“What a wonderful thing the skin is! It is the largest and most important integument of the whole human organism!
What millions of pores it contains! The minutest aperture might absorb the deadliest poison.
Once in contact with the surface of the body, whether the particle be held in a miasma, or dissolved in the water of ablution, the pore, like a fatal canal, conveys it into the system, whence its eradication may be impossible, and where it may generate untold mischief.”

— “Skin, Baths, Bathing, and Soap,” Francis Pears for Pears Soap, 1859

Happy Halloween!
I hope you all had lots of spooks and good fun and cheap candy. I was glad to eat a slightly smushed KitKat that I accidentally sat on in clinic. It hit the spot, NGL.
The scene in New York is mildly confused as that there are two Halloweekends this year, with the 31st itself straddling the work week. I chose this upcoming one to dress up, but I have to say that as soon as the clock strikes November, I’m not sure how keen on wearing fairy wings I am going to be. Alas.

Far more frightening to me is Election Day next week.
Ghouls and ghosts are ephemeral, whereas 4 years can be an everlasting eternity, as we have learned to our sorrow.
I voted early, by mail. My brother voted from overseas. Have you registered to vote?
I feel lucky to be switching over to our public hospital/Bellevue clinic this week, because I will have Tuesday off to pace around my shoebox apartment and nurse what I am certain will be a wicked tension headache.

As a dermatologist, I had to become quickly accustomed to doing biopsies. Frequently, these are punch biopsies, where a little circular piece of tissue is cut out and sent off to pathology. Every time I do these, I can’t help but think of them as a little skin cake, because you can see all the layers as you cut it out. I know. I’m sorry. Ew.
Since Halloween is really the only time I ever make gory sweets, I decided to recreate my mental image as a real, um, skin cake.

This cake itself starts in the best possible way: with two sticks of butter slowly browning, releasing the most delicious, nutty, Maillard scent. The result is pure, unadulterated gold. Allow it to cool and harden, and then it goes into a soft, brown butter, brown sugar sponge, kept moist with lots of yogurt.
A small portion is set aside and used to flavor heaps of brown butter vanilla Italian meringue buttercream. This is my new favorite and may become a go-to. Who would have thought that just 4 tablespoons (about 1 tablespoon per egg white used) could imbue the buttercream with so much flavor?
A quick fresh raspberry preserve sandwiches in, adding moisture, acid, and a little ~blood.~
The outside can be bedecked to your heart’s desire. For me, it needed little fat lobules and veins and arterioles, some eccrine glands and hair follicles and the most enchantingly snaky, twisty candle hairs. It’s sooooo gross. I love it.
Me + a fresh tube of marzipan = trouble and hours of lost sleep. I was really up until 4AM on a Wednesday rolling marzipan capillaries.
I’ll never learn my lesson. I don’t want to. It’s too fun and I have no self control. Boo!

Halloween, previously:

Kaonashi/No Face’s Feast Tart with the teeniest tiniest sculptures
Eve’s temptation with bleeding pomegranate
Pumpkin Milk Tea Cake with eenie-meenie piped decorations
Brown butter pumpkin cake with chocolate chili ganache with teeny marzipan pumpkins
Pumpkin and condensed milk cakes, à la tres leches
Edward Gorey-inspired skeleton cat and bat cookies
Ghosts trapped in chocolate ganache on a pumpkin cake
Bats, eyeballs, and pumpkin-moji cookies
Old, old peanut butter cup cake with Reese’s
Of course, this ludicrous bleeding heart cake

Brown Butter Raspberry Cake
makes 1 3-layer 6″ round cake
cake recipe lightly adapted from Buttermilk by Sam

brown butter:
225 grams (2 sticks) unsalted butter

for the brown butter cake:
150 grams (2/3 cups) solidified brown butter
300 grams (1 1/2 cups loosely packed) brown sugar
1 tablespoon vanilla extract
2 teaspoons sea salt
4 eggs
335 grams (2 2/3 cups) flour
1 tablespoon plus 1 1/2 teaspoons baking powder
1/2 teaspoon baking soda
320 grams (1 1/3 cups) whole milk plain yogurt
100 grams (1/2 cup) vegetable oil

for the raspberry filling:
15 grams (1 tablespoon) water
8 grams (1 tablespoon) cornstarch
225 grams (2 cups) frozen raspberries
45 grams (scant 1/4 cup) sugar
1 teaspoon lemon juice
1 teaspoon vanilla extract

for the brown butter Italian meringue:
4 egg whites
200 grams (1 cup) sugar
1 teaspoon salt
120 grams (1/2 cup) water
Remainder of brown butter from above, approximately 60 grams
400 grams (3.5 sticks, 28 tablespoons) butter
2 teaspoons vanilla extract

directions:
Brown the butter: place butter in a medium pot over medium-low heat and stir frequently until nutty, toasted, and brown, about 5-6 minutes.
Set aside and allow to cool completely until hardened.
Make the raspberry preserves: put all ingredients together into a small pot, making sure to stir well to prevent clumps of cornstarch.
Cook over low heat until bubbling and thick, about 7-10 minutes.
Set aside and allow to cool completely.
Make the cake: preheat oven to 345 degrees F and grease and flour 3 6″ baking pans.
Place 150 grams of the brown butter in the bowl of a stand mixer with brown sugar, salt, and vanilla.
Whip on high until light and fluffy, then add in eggs 1 at a time, being sure to allow them to incorporate fully before adding the next.
Sift flour, baking powder, and baking soda together.
Stir yogurt and oil together.
Add the wet and dry ingredients in 3 portions, scraping the sides of the bowl as necessary.
Portion out the batter into the prepared pans and bake for 18-20 minutes, or until a tester comes out with a few moist crumbs and the tops spring back.
Allow to cool completely, then torte as necessary to level the layers.
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 regular butter one piece at a time, whipping until fully combined.
Then add the brown butter and vanilla and whip until fluffy.
Tint the frosting as desired with gel food coloring.
Spread a coat of frosting on top of the first layer, creating a well in the center, then add 1/4 cup of the raspberry preserves to the center; stack the next layer on top and repeat.
Crumb coat the cake and refrigerate for at least 30 minutes or until crumb coat is completely hardened.
Frost as desired.