Saturday was baking day for Lilly and I. A planned morning of cooking delights, Devils Food Cake, Choux Buns...oh yummy, paradise. But paradise is hard to achieve, believe me, especially in this house.
My little chef and I did really well...cake mixed and in the oven and the choux pastry mixed, warm and in the piping bag all ready to go. It was all going so well. I was confidently explaining we had to use the piping bag to get the choux in nice shapes for the buns and then when they were cooked, we could fill them with cream. Looking back I must have sounded like Jamie Oliver on a really bad day. But my commentary came to an abrupt end as the piping bag exploded.
Truly, it did and it left in it's wake two really silly looking people wearing warm choux pastry!! You would never believe how far that stuff goes, it should have been entered in the long jump and the high jump at the Olympics!! Two gold medals for sure, not sure what National Anthem they would have played at the award giving though, lol.
It didn't even taste good, I know... I tried to lick my fingers and it was horrible. If it had been the cake mix then Lilly would have gladly licked it up...but this...was yuck, so no volunteers there. I lie, Charlie was extremely keen on helping. His tongue was everywhere trying to grab as much as he could before I chased him back to his bed. It really proved to me that dog would eat anything no matter how bad.
Needless to say it took an age to clear up and in the process we almost forgot the cake. But I remembered in time and an other major disaster was averted. All was well until I decided that as we were not having Choux Buns we would go to town and really dress the cake up. A little difficult without an icing bag but you know me...talented, imaginative etc. I know, but at least the imaginative bit is true.
As chocolate is a favourite, we had to include some melted chocolate into the finery of this soon to be wonderful cake. It didn't take long and everything was assembled and the chocolate melted. A certain young lady was now only interested in bowl licking, the finer points of getting it on the cake were no longer of any interest what so ever to her. I calmly explained that we needed to put some of the chocolate on the cake before she started licking.
But never fear..Super Grandma is here! A few sweeps with my palette knife, a couple of flourishes and hey presto...it would be done. In my dreams!!
It was at that point my mother rang. Her phone had been out of order all week and she was celebrating by calling me every couple of hours to tell me it was working again. Not really what I needed at that moment, but when mum calls it's really not easy to hang up quickly. But on this morning I did. It was the loud crash from the kitchen that told me that I really, really needed to hang up NOW!
Well, the dog looked guilty and the kid looked guilty.....and both stood in a mess of chocolate. Thank goodness the bowl was plastic!! The kitchen looked like it needed a hose down and the two culprits were not a lot cleaner. It's at times like this that temperament shows....if your bad tempered you yell loud and long.... if you good natured you ask calmly what has happened. I chose a middle road, I yelled loud and long at the dog and asked Lilly what had happened. I won't bore you with the blame game dodging that ensued, but I will assure you that no dog or child were injured in the making of the mess, or afterwards.
Perhaps I should have stuck to Friday as our baking day....could be Saturdays are just unlucky. No, I didn't take any photographs of this chaos. In the midst of true chaos the camera never appears....I don't want that ruined as well!!
See you all at the end of the week with an other update and gift. Have fun and take a tip stay away from the baking!!