Culinary Complications

Today is Nanny's birthday (not saying which one).  All of her young'uns decided to fix a birthday supper for her.  My assigned dishes were baked beans and a birthday cake.  I decided on a home-made coconut cake. 

Since most of my kitchen disasters have involved desserts, I figured I'd best get an early start so that I'd have time for a run to the grocery store bakery, if necessary.  While Nanny way to church, I was on my way to the store for cake ingredients.  I came home and went right to work, using an old-time recipe from a cookbook older than I am. 

The cake layers turned out great.  Substitution queen that I am, I used creme de coconut for part of the milk to add a little coconut flavor to the batter.  I was worried that this would screw up the recipe - make it too gummy, or something - but the layers came right out of their pans without mishap.  At that stage, I figured I was home free.

The frosting recipe called for making a sugar syrup to be drizzled into beaten egg whites.  I'd done this a time or two.  No biggie, I thought.  I mixed up the sugar and water and brought them to the recommended "gentle boil."  I set the timer, and turned my attention to chopping some tomatoes and peppers for some guacamole I intended to make.  A few minutes later, I smelled something burning and glanced over my shoulder to see smoke rising from my pan.  A glance at the timer revealed that, although I'd dialed in the correct number of minutes, I'd forgotten to push "start."  The syrup was - well, brown glass.  I hacked it into a tin can, filled the pan with water, and set it on another burner to try to cook the hardened syrup out of it while I started another batch.

This time, I gave my full attention to the syrup.  I let it boil without stirring it for the recommended time, then began to "stir frequently" as the recipe demanded.  It looked great for a minute, then, suddenly, as I stood there stirring it, the stuff seized up and turned back into granulated sugar.  Damn it!  I scooped it out of the pan into the trash can, filled that pan with water so soak out the clumps, scrubbed out the other pan that had been soaking.

As I stood there with the pan in my hand, I thought, Screw this recipe.  I got out another cookbook and my double-boiler and whipped up a seven minute frosting that I've made many times.  It turned out perfectly.  I slapped some coconut on it, et voila!

Finally, a cake!