Cake disaster!

I don't know what I was thinking when I tried to bake a 9-by-13 cake in a 9-by-9 corningware dish.

Here's how the disaster unfolded -- or bubbled over, I should say. I had just whipped up the batter for Dan's birthday carrot cake, when I realized both of my 9-by-13 pans were at friends' houses, and I had just one round cake pan. I could have made the cake with two of those.

I searched and searched for the guitar-shaped cake pan from my mother-in-law, but I couldn't find it.

The square dish seemed like a good choice at the time -- and the only one -- but if I had understood how much the cake was going to rise, I would have just used half the batter in it, and the other half in the round pan. Hindsight is 20/20, as they say.

Well, about 15 minutes into the 40-minute bake time, I smelled smoke. I went into the kitchen, and smoke was streaming up out of the oven through the stovetop. Yikes!

When I looked inside, the batter was dripping down onto the oven floor, and that's what was burning. I put a baking sheet on the shelf below the cake to try to catch the drips.

I took the cake out of the oven, scraped up the burn bits, and thought -- stupidly -- that the cake could continue baking, although the whole middle part was wiggly as can be, while the outside parts that had bubbled over were crispy.

Eventually, I took out the uncooked batter and poured it into the round cake pan. That's how I ended up with a half a cake. I used a LOT of frosting to make it look nice because the layers I divided it into were not so pretty.

On a positive note, Dan said it was the best carrot cake he'd ever had. Ever. Really. I couldn't believe it but must admit that it was indeed a pretty damn tasty cake. (Click here for the final edible version and recipe.)

A gross post

I said I would blog about it, so here it is. This meal was really gross.

We were so hungry when we started eating it, and it seemed OK at first, then about halfway through, it was like, "Oh. This is pretty gross all of a sudden."

I thought I'd create something Japanese-inspired. I love Japanese food -- and this salmon and veggies meal turned out great, so I thought I'd be clever and just kind of do the same sauce with whatever ingredients I wanted to use.

So, I put a little fine sugar, soy sauce, fish sauce, dashi-no-moto, and rice wine in the crock pot. Then I threw in green beans, a dried stir-fry mushroom mix that I had soaked, a red pepper, carrots, a little sweet potato, seaweed, chard... I can't remember what else; maybe it can all be seen in the photo. I let it cook for several hours on low, then added some cooked brown rice. The green beans turned out super mushy. The flavors also just didn't go together quite so well.

This photo shows the leftovers, looking even grosser in tupperware. I kept them for a couple days because Dan said he'd take them to work for lunch, but I think he just couldn't bring himself to face the dish again. I tossed it out today.