There is one thing that I don't like to make, and that is frosting. I know that it is hard to understand how I could make all of these delicacies and not be frosting them up one side and down the other. I pride myself on making treats that don't require frosting: Banana Snack Cake, Blackies, Triple Chocolate Brownie Cupcakes, Anytime Oatmeal Cake, Dream Bars, Walnut Crunch Brownies; I'm sure you have been drooling over all of their names under the title "What's In My Oven?" down there on the right.
You know that once in a while I bake requests, and every blue moon it happens that the solicited cake requires frosting. There are only a few that I would consider making, and two of my short list of three were ordered for the weekend. The one consolation for me was that both frostings are the kind that you cook, and that eased my dread just a bit.
I was on a tight schedule - you know my penchant for German planning and timing. I got up at 6:15 and performed all sorts of important duties like making coffee and checking Facebook. Bathing was not a top priority as I don't like to smell like dessert all day. I threw on some real clothes to make it feel like I was really working and not just putzing around in my pajamas. I decided to bake both cakes first and worry about frosting later.
Everything was going great gumdrops. The cakes were baking, I had sheets in the washing machine, I was correcting tests, I was rocking out on Internet radio to a U2 station that I was convinced I had invented. It was pure bliss. My timetable was impeccable. Then it came to make the frosting. The first order of business was the Coconut Pecan frosting for the German Chocolate Cake.
I studied the recipe. "Mix the butter and the evaporated milk in a pan", it said. I went to the cupboard for the evaporated milk. Reaching back to the far corner of the pantry, I hauled the can out and squinted at it. No matter how hard I tried, I could not make those words say "evaporated milk". I was confused. It looked like the can said "condensed milk". Consciousness hit me like 5 pounds of brown sugar. I searched the cupboard again, like Old Mother Hubbard. Just like hers, my cupboard was bare. There was no evaporated milk. This was a crisis of great proportion.
I considered my options: #1) change my clothes (I said they were "real" clothes, I didn't say they were fit for public consumption) and go in "to town", #2) try to google a substitute for evaporated milk and hope that I could whip something together, or #3) run down to the corner store that really is on a corner. Option #1 was not very attractive to me, not only because of the clothing conundrum, but it would throw my German time table out the window. Option #3 was a good Last Resort. Option #2 seemed very sensible and thrifty to me, so that's the route I attempted first.
You maybe never have googled "substitute for evaporated milk". If you do, you will find out that it is milk from which 60% of the water has been evaporated. Simply use twice as much milk as you need, and boil it down without scalding or burning or getting that nasty skin on the top. This seemed daunting to me. Not scalding milk has never been one of my stronger talents. Option #3 was looking decidedly better, although it did require that I wear a disguise.
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| Pointy Boiled Wool Slippers |
Driving the 1/4 mile to the store was a trick, as I was still living in an optical illusion with those glasses. I strolled into the store with all of the dignity I could muster, desperately trying to walk a straight line. The girl, who was young enough to be my daughter, addressed me as "Hon" and asked me what I was looking for. Lack of time dictated that I tell her so that I could get some help. We searched the shelves, I, crouching on the floor, and she, standing on her tip toes. (We really should have traded positions, as I am tall and she is short.) I couldn't decide whether to look for my ingredient with or without my glasses, neither choice seemed a good one. I alternated between squinting with and then without them, all the while making nervous clucking sounds. The clerk called me "Hon" some more times. We found the condensed milk, but no evaporated milk. I wilted down to the floor.
I groaned, "oh no! I can't go anywhere else like this!" Obviously I must not have looked like I was wearing a disguise (which is in hindsight disconcerting), because the girl said, "Oh Hon, why not?" My mind raced. I didn't want to call attention to the fact that it was past noon and I was unshowered, unkempt and wearing a disguise mostly because of my atrocious Bed Head. I mumbled the least vain thing that I could think of, "I can't go anywhere else WITHOUT SOCKS!" and then realized that it was like opposite day and actually sounded the most vain. I slumped out of the store and putted home, my mind wildly racing. Option #3 hadn't panned out. Option #1 wasn't really an option due to that whole schedule thing.
In the end, I decided to try my hand at evaporating my own milk. Heck, pioneers did it, and they did not have modern technology at their fingertips like I do. I read a couple of websites and got busy. While I was simmering the milk in my makeshift saucier (the new word I learned), I made the Caramel Frosting for the Dixie Spice Cake. Evaporation, which couldn't be that difficult as it is a natural phenomenon with an important role in the life cycle of water, was incredibly slow. In the end, I turned up the heat and desperately stirred the milk with a whisk. After more than 20 minutes I was bored silly, not to mention I had a cramp in my whisking hand. But guess what? It worked! Who would have thought that a person can successfully and safely evaporate milk in the privacy of her own home?
I concede that after three hours and a disguise, "successfully" may be up for debate.
I'm off now to include that on my resume. Yes, I am using "successfully".
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