that was some cake

I made the Oatmeal Cake with Cinnamon frosting for Bill for his birthday. I had also made it for Emil and Gary as part of their desserts for a year. Gary raved about how good it was. 

Yup, I made it for them before I ever tried it. I do that a lot. Make recipes for the first time for other people. 

I trusted this recipe. 

Before Bill and I got married, we had a couple of showers, like engaged couples do. One was thrown by the Schrumpf family friend, Suzanne. It was a "couples" shower and had a kitchen theme. Ask my parents and they'll tell you (somewhat proudly I'm ashamed to say) that the only thing I used to be able to cook was macaroni and cheese (from the box) and hot dogs. I could cook scrambled eggs and grilled cheese too.

Anyway, Bill was the cook. And we were going to need things for the kitchen. One of the things Suzanne did for the shower was ask the guests to provide their favorite recipes for us. Another family friend, Karen, told us at the shower that we would get the recipes later. She didn't write just one, she wrote dozens.

It's definitely because of this gift that I have a love of baking. Her recipes were clear and easy. She added tips and hints. Those made it easy for someone like me to bake delicious goodies. I know I have told her in person how much those recipes mean to me and how grateful I am that she shared so many.

Back to this oatmeal cake. I knew I could bake it and it would turn out for Gary and Emil because it was one of Karen's recipes.

So I finally made it for us.

Now, because I have gotten much more comfortable around the kitchen I'm not afraid to changes things up a bit. In this case (or cake, I should say), the frosting has coconut and is actually finished under the broiler.

I am not afraid of the broiler anymore either. But I did decide that because I had to give this cake to two people, and I only had one 9 x 13 pan, I could bake it in two 9" round pans (sorry for all of you who read this and aren't bakers, hopefully I haven't lost you completely). That meant I needed a different frosting. 

I pulled out the "Cake Dr." cookbook and looked at the Buttercream Frosting recipe. One of the suggestions on that page is for other types of Buttercream frostings. One of those suggestions was Cinnamon.

Now I know cinnamon and oatmeal go together like peanut butter and chocolate. So that's what I did.

We shared it with our friends Friday night. It was good.

Then Bill and I each had a piece last night, it was even better.

And tonight, we each had another piece.

That is some good cake.