Chocolate Cake

Now, mind you, I did not expect to be able to produce a cake to rival the Food Network Challenge cake-offs (oh my god I saw an old episode and there was an awesome Scooby cake...). I did, however, expect to produce something just a smidgen better. But the fates were against me.

At first I was going to make the molecules out of mini-muffins, hence the huge cake (you can't tell in this picture, but that's a 12" x 18" cake). Later, based on just how much cake mix that giant pan took, I settled on the idea of sugar cookies. And it didn't help that I also made a batch (which makes about ten dozen) of chocolate chop cookies (the ones made with the tomato soup) first.

So today I:

* made ~120 chocolate chip cookies
* mixed up three batches of cake mix
* made two batches of frosting
* made a batch of fondant
* made a half-batch of sugar cookies
* mixed up four different colors of icing for the sugar cookies

I also did three loads of laundry and made one trip to the grocery store. It's 7:30 and I'm ready for bed. I'm so never making another 'decorated' cake again... at least until I have the space and tools to do it properly (or if I make little tiny cakes). Rolling out a huge sheet of fondant on tiled countertops? Not good. Sadly, despite wanting new countertops desperately, it's something that is going to have to wait. :( But, oh, well, it's for someone I don't know (Mr. Smeddley is taking it to work for a going-away pot-luck) and though the execution was poor, the concept, I maintain, was brilliant.