Saturday, November 18, 2006

Sarah + Carrots = Disaster

If you had read my post about Tracy's Birthday, you would know that I don't have much luck with baking carrot-based creations. I was assured from many PPKers that if I tried VwaV's Carrot Cake, my creation would be great. Being the optimist I am, I told myself that I would yet again try to come up with an edible and equally presentable carrot creation.

So today, when I was supposed to be studying for my certification and/or vacuuming (neither of which is a desirable task), I thought that I should make some cupcakes. I thought that my blog entries have been a little bland lately, and a cupcake is more fun to post than a bowl of soup or uncooked gnocchi. I whipped out my copy of VCTOTW, and started to flip through the pages to find something that I already had the ingredients for. I first stumbled across the basic chocolate cupcake, and thought that it would be do-able. After a few more pages, I found today's cupcake: Carrot Cupcakes with Cream Cheese Icing. I had flashbacks to all of the horrible carrot cakes I had made in the past - way too damp, dense and greasy...but I knew that Isa and Terry would be able to help me erase those all too vivid memories of carrot cakes past.

Everything was going so well. I grated the carrots (and re-read the recipe to make sure that I didn't have to drain them or something), and prepared the mixture. I then read a strange step:


Spray the cupcake liners??? Odd, I thought, but I performed the task anyways. I'd do anything weird if it helped me right the many carrot wrongs! I poured the mixture into each liner, baked for 29 minutes until a toothpick came out clean, then let them cool.


So far so good, right? I thought that they looked a little too moist, but convinced myself that I was being too critical. I then prepared the frosting. The recipe called for soy cream cheese, Earth Balance, icing sugar and vanilla. Since the cupcake recipe had called for 1/3 cup soy vanilla yogurt, I had a little left over in my tub. I'm not a fan of the Tofutti hydrogenated oil/tofu combo, so I opted to use the yogurt in lieu of the cream cheese and vanilla. The icing turned out great!

I was going to use my new pastry bag set, but I was too lazy. Already, too much time had gone by without studying or vacuuming, so I couldn't waste any more time on something that wasn't totally necessary. I just used a knife, but it still looked pretty:

I had spoken to my mom earlier in the day, and found out that Tracy, Pete and Princess were going to pay her a visit tonight for some tea. Perfect, I thought, as I could take over Tracy's favourite dessert! Due to all of the disappointments I had created in the past, I decided to taste test one cupcake. Good thing I did:

In case you can't tell what this is: it is actually a cupcake after an attempt at peeling off the liner. Just like every other carrot creation, it was way too damp, dense and greasy. It didn't even remain intact! I called my mom and left a message that they would have to fend for themselves tonight for dessert :(

Does this happen to anyone else? Do the carrots shipped to Ottawa have a higher water content than those found in other locales? I just don't get what I do wrong!

I hate carrots.

1 comment:

Anonymous said...

oh I feel your pain! I too would LOVE to believe every thing in the books work out.. but, alas the stars and moons are not aligned... try try again..
then and only then use curse words in the bathroom, behind closed doors where no little ears will hear.. I mean really I am sure they loved them all the same..
take care, LOVE your blog
Julee