My earliest memory in the kitchen:

with my momma and some cake batter…

I must have been 3 or 4…Gracie’s age I suppose. I remember where I was standing, what time of day it was based on the way the light streamed through the windows in the kitchen & I remember that cute happy farmer family avocado green, orange and mustard yellow 1970’s wallpaper.

((This is not the wallpaper – but the colors and flowers are so close…))

I remember standing on something, next to my mom — she was in the corner next to the light switch and I was closest to the sink…and hoping & waiting for a lick. The batter in the mixer was white, like cream — it was for a cake ((my favorite then and still today)). The mixer beaters of her white stand mixer whirled loudly, mom had it on high, I am sure. She scraped the sides of the bowl with a spatula as the beaters mixed and fluffed. She must have warned me to keep my hands away, because I remember consciously keeping them at my sides.

But then in a flash, that beautiful, delicious, creamy white batter ((my nose had already teased my taste buds of what was to come)) was splatted with crimson red. And the noise as the beaters tried to continue whirling against the resistance jarred me out of my thoughts of licking beaters and making frosting. And the yelp and scream, as mom pulled the plug to the mixer out of the wall…and then the sudden silence. Crimson drips poured across the cake batter. What had happened? I couldn’t tell — how did mom get her fingers caught in the beaters? Would she be okay?

But my 3 year-old mind quickly flashed from worry about my momma to that once creamy white cake batter – now strangely and irregularly colored, with my momma’s blood. I imagined momma’s pain – but wondered…would I still get a lick?

Last night, I stayed up late measuring and mixing and whirling a white cake for Kade’s half-birthday – which is today. I picked a simple recipe out of my grandma’s 1970’s Betty Crocker cookbook…the one my momma told me I should make – the “Dinette Cake”. As I read the simple instructions – this very memory flooded back into my mind. Making a cake with my momma. It must have been this very recipe – because I read something unique in the instructions:

“Beat all ingredients in large mixer bowl on low-speed, scraping bowl constantly…”

Constantly scraping a bowl while the mixer is on is tricky ((at best)) and as I read it, it gave me the willies and caused this very memory to flash into my mind. Needless to say, I didn’t scrape the bowl constantly. I called mom this morning to tell her about my memory, I told her I read the instructions to the Dinette Cake in the Betty Crocker cookbook and figured out why she got her fingers caught in the beaters… she said “Oh, yes…” before I could tell her the part of the instructions that could lead to such a mishap, she already knew. Then I asked “what did you do with the cake batter?”. To which she replied, “I don’t know, I think I scooped out as much blood as I could and baked it anyway” and then she laughed. I don’t remember that part haha!

I will be sharing my ganache recipe very soon…but first let me just say: