I can Bake
Fresh Baked Biscuits
I Can Bake
I was bored while waiting for the cake to finish baking its last 15 minutes. As the vanilla scent engulfed my apartment, I remembered I had to wait for the cake to cool before slicing. I was proud to accomplish making a cake like my grandmother seemed to do every Sunday.
After the cake cooled, I sliced through the firm outer crust and found a horizontal line through the fluffy yellow center of my first homemade pound cake. Confused, I called my aunt for her assessment. “You likely overbeat the batter or didn’t cook it long enough. “ she said. What the hell? I did exactly as the directions told me. My ego was deflated.
That day I decided I couldn’t bake from scratch. Yes, I’ve baked cakes from a box and a few homemade cookies, but never lush desserts like my family matriarchs did. I always saw baking as an artform and a science that required precision.
Nearly twenty years after that incident, I needed to make a pie for Thanksgiving. Our daughters were celebrating with us for the first time and kept talking about getting a slice of their dad’s sweet potato pie. Unfortunately, he fell ill and the entire meal, including the pie was on me to cook.
So, instead of purchasing a frozen pie to bake, I decided to make the pie they longed for. The filling wasn’t the challenge, but the crust was intimidating. The success of any cobbler or pie hangs in the crust. I searched in a cookbook for a basic crust recipe and got busy. As I made the crust under my family’s watchful eye, I pretended to be confident as I prayed.
The pie was a success. Yet my emotions were stuck with a vision of that failed pound cake. I’m not a baker. I just got lucky I thought.
One day while admiring my friend Kathy’s skills in making yeast rolls, I decided to rip off the label of not being a baker. I started with a buttermilk pie. I studied the recipe for days, paying attention to directions like, pre- bake crust or use room temperature eggs, which proved to be important. That year, I made two pies for my family’s Thanksgiving celebration.
In 2022, I committed to an eggnog pound cake to the Johnson family Thanksgiving menu, confronting the nemesis which had bruised my ego many years ago.
I studied the recipe thoroughly! Details like, while beating batter, add one egg at a time and alternating with the cream/eggnog made me slow down and focus. Without a standing mixer, this process is as effective as upper body strength training. The cake was a success!
Since then, my confidence has spiked. Now, I want to get comfortable making biscuits, which my husband does so well. I’ve made a batch a biscuits three times and they get better each time. Recently, I made biscuits for some co-workers and prayed for them like my husband does when he makes biscuits; a practice he learned from his grandmother.
This time, I recalled what each stage of the biscuits should look like. Without measuring ingredients, I felt my way through the process. This batch was by far the best I’ve ever made. My co-corkers quickly devoured them with the butter, jam, or cane syrup I served with them.
While following a recipe is important, the right ingredients seal the deal. White Lilly Flour, Crisco shortening, Land O’ Lakes butter and other brands of baking ingredients can make a difference between a good biscuit and a smackin’ biscuit.
One day, I hope to make yeast rolls; another item my grandmother Bo-Bo was known for.
What changed? I decided to stop playing the old tapes and to keep old labels from sticking to my spirit. Without labels, I will have fun experimenting with baking and in the process learn more about what I can create successfully.
