My kitchen is starting to look like as kitchen, but not like the kitchen I had before.

I am not complaining.  The kitchen in Old Lyme was created by me and my husband.  As always, it was the first room to be finished.  It was two rooms and a hall.  It was dark and applianced in harvest gold.  The counter was Formica or faux Formica (is that an oxymoron?)  The floor was linoleum.

In around two months, the two rooms began one, the hall was annihilated, and the door to what would become a patio became French doors.  The counter was granite on the island, butcher block on two other walls.  I had a six-burner gas cooktop, two electric ovens and a warming drawer.  Under the cooktop were two enormous shelves that held my two-foot salad bowl and my big stockpots.

My new kitchen is pretty, too.  But I have an electric range with one oven.  My dishwasher died after two turns with dishes.  I do have granite counters, but no island, no easy action to my special rack for muffin pans, warm cookies or half-sheet pans.  But I am making do and consider myself lucky that a mediocre cook learned how to be better with a great kitchen.  I am good enough, now, to cook anywhere.

Parties have begun and I am expected to bring food to the homes of terrific friends.  Last week I made potato salad (yes, two of my stockpots are on top of another rack over the sink.)  This week I may make a dessert.  I gave away at least 10 loaf pans and round pans and square pans in 8”, 9” and 10” sizes.

Here is the lemon cake everyone likes; as Staples says, “We have that!”

Lemon Cake

Adapted from Barefoot Contessa Parties by Ina Garten (Clarkson Potter/Publishers, New York, 2001)

Yield: Two 8-inch loaves

½ (one-half) pound unsalted butter at room temperature
2 ½ (two and one-half) cups granulated sugar, divided
4 extra-large (or 5 large) eggs at room temperature
1/3 (one-third) cup grated lemon zest (6 to 8 large lemons)
3 cups all-purpose flour
One-half teaspoon baking powder
One-half teaspoon baking soda
1 teaspoon kosher (or sea) salt
Three-quarter cup freshly squeezed lemon juice, divided*
Three-quarter cup buttermilk at room temperature
1 teaspoon pure vanilla extract

For the glaze:

2 cups confectioners’ sugar

three and one-half tablespoons freshly squeezed lemon juice

Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Grease two 8 ½ (eight and one-half) by 4 ¼ (four and one-quarter) by 2 ½ (two and one-half) inch loaf pans.

Cream butter and 2 cups of the granulated sugar in the bowl of an electric mixer fitted with the paddle attachment for about 5 minutes, or until light and fluffy. With the mixer on medium speed, add eggs, one at a time, and the lemon zest.

Sift together flour, baking powder, baking soda and salt in a bowl. In another bowl, combine one-quarter cup lemon juice, the buttermilk and vanilla. Add flour and buttermilk mixtures alternately to the batter, beginning and ending with the flour mixture. Divide batter evenly between the pans, smooth the tops and bake for 45 minutes to 1 hour, until a cake tester comes out clean. (I find that on convection bake, this takes just over 35 minutes, so check with a cake tester after this period of time.)

Combine one-half cup granulated sugar with one-half cup lemon juice in a small saucepan and cook over low heat until sugar dissolves.

When cakes are done, let them cool for 10 minutes in the pan, then invert them onto a rack set over a tray. Spoon lemon syrup over inverted cakes. Allow cakes to cook completely.

For the glaze, combine confectioners’ sugar and lemon juice in a bowl, mixing with a wire whisk until smooth. (It should be thick but if it’s too thick, add a few drops of water.) Turn cakes right side up and pour glaze over tops of cakes. Allow glaze to drizzle down sides.

This is where I use the release kind of Reynolds Aluminum foil to wrap the cakes. But wax paper works well, too. The important part is to wrap them so the wrapping doesn’t strip off the glaze when you unwrap. After wrapping (if you’re not serving these right away), I put them in zippered freezer bags and freeze until ready to use.

*If you squeeze all the lemons you use for the zest (7 or 8), you get about 1 cup of juice, enough for cake, syrup and glaze..

Canisters for dry goods

One thing I did not mind leaving at my old house was the weevils.  Maybe they are not exactly weevils, but they began as evil little things and wound up as moths.  I spent lots of money on Pantry Pests, not as ugly as fly paper, but not the prettiest thing in my pantry.  Before I left the old kitchen, I dumped all the dry food, like flour, sugar (although I don’t think they like sugar), barley, couscous and the like, along with the canisters that held the stuff.

For over two weeks, I looked for canisters that would hold at least 10 pounds of flour, 5 pounds of sugar and enough rice and quinoa to hold weevil-free white goods.

I found them in T.J. Maxx.  Not sparingly, they are made by OXO Good Grips, a company that began with a potato peeler for people whose grip wasn’t as good as it used to be.  I wrote about them years ago and they sent me a Christmas card signed by all seven of OXO’s employees.  They still make incredible, reasonably priced, gadgets. Especially now that my grips are not as young as they used to be.

About the author: Lee White (left) has been writing about restaurants and cooking since 1976 and has been extensively published in the Worcester (Mass.) Magazine, The Day, Norwich Bulletin, and Hartford Courant.  She currently writes Nibbles and a cooking column called A La Carte for LymeLine.com and the Shore Publishing newspapers, and Elan, a quarterly magazine, all of which are now owned by The Day.