(Too Much!) Trouble Cake...

Ok, in reference to my post below about "no chocolate, no deal," like I mentioned before, I put myself in charge of the birthday cakes for my mom and nieces this weekend. Since I'm not the only chocaholic in the family, I decided to make German Chocolate (mom's fave) from scratch. Every other year its always the $0.89 Betty Crocker cake mix and lame canned frosting. Since I am a big believer in baking from scratch, I thought this would be the year to see if it's really worth it. So I consulted my trusted friend, the Betty Crocker Cookbook (circa 1970- my mom's old book, complete with pictures of women standing by the stove in their heels and pearls- we got a huge kick out of that!) Betty rarely lets me down. Even though everyone said I was crazy, I had to give this one a try. I should have known just by looking at the ingredient list just what we were in for...but alas, I was undaunted and unintimidated. I even had to buy special flour for this cake! So my grocery list included a bar of German Cooking Chocolate, cake flour, coconut, pecans, evaporated milk, darn close to a dozen eggs (dang!), 1/2 lb. butter, and many other various and expensive ingredients. And so, we embarked on our confectionary journey (sad that my mom had to help make her own birthday cake, but lets face it, this was a two man cake!) So we get halfway through and realize that we are out of eggs, and that melting the chocolate in the microwave is NOT the way to do it (the instructions on the bar said we could!! Can you say "scorch?" Looked like a meteorite had landed in it. Good thing Marshall was just leaving the grocery store after running to get us some more eggs, he had to run in and buy us another $3.00 bar of chocolate-oh brother.) After all the melting, stirring, beating, mixing, folding in, and pouring, we (ever so carefully!) put it into the oven. Now we just wait and watch, while we make the coconut-pecan frosting on the stove. (Yum!) So when all was said and done, after 2 hours, and about 25 dollars worth of ingredients, the masterpiece was frosted and presented for judgement. For me, it was not entirely worth the money and trouble..I mean, don't get me wrong, it was great, but it was a ridiculous amount of work and money! But to my mom, she said it was the best chocolate cake she had ever tasted. So that was it- 100% worth it, all the way around. Good thing birthdays only come once a year!