calls for a reservation at five, Sunday. On Saturday, we go to the movies and she asks me to check the reservation. It is a good thing I did because they didn’t have it. Sunday at five the eight of us, Teri, me, Nastia, Sean, Elena, Nancy, my mom and her friend Bruce are ready to be seated. Nancy brings her grandson KJ because Amanda is working. I think I see a big disaster heading towards Nastia’s birthday party. It turns out KJ is the perfect guest. He is a little loud and is moved from right next to my mom to the next seat over. He doesn’t cry or act bad. He is amazed by the Onion volcano and by his reaction is very surprised by his first taste of ice cream. He eagerly comes back for more so I think he liked it.

I take more videos of him than Nastia. He is more entertaining. The food is as usual, very good and Nastia asked to have Peter chef our meal, both she and Sean know him. My only complaint is whenever there was extra rice or noodles or steak it went to Sean who was not 100% over his disease. Peter should have shared the wealth. We wrap things up and I believe we are home around eight. It is a nice night. Nastia asked me to make a tres leches cake on Saturday. When someone wants this cake I usually go to Restaurant Depot and purchase a cake that is too large for the occasion and sometimes it doesn’t get eaten. I also like to try new things when I cook. Sometimes they go off the rails, other times I amaze myself. So the idea of making a Tres leche cake interested me. I found a recipe online and it turns out it is a very simple recipe to make. The hardest part is to separate the egg whites and yokes without polluting one or the other. The yokes go in first and after the whites are whipped into their foamy glory you combine them gently into the mix avoiding over mixing preventing losing all the air you incorporated into the whites. Basically you are making a sponge cake. You poke a lot of holes in it after it cooks and cools. You then mix three kinds of milk, condensed, sweet and regular, I used ½-½. It was only supposed to sit in the refrigerator from Saturday to Sunday, but no one was hungry after dinner. It sat until Tuesday. A quick whipping of heavy cream and vanilla, a splash of cinnamon on top of it and it is cake time. It was really good. We ate it after dinner on Tuesday. Well worth the wait.