Christine Chang Photography

I’m currently sorting through Eric and Pinar’s wedding photos (see previous entry), and I can still remember the initial shock when she told me that her mom and sisters were baking the wedding cake. When I say shock, I did the “math”: 120 guests + baking at two locations (one of them a Residence Inn) + my own experience of baking a cake = shock. Let’s add another word for a more accurate description. How about intimidating?

Move over, Betty Crocker. Baking a cake from scratch is quite an undertaking. I baked a cake for my husband’s birthday one year and though it was decent, I was a bit frustrated. 5 hours of baking for a “decent” cake? Decent might be a bit generous too: the cake was kind of hard and the crumbs got all over the frosting. I had also decided to use frozen whole strawberries to decorate the top of the cake but that melted and it was a mess after about 30 minutes. Sure, I finally got to use the cake stand that I got as a wedding present, but let’s just say that currently it’s useful as an elevated snack server at get-togethers.

You would think that because the idiom “piece of cake” existed, that baking a cake would be, essentially, a piece of cake….

But Pinar only told me afterwards that her mom always made a cake for special occassions. Sometimes it was chocolate, and sometimes it was vanilla, and it was then that it all made sense. Because as she told me, even if no one liked the cake at least she would like it, and it would be a fond memory.

Let me tell you though, the cake was excellent. It was sweetened just right and there was a fruit preserve filling that really made me say, now that’s a wedding cake! And the recipe can be repeated again and again for generations of the Bilir family to come. I can imagine a granddaughter saying that she’s eating from the same exact cake recipe her grandmother ate.

I think it’s almost dinner time and that’s why I’m writing about cake. But nevertheless, it’s these little details that I enjoy remembering.

So what do you think, cake for dinner? As for me I’ll leave the baking to the bakery around the corner.