Marie asked me to decorate a cake for Nick’s and Gino’s graduation gala today.  I have to admit that I am really hesitant to decorate cakes because it’s been so long since I actually did them.  Years.  And Years.

But…  since we didn’t have to do anything else, I said okay.

I got myself nice and organized, and even went to Bon Appetit for an icing recipe.  I just wing it when making icings – I make those regularly – but I wanted this to be a bit special.  I found one that was cream cheese, butter, melted chocolate…  looked nice and rich.  Onward, I went.

I was organized.  I had all my ingredients right where I needed them.

Everything was perfectly creamed, I added the chocolate, then the powdered sugar and vanilla – exactly as the recipe stated and…

WTF?!?  A greasy, slimy, disgusting bowl of not what I was expecting! I threw it all away and just made an icing from memory.  I was bummed.

It’s a big cake with nice, thick layers, so I decided to split them and coat the split layers with raspberry jam.  I heated the jam, strained out all the seeds, and just lightly brushed it on.  Accent flavor.

Second batch of icing was perfect.  Naturally.

Ta-Da! All put together…

And then, the part I was dreading – the actual decorating part…

Ya know… the Food Channel is not going to be busting down the door any time soon, but it will work for today.

I really, really need to practice more, but I know I’m not going to any time soon.

Oh well.  I bet it’s gonna taste really good – and that’s the important part!