Key Lime Pie

I have gotten to know my dentist and endodontist very well over the past 15 months. After 8 fillings, 2 cleanings, multiple x-rays, endodontal surgery, a root canal, and a treatment for a crown (got the temporary one on my tooth right now and will get the actual crown on the 25th), I know that my dentist enjoys manchego cheese, that the dental assistant doesn’t eat pork, but will still cook with bacon fat (also, we recognize each other when we run into one another at Whole Foods) and, somewhat inexplicably, I also know that my endodontist has had a hysterectomy. Things just “pop” out sometimes, I guess? (And I’m the one under the anesthesia.) It’s like being at the hairdresser, except you have drills and brushes and picks in your mouth so you become the one doing the listening.

Key lime pie topped with fresh whipped cream.

What am I trying to say, though? Why do you need to know about my dental work? Oh, yes, I remember: Despite all these problems, all this dental work, I have yet to be told by these professionals: STOP EATING ALL THAT SUGAR. I’d like to say I’m trying to cut down, but I’d be lying. Some people smoke. Other people drink. I, like Lamar Odom, love sugar. I like it in candy. I like it in desserts. I like it in my drinks. We all have our vices. I just have to be careful. And so, for the most part, when I make all these desserts I share with family, friends, and mostly coworkers.

So I will occasionally make attempts to reduce my sugar intake, because it’s unhealthy and I don’t want to encourage this kind of behavior, it won’t stop me from baking all sorts of concoctions. Concoctions such as this lovely key lime pie:

Pastel de tres leches (tres leches cake)

Today is my boyfriend’s birthday. We celebrated this weekend with a good deal of good food, too. On Saturday we went to Woodberry Kitchen and had an all-around wonderful meal, simply wonderful (review and pictures to come). I can’t say too many good things about it. I had tuna seared with Moroccan spies; he had braised leg of lamb with lamb sausage and eggplant and other good things. I could go on, but I’ll save that for another time.

We continued the food good times Sunday night with steamed crabs covered in salty, delicious Old Bay seasoning. At the end of the meal, the proprieters were so good to let me bring in the cake I had baked for his birthday.

This cake, in fact:

Tres leches cake made with a rum milk syrup.