She’s No Betty Crocker…

I’ve been a little stressed lately (READ: two outbreaks of hives and a migraine). To deal with my stress level, my Mom suggested that I do more things that make me happy. For me, this is baking. I truly love to bake. I cook all the time so that kind of loses its shine, but baking is rare for me and when I do it I just feel so good. The catch? I’m a terrible baker!

You would think with all the practice that I have I should at least be in the edible category, but sadly that is not the case. Things always taste just a little off. Cookies are a little too doughy, cakes are a little too bland, breads are a little too floury. Its never good. The thing is though, I still make people eat them.

A few months ago, Williams Sonoma had a great pastry products sale and I bought myself these adorable white pastry boxes with my monogram on them. So, even though I know the food doesn’t taste good, I still box it up real pretty like and send them out to friends. I feel like one of those people who sings terribly, yet insists on giving concerts to her family. Actually, I’ve been known to do that, too…

This weekend I made these God-awful muffins. They were strawberry, but tasted like prunes. They looked really pretty, had the right texture, the fruit looked great peeking through the golden muffin – they tasted like crap! The muffin itself tasted like raw flour with pockets of sugar throughout, and the fruit was so tart you could barely chew it. And what did I do? Plated it up beautifully and took it to my office for everyone.

Makes absolutely no sense, but it does make me feel a lot less stressed. So I’m just going to keep on baking. Maybe one day it will just click in my head and I’ll produce edible food. Until then, I’ll go on being the world’s worst baker.