A Tale of Disastrous Cakes at my House

After my catastrophic efforts to save money by baking birthday cakes instead of buying for family members  last year, I vowed to keep trying. Never say die, up girl and bake, right? Read here about what happened when I baked for my 2-year-old daughter, Rudairo, in November 2015.  .Well, it doesn't look like things are improving much this year. The pictures below tell the full horrific tale. 

 23 November 2015

This is the shameful cake I made for Rudairo when she turned 2. There was sweltering heat that November day, which I blame for the icing that melted like a burning candle. The real truth is I can't ice cakes. 

12 January 2016

I decided to bake a two-layered moist chocolate cake on the eve of my son Victor's birthday. He was turning 10. To make up for the icing challenges, I bought ready-made icing,  and slept well assured that nothing could go wrong this time. 

I woke up to find he had dug a hole in the centre from top to base

Determined not to fail this time around, I dashed to the shops to buy cupcakes to do some patchwork. Unfortunately I could not find chocolate ones and had to make do with vanilla ones. 

After filling up the hole, I iced the cake and sprinkled hundreds and thousands on top. No-one could have guessed what lay beneath the icing. Can't help thinking that's exactly the same way people present themselves in life - masquerading as people they are not, putting layers of icing on their real personalities. Sobering thought. 

We placed the candles and joyously sang "Happy Birthday to You  Vicky", and he blew his candles. So we can safely say I iced and aced it haha!

You can never hide the truth forever. After cutting, the true colours Cyndie Lauper  sang about started showing J

9 February 2016

I had my husband's cake professionally made at Bakers Corner, Matsapha. The joint is known far and wide for making very good cakes. I decided against baking at home because we were having a dinner party and I did not want to embarrass myself and have the guests feel sorry for me and say, "At least you tried, shame!" I sent a whatsapp message requesting a Manchester United cake. I was quite relaxed because, come on, these were professionals who baked and delivered cakes everyday. What could possibly go wrong? Nothing!

Before loading the cake in the car, I decided to just peek to ensure it was really his. Lo and behold, they had made an Arsenal cake. He would have choked on it. I had to sit for some 15 minutes while they superimposed the Manchester United  logo

I think God is trying to tell me something. We should not be eating cake in our house. I'm trying to lose weight and sugar is my biggest downfall. It can't surely be a coincidence that all efforts at cakes are such epic fails? Next birthday in the house is in August. Let's wait and see! I think God is telling me, "Child, eat apples on birthdays. Your waistline will thank you!"

The birthday cake

This year I decided that I would not buy birthday cakes. I wanted to save, and wasn’t going to spend money on things I could do myself. In January, my friend sent money for my son’s cake and I thought I would be misappropriating funds if I didn’t use it for its intended purpose, so we bought the cake. In February I baked the cake for my husband’s birthday, which turned out to be a catastrophe. I was going to bake one for myself too in August, but my husband had already ordered from a shop. On my daughter’s second birthday in November, I decided to stick to my resolution and baked a nice red velvet cake. I could see my husband was worried when I declared I would bake again, but for the sake of world peace he decided to zip it. I do very well when I have a recipe. Unfortunately I cannot ice a cake to save my life. I had all the ingredients for butter icing with me but just could not crack it. It did not help that temperatures were extremely high on the day, in their 40s and the icing just dripped left right and centre. There was more of it on the tray than on the cake.

Still we were able to put two little candles on it, placed the birthday girl next to it and she led us in singing “Happy birthday to you!” She wasn’t even aware that she had the ugliest birthday cake in the world. She was happy. So was I. Even though I was a little embarrassed about my atrocious handiwork, seeing her look so joyous, quite oblivious of my misgivings really melted my heart, I guess in the same way the icing melted from the cake. Although it wasn't easy on the eye, it was quite nice and fluffy inside.

Hopefully when she is 21, and looks at that cake my daughter won’t roll her eyes and say, “Duh that cake is like so ghastly! Why didn’t you just buy one?” I hope the message she gets from that cake is it was made with love, and Mum is a fighter. She must have known she wasn’t good at icing but that didn’t stop her from trying.

As the year draws to a close, I still vow not to buy birthday cakes next year. I will find someone to teach me how to ice properly so that my kids never feel they have to hide birthday pictures because of the hideous cakes mummy made.