A Year of Blogging: January 27, 2011

Yesterday was Chocolate Cake Day. If I hadn't been sick with a stomach bug, I would have made a nice yummy chocolate cake to celebrate. I had hoped to make a cake last weekend, and never got to it. I'll try again this weekend. I have a checkerboard cake pan, and I was planning to make a chocolate and cherry cake- so the checkerboard would be alternating squares of chocolate and cherry. Erich thought that would be a good combination. I don't know if I'll be that elaborate- the checkerboard cake is actually a pain in the butt to make (I have no idea why I wanted to make it last weekend), but at the very least I'll make a chocolate cake (or cupcakes) with vanilla frosting. Chocolate cake has always been a part of birthday celebrations in our house. It is my father's favorite. Sometimes he would get a fudge marble cake, which is a yellow cake with chocolate cake swirled in. Sometimes he would get a chocolate cake with raspberry frosting. I never cared for that, it was too sweet for me (and that's saying something!). But the most special treat was the Chocolate Mayonnaise cake. Did you just wrinkle your nose? Most people do when I talk about the Chocolate Mayonnaise cake. I haven't made one in years, but I know I could get mom's recipe. The mayonnaise replaces the eggs and the fat you would normally have in the cake. You really don't taste the mayonnaise when the cake is baked. It is a very moist cake, and extremely rich. You don't want a big piece. Chocolate Mayonnaise cake is my dad's favorite. My mom still makes it a couple of times a year. And I bet- if I didn't tell you it was a chocolate mayonnaise cake, you wouldn't know the 'surprise' ingredient. My sister usually wanted a chocolate cake for her birthday too. I rarely had chocolate cake for my birthday. There were so many other options: cherry, strawberry, carrot. We usually made a carrot cake for Mom's birthday, using the family recipe. All this talk of cake has me hungry. I'm definitely going to make one this weekend- and likely it will be chocolate. What a yummy day!