Dirty Little Secret?

Confession: I can't take full credit for my cakes. I get a little help from someone named Betty. Or Duncan.

That's right. My cakes come from a box. 

For some reason, I feel compelled to call that a confession, a dirty little secret. But you know what? I'm pretty proud of my cakes and how they taste. And I can't say I've had any complaints.

This is what Step 1 typically looks like at my house. Gotta problem?

When someone commissions a cake from me, I often struggle with whether to tell them up front that I'll be outsourcing part of the work to a certain "doughboy" seen in the picture above. It rarely, if ever, comes up on their end. And that only strengthens my belief that many people just don't care that much how the cake is made, as long as it tastes good. 

Have you ever heard anyone say that cake from a box doesn't taste good? I haven't.

Here's an excerpt of an excellent article I came across on the CakeBoss website (not the TV show, the cake business software.)

Food conglomerates have spent millions of dollars perfecting... formulas to create a tasty cake that is, essentially, fool-proof. The fact is that many Americans don’t know what a scratch cake tastes like, and even those who may disdain “box mixes” wouldn’t know a scratch cake if they had one. Scratch cakes have a distinctively different crumb and mouth-feel from box mixes, because box mixes contain ingredients like emulsifiers that are not readily available to the home cook. In our experience here at CakeBoss, many people who claim to prefer scratch cakes will pick a box mix cake in a blind taste test, simply because it is what they are accustomed to.

Amen!

And to shed even more light on the cake vs. scratch debate:

Don’t get caught in the trap of thinking that you must bake from scratch if you sell cakes. Most bakeries do NOT bake from scratch. In fact I once worked at a bakery that actually claimed to be a “scratch bakery”, but all their cakes started with a Duncan Hines cake mix, the same kind you buy in the grocery store. 

Gasp!

And finally:

... if your customer asks, CakeBoss highly recommends answering confidently and directly. Don’t mince words or talk about using “pre-measured ingredients”. There is nothing wrong with saying “I start with a mix and use my own recipes with premium ingredients like (buttermilk/sour cream/butter/white chocolate, etc.). My cakes are some of the finest in town. Go ahead, have a taste.” Be a salesman and sell your cake.  

Read the whole article here. 

For mix-bakers looking to learn more about scratch baking, CakeBoss recommends The Cake Bible, by Rose Levy Beranbaum, which I own and love. It's the only recipe book I have that I've been compelled to pick up and read outside of the kitchen. Still, the one time I tried to make a recipe from her book... it didn't turn out so well! More on that later.

So for now, like it or not (and you'll probably like it,) I'm sticking with the comfort, consistency, and convenience of my cardboard box.