And day to day, life’s a hard job, you get tired, you lose the pattern.
You need distance, interval.
The way to see how beautiful the earth is, is to see it as the moon.
The way to see how beautiful life is, is from the vantage point of death.

― Ursula K. Le Guin, The Dispossessed: An Ambiguous Utopia

Happy twelfth birthday to La Pêche Fraîche.

This blog, and baking, could easily be a burden, after all these years. Yet it has grown with me through that time, and challenged my creativity at every step, and feels more like an extension of my soul than a beast of burden.
Each and every of the past 144 months has represented a project, a production, something that I am forced to do with my hands, that stops me from my regular life doldrums and allows me to immerse myself in the comforting realm of my kitchen.
There have been so many kitchens now that I have baked in and posted from, but each represented a little oven oasis that was all mine. (Even when the bakes ended up in the bin… That can be cathartic too.)

So thank you for being here, reading this, and allowing me to share my escapist confections with you.

Zucchini bread, zucchini cake, all summer long—no one blinks.
Pumpkin bread, pumpkin cake—literally representative of an entire season’s bakes.
Carrot cake is an oft-cited favorite flavor year-round, and I’ve dabbled with parsnip before, and fresh sweet corn… And as summer peeks around the corner, I thought, why not tomato cake?
My grandma has described her experience with tomatoes as a child in Korea: sliced and sprinkled with sugar, served as fruit after a meal.

As it turns out, I was far, far, far from the first to have this idea. In fact, Campbell’s first cites a tomato soup spice cake in one of their recipe books from the 1920s.

The cake it produces is soft and moist, with a wonderful, gently spiced flavor punctuated with ginger and cinnamon. The tomatoes add a certain earthy je-ne-sais-quoi that I also find in the aforementioned vegetable cakes; just the right touch of umami. The color is a beautiful terra cotta, and could easily be mistaken for a pumpkin spice cake.
Here, I’ve paired it with a similarly savory olive oil Italian meringue buttercream, which is glossy, fluffy, and fatty, with a whisper of peppery brightness from the olive oil.
It’s practically salad, at this rate, and I can imagine it in cupcake or muffin form all through the fall, fitting in with all of its spiced brethren.

Eleven years / banana and maple caramel cake
Ten years / choco-Kewpie ichigo daifuku cake
Nine years / raspberry cloud cake
Eight years / white chocolate, mascarpone, and lemon cake
Seven years / yellow cake with cherry buttercream
Six years / vegan coconut and chocolate cake
Five years / simple chocolate cake
Four years / eclectic chocolate cake
Three years / vanilla almond cake
Two years / malted milk birthday cake
One year / eek

Tomato Cake with Olive Oil Frosting 
makes 1 3-layer 6-inch cake
ingredients:
for the tomato cake:
260 grams (2 cups) flour
2 teaspoons baking powder
1 teaspoon cinnamon
1/4 teaspoon nutmeg
1/4 teaspoon cardamom
1/4 teaspoon allspice
1/8 teaspoon cloves
1/2 teaspoon ground ginger
113 grams (8 tablespoons) butter, softened
200 grams (1 cup) sugar
3/4 teaspoon salt
2 large eggs
1 (10 3/4 ounce) can condensed tomato soup
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
1 teaspoon baking soda

for the olive oil Italian meringue frosting:
85 grams (3 large) egg whites
150 grams (3/4 cup) sugar
1/2 teaspoon salt
45 grams (3 tablespoons) water
310 grams (22 tablespoons) butter, softened
2 tablespoons olive oil

directions:
Make the cake: preheat oven to 350 degrees F and grease and flour 3 6″ round pans.
Whip butter, sugar, and salt together on medium speed until light and fluffy.
Add in eggs one at a time, beating fully to combine after each one.
Stir flour, baking powder, and spices together.
In a separate bowl, stir tomato soup, vanilla extract, and baking soda together—it will fizz and foam, so be sure to use a large bowl.
Scrape the sides of the bowl with the butter mixture.
Add the soup and flour mixtures in alternating measures, starting and ending with the flour.
Portion into prepared pans and bake for 15-18 minutes, or until a tester comes out with a few small, clinging crumbs.
Allow cake to cool completely.
Meanwhile, prepare the Italian meringue buttercream: place sugar, salt, and water into a pan over medium heat.
Begin to whip egg whites on high; once the sugar syrup comes to 240 degrees F, the egg whites should be at soft peaks.
Slowly stream the hot syrup into the whipping egg whites, being extremely careful to not splatter the syrup.
Whip on high speed until the meringue has cooled to close to room temperature (or fully room temp, if your butter is completely at room temp).
Add butter one piece at a time, whipping until fully combined, then add the olive oil and whip until homogeneous.
Tint the frosting as desired with gel food coloring.
Crumb coat the cake and refrigerate for at least 30 minutes or until crumb coat is completely hardened (this is especially important given the caramel inside of the cake).
Frost as desired.