Big weekend plans

Going over my change of address card yesterday reminded me that I don’t think I’ve mentioned Bear’s new hobby. This makes a grand total of four. Me, sports, TV, and now baking. In that order.

Years of watching the Food Network finally got through to him. We’d watch those crazy cake decorating competitions and, of course, Ace of Cakes, and one day out of the clear blue sky Bear turns to me and says, “I think I’d like to try that.” I remember turning to him and waiting for the punchline, but he was absolutely serious.

So for Christmas that year I bought him a kitchen scale and a really really fancy baking book. He hasn’t had a ton of time to delve into things, but so far everything he has made has turned out perfectly. It’s kind of infuriating to me. I’ve been baking for years with mixed results, and on his first try everything just works. He keeps signing up to bring complicated desserts to events when he’s not only never made them before, but never even tried the technique before. I try to gently warn him that you probably shouldn’t plan on taking an untested recipe out in public, but then it turns out perfect, again, and I just look like a killjoy.

I think the secret for him is two things: 1) I splurged and got him a PROFESSIONAL cookbook. A cookbook they use as a textbook. Everything is measured by weight and everything is explained in super precise detail. This book is made to set a baker up for success. And 2) Bear has years of training as a Chemistry student that make him an excellent baker. I am a fantastic cook. But I’m a mediocre baker. And that’s because cooking and baking require different skill sets. My creative, throw it in a pot and let’s see what happens, a little of this and a little of that, style of cooking works great. But it’s a disaster for baking which is much more like a chemistry experiment. All those years he thought he was preparing to be a doctor, turns out he was in training as a pastry chef.

Bear’s already imagining what Atti’s first birthday cake will look like. He has grand ideas of some fondant and buttercream extravaganza that would be right at home on the shows he loves. So in preparation, he’s volunteered to make all the family birthday cakes until then as practice.

Our first outing was for our niece Ella’s 2nd birthday. She’s totally into pink and girly and loves butterflies, so we thought we’d keep it simple and do a cake covered in pink fondant and decorated with butterflies. Actually, I thought we’d keep it simple. It took quite a while for me to convince Bear that for his first attempt at fondant he should start small instead of carving an enormous butterfly out of cake and decorating it with every color in the rainbow.

It’s a good thing I prevailed because the cake turned out cute, but stretched us to the ends of our abilities.

Bear mixed the colors into the fondant and rolled it all out. A huge pair of muscley arms really come in handy for that. Then we used cookie cutters for the flowers, and I cut the letters out by tracing letters I printed out on the computer. The butterflies are made out of gum paste because it’s supposed to dry hard, but it apparently takes longer than overnight because we had the hardest time getting them to hang on the wires without sagging and breaking. Then we colored them with these really cool food coloring markers. The wire by the way, is a straight up knock off of Chef Duff.

We also made cupcakes so we could have enough to feed all the guests.

This weekend is our next family birthday. It’s actually a 3-fer. My sister-in-law Dianna, My other sister-in-law Mari, and my father-in-law Mike. Bear is still every bit as ambitious, but this time I have completely failed in reigning him in. His plans include two kinds of filling, eight layers of cake, and building a pyramid complete with palm trees and the Nile river. He’s very excited, and I think we might just be able to pull it off.