Botching a Botch-Proof Cake
This year I reached a new low in the ever-continuing cake decorating fiasco saga... Henry wanted a "Harry Potter" themed party to celebrate his birthday. I was thrilled, because in the stories his oaf of a friend, Hagrid, makes a cake. On the way to Harry he sits on it and practically destroys it. The result is a messy, cracked, smudgy cake. Perfect, I thought, there's literally no way to mess this one up!
I underestimate even my own (in)abilities...
This is what the cake should have looked like, more or less:
I baked the first layer and turned it out onto the cooling rack beautifully. Oh yeah, I've got this. This year I was going to nail the cake business.
I put the second layer in to bake and went about my business, cleaning the house to get ready for the party. I came back a little later when the timer beeped. Grabbing my small grabber hot pads (rather than real hot pads), I reached absently into the oven to pull the pan out.
It was just about out of the oven when the pan slipped from my fingers and crashed onto the oven door. Cake crumbled and spilled everywhere.
How can you goof up a goof-proof cake? Drop it. That's how.
As usual, Micah swooped in with suggestions to fix the situation.
"This is perfect! Dudley, Harry's cousin, eats the cake in the movie, and completely destroys it. Just say Dudley got to it before Harry could."
So this is what we made:
But I couldn't live with presenting that as a birthday cake. So after the house was clean, I mixed up another batch of cake. After decorating it, this was the result:
And then I ran a cleaning cycle on the oven.
Birthday cake disasters: 558
April: 0
You can't win 'em all...
I underestimate even my own (in)abilities...
This is what the cake should have looked like, more or less:
 |
| Photo credit: http://thecakedcrusader.blogspot.com/2008/09/cafta_10.html |
I baked the first layer and turned it out onto the cooling rack beautifully. Oh yeah, I've got this. This year I was going to nail the cake business.
I put the second layer in to bake and went about my business, cleaning the house to get ready for the party. I came back a little later when the timer beeped. Grabbing my small grabber hot pads (rather than real hot pads), I reached absently into the oven to pull the pan out.
It was just about out of the oven when the pan slipped from my fingers and crashed onto the oven door. Cake crumbled and spilled everywhere.
How can you goof up a goof-proof cake? Drop it. That's how.
As usual, Micah swooped in with suggestions to fix the situation.
"This is perfect! Dudley, Harry's cousin, eats the cake in the movie, and completely destroys it. Just say Dudley got to it before Harry could."
So this is what we made:
But I couldn't live with presenting that as a birthday cake. So after the house was clean, I mixed up another batch of cake. After decorating it, this was the result:
And then I ran a cleaning cycle on the oven.
Birthday cake disasters: 558
April: 0
You can't win 'em all...
