TheBanyanTree: Another Story From My Kitchen

[Pam Lawley]

Thanks Jodene - that's always nice to hear!!

And for the record, I tried the cake... I think the layers *are* a little
dry, but seriously, between the 'blackout' filling and the frosting - WHO
CARES??!?
I've only had a couple of small bites so far, and my teeth hurt!  ;/

So I guess actually it's NOT ruined - but man-oh-man, how much better could
anyone stand it with a cup and half of hot water!?!??!  ;/
On Tue, Jun 21, 2011 at 12:15 AM, Jodene <jodeneperrin at comcast.net> wrote:

> Very funny story, well told!
>
> Sent from my iPhone
>
>
> On Jun 20, 2011, at 6:51 PM, Pam Lawley <pamj.lawley at gmail.com> wrote:
>
> I like to bake.  I like to bake new and different - sort of difficult -
>> recipes.  Big, juicy cakes with lots of ingredients... not really
>> "complicated", but not super-easy.  Okay, sometimes those
>> 'throw-all-the-dry-**ingredients-in-and-add-the-**wet-stuff-and-mix'
>> recipes are
>> kind of effective too!  But I like surfing the net and looking for new
>> recipes.  I've built myself a binder of those recipes I've printed out,
>> and
>> sometimes I flip through and see one and think, 'oh, that was GOOD!  I
>> should make it again!' - and then I go find a new one!
>>
>> A couple of weeks ago I made a big cake for a co-workers wedding rehearsal
>> dinner, and I put a mousse filling in between the layers.  I hear the cake
>> was tasty, but I wondered about that mousse sitting out for a couple of
>> days.  So when I was making another big cake for a
>> non-co-worker-but-my-son's-**girlfriend's-father-who-also-**
>> works-for-the-government
>> (who'd requested it for his 'Employee Appreciation Luncheon), I went
>> surfing
>> for another filling recipe.  And I found this:
>> http://www.oprah.com/food/**Three-Layer-Chocolate-Cake-**
>> with-Blackout-Filling<http://www.oprah.com/food/Three-Layer-Chocolate-Cake-with-Blackout-Filling>
>>
>> I thought the filling sounded perfect, so I printed out the whole recipe!
>>
>> The filling had to be cooked and then allowed to cool, and then
>> refrigerated.  But I found that when I went to actually spread it that it
>> was pretty darned hardened.  Hmmm...  not a problem - I just nuked it for
>> a
>> few seconds and it softened up just enough to work great!  Because I was
>> spreading it between two 14" layers, I'd doubled the recipe and I had just
>> enough!  (And I hear that cake was pretty tasty too!)
>>
>> Meanwhile, a wonderful friend had sent me a cookbook by this chick:
>> http://www.bakerella.com  and I'd tried my hand at making her cake balls.
>> Bakerella suggested just making a boxed cake and using canned frosting.  I
>> really, really detest canned frosting!!  While I HAVE been known to use a
>> boxed cake mix occasionally when I was going to spend time decorating a
>> cake, the frosting from a can just does not deserve to be called frosting
>> in
>> my very humble opinion.  But I bought a can to make the balls.
>>
>> They turned out pretty good, though my decorating artisticness is NOTHING
>> close to hers!  But they were fun, and it was a first try, and I got to
>> play
>> with colored candy melts and sprinkles!
>>
>> And then I had a brainstorm!  I could try the balls again, but instead of
>> the cake I'd make up a batch of that chocolate filling that hardened so
>> well, roll that into balls, and then do the decorating, etc...  They'd
>> actually be more like candy - and I'd even use real chocolate instead of
>> the
>> colored melts!!  Or, I could use some of the leftover-from-the-first-time
>> melts to decorate with!  I had big plans!!  So I made a QUADRUPLE batch of
>> the filling so I'd have plenty!!
>>
>> Not surprisingly, with so many great plans, when I made it the second time
>> it didn't harden up quite so nicely!!  Obviously something with the heat
>> in
>> cooking.  Or something.
>>
>> Okay, not a problem!  I'd make up a chocolate boxed mix real quick, and
>> then
>> I'd use the filling in place of the canned frosting!  Which I did, and it
>> worked out okay though I really don't think that it tasted all that
>> different from the first batch with (e-gads!!) canned frosting!  I
>> probably
>> could have added more filling, but I didn't want it to be too mushy, which
>> is something Bakerella's book warned about.  And I surfed the web to find
>> out how best to make chocolate candy coating.  Actually Hershey's website
>> told me how - but I think I shouldn't have listened.  As it turned out,
>> and
>> I figured this out talking to another co-worker (hey!  the government
>> hires
>> a LOT of people!), I should have added just a bit of paraffin to keep it
>> hardened so it wouldn't melt when I touched it!  Because I was trying to
>> be
>> all creative and artsy - but as soon as I went near the coating it melted!
>> Bummer.
>>
>> But again, not a problem.  I figured to just treat them like a 'truffle',
>> and that I should run to Michael's to get some of those cute little paper
>> 'cups' to hold each piece.  And then it dawned on me (I LOVE it when that
>> happens!) - probably I could save myself the trip and just use the some of
>> the STACKS of mini-cupcake papers I have!!  Viola!  (I always think of
>> sash
>> when I type that word though that has nothing to do with my story!)  I
>> have
>> developed something of a cupcake baking cups fetish and I have HUNDREDS in
>> my cabinet - for 'regular' cupcakes, and for minis!  Purple paisley ones,
>> purple shiny ones, purple polka-dotted ones...  Turns out they worked just
>> perfectly, and my Tupperware container looked like a very pretty box of
>> candies!!
>>
>> As it turns out though, I hardly used any of the quadrupled batch of
>> filling!  What to do, what to do... I finally figured it out - I'd make
>> the
