Cake Madness - Day 1

I know what you must be thinking: make a cake every day for a whole month? She is going to be so broke and so fat at the end of this challenge. Have no fear, I spent many hours before February even started trying to solve the many problems that could arise with baking every day. First of all, I knew I couldn't afford to make 29 cakes, so the idea of "cake sponsors" came up. A sponsor would give me $10 (or buy the supplies needed for their cake) and in return would get some say in what kind of cake I made and I would deliver a piece to them in the morning. This works well for the people at my work as they not only get a piece of their cake, but can partake in every other cake I bring in to work, if they so desire. It was a little bit of effort to find enough people, but that helped defray some of the costs at least, and since my coworkers will be eating the cakes, it keeps me and my husband from gaining 200 pounds this month. The other stipulation I had for my friends who came up with the Cake-A-Day challenge (and happen to work in the department I used to work in) was that they had to protect me from the people in the department I currently work in as I knew they would be irate and probably kill me if I made cakes for my old friends and not my new ones. This problem was solved by opening cake sponsorship up to everyone, and placing every cake in neutral territory . . .the lunchroom ;) So, now that most of those issues are settled, turn on the oven, it's time to bake.

My preliminary cake supply set up (yes there are some cake mixes, I can't make them all from scratch)

Thank the Lord for KitchenAid mixers (and no, I didn't put the avocado in the cake)

My friend who was the instigator of the Cake-A-Day idea kindly volunteered to sponsor the first two cakes. He has a serious coconut tooth (as some people have a sweet tooth, he just loves coconut), so German Chocolate Cake was chosen as the first day. After scouring the internet, this is the recipe I decided on: Willard Family German Chocolate Cake. I've never made that recipe before so I was a little nervous about it, but I shouldn't have been, it turned out great.

"Yolky" was not too sure about this Cake-A-Day idea

My first cakes

I made the cake in two 8" x 8" pans since I don't have 9"x"9" pans without any problems. I stayed up way too late making this cake, but it was worth it. There was quite the buzz at work in the morning with lots of people wondering about the comment cards and the "Cake-A-Day" idea. The cake must have been good too, it was gone in under 2 hours. Without further ado, here are some of the highlights from the comment cards:

• All I can say is yum
• Fabulous job!
• You crazy!
• Great job!  Moist, rich, not over powering. Thanks for sharing.
• Very visually pleasing, thank you for making!
• Pretty, pretty, pretty good
• Dieser Kuchen ist so feucht und kostlich. Dies ist die beste Deutsch Schokoladenglasur, die ich je gegessen habe (which I think means "This cake is moist and delicious. This is the best German Chocolate cake/glaze that I have ever eaten." Although, the Google translate version was much more humorous: "This cake is moist and delicious. The chocolate glaze is the best German that I have ever eaten" . . .guess I work with cannibals ;))
• The only thing that could make it better is if your German Chocolate Cake was also Bavarian cream filled (amazing idea)
• Visually pleasing so much so it was difficult to cut into. Frosting is coconut heaven!
• Holy cow - I loved my Aunt Dolores' cake as a kid (bless her since departed soul) . . .but you bake one heck of a mean German chocolate cake - not even in the same league . . ."Sorry Aunt Dolores . . ." this cake is very good!!!!

Of course I knew not everyone would like the cakes, and I did get one negative comment:

• Don't like this kind because I don't like coconut - and the frosting looks disgusting.

But I also got this comment:

• BTW if you get any nasty comments by this method (meaning the anonymous comment cards) show me the paper and we'll figure out who to punish for their bad manners.

How kind :) Well, I took the criticism constructively and will warn people from now on if there is coconut (or something else I fear people might not like) in the cake, and as for the appearance, plenty of people said they like it, so I'm okay with it. That's what German Chocolate Cake is supposed to look like :)

Finished product . . . yum