I decided this year I wanted to make my own birthday cake. I didn’t have anything particular in mind, but I knew I wanted it to include strawberry Jell-o. I did a quick Google search for “jello strawberry cake” and found this recipe from Cooks.com.
The first sign of trouble happened at the grocery store. The recipe calls for 1 box of strawberry Jell-o. The store had two sizes, small and large. I picked up one of each. I would consult Courtney later on the topic.
At home Courtney and I concurred that the more strawberry flavor the better, so I used the larger of the two boxes. The last step before baking is adding frozen 1/2 cup of strawberries to the batter, which amounted to 3 - 5 whole frozen strawberries. Something looked wrong but I wasn’t about to deviate from the recipe. I threw in the 3-5 whole strawberries into the mix and added half a dozen more for good measure. I now had a bowl full of cake batter with 12 lumpy frozen strawberries in it. I put the batter into cake pans and threw it in the oven.
While the cake baked I made the frosting, which was your run of the mill powdered sugar frosting with a few frozen strawberries thrown in. My mom used to make this type of frosting all the time and I consider myself a connoisseur of confectionate frosting. It is my all-time favorite thing. I love it with graham crackers. Although I have a deep love for it, I never paid particular attention to how my mom made it.
I melted the butter and poured it on top of a pound of powdered sugar. I mixed it for a few minutes but nothing was “creaming”. In fact, all I had now was lumpy sugar. Assuming the frozen whole strawberries might help the issue I threw them in too. Now all I had was lumpier sugar with whole frozen strawberries in it. Feeling desparate and confused I started chopping the strawberries up, shredding them with the mixer. Surprisingly the frosting started turning red and the strawberries pieces started mixing in quite well. In hopes that this wasn’t just a fluke I realized that the recipe needed a little creative influence. Remembering back to how mom makes frosting I noticed no milk ingredient. I tossed a splash of milk in. I also melted a bit more butter. Soon I had near perfect frosting, the likes that would make a mother proud.
After my triumph against poor frosting directions I realized that I had made the same frozen strawberry mistake with the baking cake; I hadn’t chopped up the strawberries. After letting the cake layers cool I flipped them over to see what the damage was. The whole frozen strawberries had became some sort of weird, moldy-ish, disgusting blobs at the bottom of the cake. I was devistated. I couldn’t serve this to my family! They would think I was crazy. I dug out the rotten parts of the cake and hoped to solve it with frosting.
The strawberries had left gaping holes behind which would hinder the structural stability of the cake. I questioned the ability of the cake layers to stay on top of each other. The frosting seemed to do its job, gluing the two layers together.
Once at my folks house I filled them in on the cake situation. I told them that I would be the sacrificial guinea pig, I would eat my own dog food before making anyone else eat it. I wasn’t about to put any of them through the hell that might be my own cake. Surpringly the cake turned out real good. I was amazed that it actually turned out. As we enjoyed the cake the layers started falling apart. As I looked at my cake with a half prideful, half disappointing look my mom said, “Toothpicks. Next time use toothpicks.”
That tip is going in my life lessons book.
