Lessons from Baking

Today at school my grade level and some other teachers were in charge of putting together a spread of goodies for our once a month "fat friday" brunch in the teacher's lunch room. The routine goes like this: we set up the food and then teachers can come in before school or when they have a break and get a plate of what ends up being mostly carbs (but tasty carbs, to be sure) to take back to their rooms. The array of treats this morning was impressive, but a little more on that later. My main comment is more personally based, and it has more to do with life and emotional lessons than calories.

For my contribution, besides napkins and plastic cups, I decided I would bake a Grapefruit Pound Cake  , for I had been privy to its most excellent, light, fluffy flavor when Katy and Aaron made me this for my birthday. I decided this would be a perfect choice, and it would be a great opportunity to use my oven at my new apartment for the first time.

Last night I came home, I got my ingredients out, juiced and zested some grapefruit, pre-heated the oven, prepared my bundt pan, and things smelled and looked great. The first and only other time I have tried this recipe I made it for the family, but I over baked it and while good, it was dry. I was determined not to make the same mistake twice.

Cooking time on this is an hour and ten minutes, or until the toothpick comes out clean, which was good for me since I was grading papers and used that long baking time well. I checked on it after 58 minutes, and guess what? Toothpick came out clean. Checked again, and it slip out, clean. Sides looked brown. Top was barely golden, but it looked just like what the picture showed. I took it out, cooled for a few, and removed it from the pan. I made the glaze (which I like better just fresh juice and pwd. sugar) and set it in the fridge (no use making the cake soggy overnight with it) and went to bed.

Today I woke up and plated by cake, glazed it, and wrapped it up. I made my little card to say "Grapefruit Pound Cake"and went to school, set it up, then proudly put my contribution on the table. I couldn't wait to come back and get my share of the cake-- it is quite delicious to be sure.

I didn't get a chance to come back until a few hours later, and when I did, I noticed that yes, indeed, the cake had been cut into and one piece was missing, and inside I could see that it was dense and woefully underdone. My heart sank.

It seems so trivial, but I was actually really excited to offer that as a contribution. I knew that amongst the donuts, the casseroles, and the bagels, it would be nice to have a light, citrusy alternative. I think that more people should be exposed to grapefruit in their food-- cookies, cakes, cocktail.... and on a personal pride level, I was hoping that people would be interested enough to try my cake and I wanted to see how much would be gone.

Accordingly, to look inside and see how underdone it was made me feel very embarrassed. I wanted nothing more than to snatch my tray back up, slide the perfectly done apple cake over to fill its spot, and take my wounded pride and deflated cake back to the corner of my classroom. I thought to myself, "Well, this is actually a perfect metaphor for how you're teaching is going this first year at the school. You are putting in some great effort and are enthused about what you have to bring, you want to share it with others, and you do your best, but inside, you are still just raw and inexperienced...just underdone. You are going to have to face the fact that this is how the year is going to be and it will just have to be okay. You'll just sit with those other cakes who have had more baking time and more experience, and you'll make it through. It will be embarrassing sometimes, but it doesn't mean you aren't doing the best you can; you know that you are trying your best."

I was already nodding to myself looking at that sad cake in the empty teacher room between classes-- and then I found myself snapping my head up and thinking, "Stop. THIS IS NOT SOME HUGE SIGNIFICANT EVENT. It's just a cake on a table. Period. It doesn't have anything to do with your teaching, and it is not a perfect metaphor. There are no signs like that, so stop making meanings out of mishaps. So the cake didn't turn out. SO WHAT."

It's hard for me to talk myself into failure-apathy ...so I had to think through that two or three times, but it helped. I looked at that cake, took the knife, and cut myself a slice. For all its denseness, it still tasted great.

                                                 ------------------------

Other treats at the Fat Friday:

Donuts
Bagels with Cream Cheese
Fruit Salad
Egg and Sausage Casserole
Potato and Cheese Casserole
Apple Cinnamon Cake
Peanut Butter Acorns (MY FAVORITE!)
Dried Fruit
Blackberry and Cheese French Toast Casserole
Juice
Chocolate Pretzels
Muffins
Yogurt and Granola
Cinnamon Bread