maddie

My birthday is coming up soon, and my partner just ran up to me and said she was going to bake me a cake. Naturally, I responded with:

"So should I make a backup cake or...?"

Anyway, I got sent to my room and that's why I'm here making this post.

This is my first birthday as Maddie. 🎉 I really didn't think I'd make it through last year. Thank you all who supported me and kept me going.

This is also my partner's first time ever attempting a cake. She told me she intentionally chose something easy. When she started, she made me "sit down over there and shut up. You...you...judgy mcjudgerson."

I had said nothing up to this point. I had sworn a vow. Carthaginian torturers could not break my silence.

"I can tell by your eyes that you're judging me!"

"...That's a reflection on yourself, honey."

"SHUT."

Three minutes in, she hurt herself with the rolling pin and asked me for help. I also cut the butter, measured the rest of the ingredients, and diced up the chocolate for her just in case. After which she stood back and exclaimed:

"WHY IS BAKING SO HARD THERE'S SO MUCH SHIT ON THE COUNTER."

Let the record show that I was incredibly entertained by her suffering. Best birthday gift ever.

After explaining to her the concept of "clean as you go", I left her alone. Within moments, I was called back. "Nothing works," she cried. "This is so stupid!"

I asked her to show me the recipe. Turns out, when she said "easy", she meant that she took it from an ASMR channel; not only did it not go over the steps in detail, it also didn't actually specify the type of ingredients, nor did it point out any potential pitfalls. It also meant that she had bought all the wrong ones. Instead of drinkable sweet yoghurt, she had bought thick greek unsweetened. The recipe itself was also sparse on details and simply noted 'yoghurt', 'cookies', and 'chocolate' instead of the brands or percentage choc shown in the video. She had used an 80% dark chocolate instead of the 33% milk that I guessed from the colouring.

She insisted we press on, despite the video using a completely different set of ingredients--given its ASMR nature, it was one of those feel-good types: use these premade things to make this! No bake! Easy! Unfortunately, I told her that no bake cakes weren't necessarily easier, and using those premade ingredients often made things difficult to control. When I went over her measurements, it turns out she also didn't buy enough cream. She was missing another 250 ml. 🗿

Afterwards, she told me, "You can't tell but I was this emoji the whole time! 😭" Since she's not terminally online, I found that phrase hilarious.

I told her to go lie down while I cleaned up the kitchen.

Some of y'all are gonna ask how it tasted.

TASTES LIKE LOVE, YA LOSERS.

||SOUR AND BITTER, WITH A WEIRD AFTERTASTE||

SOUR AND BITTER, WITH A WEIRD AFTERTASTE

SOUR AND BITTER, WITH A WEIRD AFTERTASTE

||We had to force ourselves to swallow||

We had to force ourselves to swallow

We had to force ourselves to swallow

||We agreed to throw away the rest lol||

We agreed to throw away the rest lol

We agreed to throw away the rest lol

and that people use tables for a reason huh who would've thought.

At least putting the coffee in a reusable cup was a good workaround for possible spillage

I HAVE BEEN DEFEATED.

I HAVE OVERWHIPPED THE EGG WHITES, I HAVE SPILLED MOLTEN CHOCOLATE OVER THE STOVE, AND I HAVE WHACKED MYSELF HARD ON THE DISHWASHER AND EVERYTHING HAS GONE WRONG.

Once it's set, I'll post the results and try and identify the cooking mistakes that I made other than BEING A CLUMSY IDIOT.

Also I have some extra buttermilk so I'm going to try and make buttermilk pancakes for her as breakfast in bed, but at this point I'll probably FUCK THAT UP TOO.

EDIT: I just realized I don't have maple syrup.

I BURNED MYSELF TAKING THE CAKES OUT OF THE OVEN.

WHAT.

WHAT AM I EVEN DOING.

Don't mind the kitchen clutter, that's all belongs to the flatmates. 😞

Anyway, she really liked it! There's a slight nuttiness from the browned butter, the buttermilk adds a very gentle tang, and I cut the sugar by 10% and used 70% dark chocolate instead of the recommended 60%, so it was a perfect sweetness by her standards. Using good dark chocolate really helps because you get a more complex flavour and some fruity notes. The reason most recipes recommend not going over 66% is that when you bake chocolate, it tends to amplify the 'dark' flavour and makes it seem a higher cacao content than the one you used, but that's exactly what I'm going for.

Here's a closeup so you can see the consistency. It's beautiful, really. (The top is dusted with cocoa powder mixed with a little bit of powdered sugar)

Ideally want to underbake it a little bit more next time, maybe by five minutes! We drove to our friends' houses and gave the rest away.

Also, I know a lot of pro chefs will recommend you crack all your eggs into a bowl (this one used six eggs) and then scoop out the yolks by hand, but I've had terrible results with that method. Some egg shells are more fragile than others, and the process of cracking them shatters it and the shells cut into the yolk, so when you drop it into the bowl, it's already mixed yolk and white. I still prefer the one by one method, because you really want to keep your egg whites free of yolks. A bit more work, but you only need to ruin one egg for you to regret it.