139.

[coraeis]

Ok, pardon the soapbox, but to the general public

Comments

[aridice]

I wonder if all the commenters are simply trying to assert their own shaky identity as pastry chefs. Imagine this: you, for either lack of skill or lack of time, are incapable of making a cake from scratch. Despite this, you would like to believe that you're a Real Chef. As you're browsing the internets for an easy and simple recipe, you see pudding+cake mix. Someone bothered to put that on a recipe website? You think to yourself, chuckling. All of a sudden it dawns on you: if it's on a recipe site, it must be Real Cooking! All the 5 minute meals you've been making--that's Real Cooking! Ramen+boiling water is veritable Haute Cuisine! In your excitement, you congratulate the original poster on their awesome cake in an attempt to secure this overwhelming moment of self-affirmation.

[coraeis]

Heehee. Real Cooking is about the Exploration and Discovery ;) (to outside folks, this is an inside reference and not a throwaway comment)... and ramen is just like the deconstruction of an obsolete system. (this is a throwaway comment.)

[candrabindu]

Sometimes it bugs me when commenters say what a great recipe they think it is and then go on to list all the things they did differently, eg: "This banana bread is so delicious! I cut the sugar in half, used yogurt instead of the butter, and added 2 T of rum and some cinnamon." I mean, it's interesting to see the variations people suggest, but at a certain point, I think you should just write your own damn recipe.

[coraeis]

Haha, on the money. That drives me nuts; you mouseover and there's a huge wall of text detailing that and then how they served it to their aunt marnie who normally hates banana bread and won't even eat it and then she totally loved it and said "It was so delicious and BOOZY!" It's a fine line. Changes that help to save the recipe are absolutely necessary--things like where there was too much salt or not enough liquid--but slammin' up a 2.0 elicits the exact same thought you had.

[braidsofdeath]

Last year I made two kinds of cupcakes for one of my classmates' birthdays. I made black bottom cupacakes (similar to this recipe), and because that took a lot of time, my other set of cupcakes was lemon cupcakes from a box. I still get compliments on the lemon cupcakes.

[coraeis]

Heehee. I won't tell :)

Also, I'm totally craving lemon cake. How did you know? ::peer::