A Mud Cake with Dirt Sprinkles!
Like the backhoe loader in one of our favorite books, I’m Dirty, Drake wanted a (pretend) mud cake for his birthday. I skipped the scoop of Rocky Road–I figured the cake had more than enough sugar for the adults, much less the kids. I made the “mud” cake (actually a Blackout Cake from Cook’s Country) on Friday night, assembled it (complete with toy digger and mounds of “dirt” frosting), and cleaned the house on Saturday, and then had some of Drake’s friends over to celebrate.
THEN I began to bake again, because in a fit of something (madness? hubris?) I entered the baking competition at the State Fair in several categories, and samples were due the next morning. I made four recipes in three and a half hours: brownies, banana bread, corn muffins and scones.
I have no idea when the judging happens, or when and how the results are communicated. I had a great time baking this weekend, and an even better time eating the results. If I get a ribbon, that’ll just be metaphorical icing.
Final stats for all five recipes:
Eggs: 8
Sugar: 6 1/4 cups
Butter: 1 1/16 pounds
Chocolate (bittersweet, unsweetened, white, and cocoa): over a pound
August 21st, 2007 at 7:13 am
What’s the verdict on the blackout cake? I think it looks fabulous in the photo and have been tempted to make it a few times since that issue of Cooks Country arrived.
August 21st, 2007 at 2:12 pm
I thought it turned out well. The contrast of the cake and the pudding were good, and the flavor was strongly chocolate. It was also fairly easy to make and assemble because of the pudding topped by crumbs. One of the two cakes broke when it came out of the pan, but I was able to rescue it by making it the middle layer and the crumbled coating, so it was a very forgiving recipe. There wasn’t a crumb left over, and both the kids and adults seemed to like it. But then again, maybe they were humoring me. There also seemed to be suspiciously few dishes, so I think we had some very considerate guests.