Cake Odyssey

In April Joe volunteered us to bring a dessert to the YM/YW chili dinner/auction. So I decided to make a carrot cake from a recipe my dad gave me. It’s a yummy yummy recipe using fresh ginger. I started it in the afternoon while the two youngest were napping. Cassidy is quite enough to try and allow help by herself.  So everything was going well until it was time to un-pan the cakes.  Both layers failed to completely detach from the pans and came out in two pieces. I knew right away that this was going to be quite a “fun” experience so I grabbed my camera and took a picture. After cooling and making the frosting I tried to stack the layers. Our wall oven is slightly tilted forward because the counter tiles get in the way of it fitting level. Of course I thought I had rotated them to account for this (even though I had tried to level them by shaving them flat) and of course I miscalculated and the high sides stacked on top of each other so the cake was a little less then perfectly level. Oh well. I put on a crumb coat, refridgerated it and then did the final coat. I even came up with a cute carrot design; nothing requiring too much creativity or skill, I have neither, but I was more than satisfied. So I took another photo. Well, prior to leaving to the auction, I was descending from upstairs when I heard the two older girls quickly getting out of the fridge and Cassidy making a comment about the cake. I came into the kitchen to find them having taken a chunk out of the side of the cake. Ohhhhh, I wasn’t happy, so I took another picture. Then I had the decision to make, blow off the auction (they had TOO many deserts as it was) or come up with a fix. I decided to make it a “diet cake” and only take half of it (half the calories of a whole cake).  After frosting the cut side I took another picture. I think it turned out rather cute. I figured that there might be a couple who would like the smaller portion. Bonus that we got to eat half of the cake, it was yummy.