Sometimes You're the Egg

You've heard the saying "Sometimes you're the windshield, Sometimes you're the bug"? Well, tonight I coined a similar phrase--a baking metaphor, given my current project.

Sometimes you're the bowl; sometimes you're the egg.

On the first recipe of this cake I am repeating too many times to tell, I bent my thumbnail back far enough to cause a fair amount of bleeding underneath the nail, effectively ripping the front half of my nail off the nailbed. I almost got the other thumb at the same time.

Sometimes you're the egg.

This recipe is so good, but it's really tough to get out in one perfect piece. . .too moist, I suppose. So, the first cake didn't quite come out of the pan as intended.

Sometimes you're the egg.

I need 3 batches of icing, but I only had 2 bags of powdered sugar. And, on top of that, I have to go to Rachel's to make icing, because my THREE MONTH OLD mixer died last week.

Sometimes you're the egg.

A free replacement mixer is in the mail.

Finally! Sometimes you're the BOWL.

While I wait on it, I do have good friends nearby with a durable mixer, who are even kind enough to share dinner and clean up after me.

Sometimes you're the bowl.

On my first large layer, I had the bright idea to not only cut parchment paper for the bottom, but to line the sides with strips. It came out perfect.

Sometimes you're the bowl.

And I chanced putting it on a cooling rack that often peels the top off a cake, placing a strip of parchment between the two as a hopeful safety net. An hour and a half later, the cooled cake slid right onto the waiting transfer plate.

Sometimes you're the bowl.

I can't add. Somehow, I only bought cake ingredients for half the layers.

Sometimes you're the egg.

My darling husband went to the store at about 1:30am to get what I was missing.

Sometimes you're the bowl.

The store I sent him to didn't have cake flour.

Sometimes you're the egg.

He also washed my pans and bowls for me. . .over and over and over and over.

Sometimes you're the bowl.

It's 3am, and I will be up for at least another 30 minutes. Then I'll snatch 4 (I hope that many) hours of sleep and continue. Weddings don't wait for cakes. Some days, no matter how many times you're the bowl, you still feel like the egg.

But tomorrow, when I watch our friends join their lives together and then see their friends enjoying this truly fabulous, moist, chocolate goodness. . .I will be the bowl.