>> whole cake from the recipe!!  yeah!  It did look pretty darned tasty and
>> all...  Since I already had the filling ready to go, yesterday I made the
>> frosting so it could refrigerate overnight, and this afternoon I planned
>> to
>> come home from work and make the cake.  It's become a habit with me -
>> Monday
>> nights I'm usually baking something.
>>
>> I had to run by the grocery store first though.  I'd perused the recipe
>> and
>> I knew it called for brown sugar and sour cream, and I didn't have either.
>> I usually have about a bag's worth of brown sugar in the cabinet, but I
>> remembered that it was running precariously low so I bought two more bags.
>> It wasn't until I was measuring it out that I realized it called for DARK
>> brown sugar!  Ack!!  Three cups of it, and all I had was light.  So, I
>> googled the difference, and everything pretty much said it didn't make a
>> difference in the outcome, that it might just taste a little different.
>> Then, when I realized that I didn't have any 'regular' cocoa, just dark
>> chocolate, I decided that it would work out even on the flavor!
>>
>> I was trying to be organized and neat, so I was laying everything out and
>> measuring and sifting before I started.  I'd greased and papered the pans
>> so
>> they were ready.  The recipe called for a cup and half of hot water, so
>> I'd
>> measured it in a glass cup and set it in the microwave to be ready to heat
>> when I needed it.  Most all recipes call for eggs to be added one at a
>> time,
>> but this called for first mixing the eggs with the vanilla and then adding
>> it in two parts.  That was ready to go.  I had cocoa and cake flour sifted
>> and sitting on pieces of waxed paper.  When everything was in its place, I
>> preheated the oven and got started.
>>
>> The recipe had printed out in two pages - one listed all the ingredients,
>> the other had the directions.  And I had to go back and forth with each
>> part
>> of the directions.  I was being VERY careful and conscientious and
>> re-reading everything to ensure I didn't screw anything up.  (HA!)  That's
>> how I found out that it was NOT calling for a teaspoon of baking soda but
>> a
>> TABLESPOON!  I was pretty darned proud of myself for catching that!!
>> Even
>> though I had my "old lady glasses" on, I was still basically only working
>> with one eye so I was being really careful!!
>>
>> The batter mixed up thick and fluffy and dark!  Yum!  I evenly spooned it
>> into the prepared pans and put them into the oven!  This is the first time
>> I've actually used three layer pans in my new oven and all three fit!
>>  Yay!!
>> I set the timer and cleaned up the kitchen.  The recipe said 30-33
>> minutes,
>> until the cake pulled away from the sides of the pan.  At 30 minutes I
>> used
>> a toothpick to check - just in case.  I thought three more minutes would
>> be
>> fine.  While it looked like the cakes were indeed pulling away from the
>> pans, it didn't really look like the layers had risen very much.  All
>> three
>> looked a little flat in fact.  And, after I'd removed them to cool, well
>> those babies looked downright sunken!!  With my husband and son's
>> girlfriend
>> (her name is Katie) looking on, I told them both that I had followed the
>> directions EXACTLY and that they must have been supposed to look like that
>> because *I* had done everything right!!!
>>
>> When I'd put the cakes into the oven, I'd removed the frosting and filling
>> from the fridge so they could soften up a bit to room temperature.  By the
>> time the cakes had cooled, the filling was perfect and I slathered it on
>> rather thickly - trying to fill in the sunken parts!  But when I went to
>> frost the whole thing, the frosting was still a bit hard.  No worries!  I
>> knew what to do about that - just a few seconds in the microwave would be
>> perfect!
>>
>> Please try and imagine my chagrin when I opened the microwave to do just
>> that, and found THE MEASURING CUP WITH A CUP AND HALF OF WATER sitting
>> there!!!!!  I'd already put the recipe in my binder, but I dug it back out
>> to read it again!!  Sure enough... right there at the end... "slowly add
>> the
>> hot water"....  WAHHHHHHHHHH!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
>>
>> I had ruined my cake.  It's ruined!!  It's bad!!  This is huge!!!  There
>> was
>> no adjusting anything at that point!!!  The cake was done and cooled and
>> sunken and filled.  Without that water it was probably going to be pretty
>> darned dry!!!!!!!!!!  Should I toss it?!?!  I had a LOT of money tied up
>> in
>> chocolate and the rest of the ingredients in the dumb thing!!!
>> WAHHHHHH!!!!!!!!!  (Sorry, I keep going back and forth on my tenses
>> here...)
>>
>> I tried to think of something worse than ruining this cake.  Okay, so
>> actually that was pretty easy.  Probably this Bell's Palsy causing me to
>> be
>> one-eyed was worse than a ruined cake.  And I'd been telling myself that
>> even that wasn't so bad - it could have been a stroke!  And hell, if we're
>> going there, that probably wouldn't have been as bad as some of those
>> tornadoes that killed hundreds!  Or even the one ten miles down that road
>> that flattened houses!  What's a sunken cake in comparison?!?!?!?!?!??!
>>
>> Well, it's probably not much in comparison, but, in the quiet of my
>> kitchen,
>> it was pretty darned sad.  I really didn't know what to do with that cup
>> of
>> water in my hand.   I have had occasion to take batter back OUT of the
>> pans
>> and put it back into the mixer to add something I'd forgotten, but I was
>> long past that now.
>>
>> Finally, with no better ideas, I covered the whole mess in frosting.  It's
>> sitting in the fridge as we speak.  It LOOKS delicious and juicy!!!!!
>>  Maybe
>> I can just use it as a decoration..... Or a big hockey puck.
>>
>>
>> Pam
>>
>