Published: February 24, 2008 11:22 pm      

LEE WARD: Have your cake and eat the batter, too

My cousin David took on a multitude of life changes all at once.

In one month, he took a new job and moved hundreds of miles away from the area he’d always lived in.

The next month, he was engaged.

The wedding occurred about six months later and within another few months, David was an expectant father.

Now, David and his wife have a baby boy. Just three years ago, I’m sure he’d never have dreamed his life would be so different.

David and I became close when I was a freshman in college. He lived in town and also was a student. In fact, he was my closest friend in college. We talked about serious things and crazy things, too.

The serious topics weren’t nearly as much fun as the crazy ones, because we had opposite views on nearly everything in politics and religion.

However, we could talk about silly things.

Once of the silly things we agreed on was cake batter.

We decided that someday we will have a cake batter party. We will make a few different kinds of cake batter and eat it buffet style, allowing ourselves a different little bowl for the German chocolate batter and another for the classic white and another for the strawberry. Forget the carrot cake. We’re not talking about vegetables; we’re talking about cake batter.

My husband made fun of us, saying he preferred his salmonella cooked, but we are healthy people and are in the right age range to tolerate a little raw egg now and then. Besides, raw egg never tastes so good as when it is thoroughly laced in chocolate or strawberry flavoring.

I remember watching my grandmother make cakes when I was a little girl. It was fascinating to watch her seemingly make something out of nothing. But ultimately, I was there to lick the bowl and the beaters. This is an area where it clearly is best to be an only child: no sharing the leftover batter.

The first time I made a cake by myself was for my Uncle Chic’s birthday. It was a strawberry cake with strawberry icing and I was about 12 years old. I felt like a grownup because I was being trusted to make a cake by myself, but I never felt more mature than when my younger cousin Gene asked if he could lick the bowl. Even though I still enjoyed licking the bowl myself, I was proud to turn the spatula over to him. I viewed it as a rite of passage, but I also secretly knew my taste buds hadn’t seen the last of the cake batter.

I realize cake batter probably ranks right up there on the list of unhealthy foods no one should eat, ever, just below doughnuts and just above canned soup. And as a cook and baker, I realize the importance of using as much batter as you can scrape out of the bowl. But still, when I make a cake, after I have put the pans in the oven and before I’ve filled the bowl with soapy water to soak, I can’t help but swipe my finger on the inside of the bowl and taste the creamy, cool delicious batter, which is an accurate predictor of the quality of cake you can expect.

David and I have never had our cake batter party and probably won’t, although we still talk about it sometimes. But I suspect this food fantasy we share might be about the one thing in David’s life that hasn’t changed.

LEE WARD can be reached at lward@dailyindependent.com or (606) 326-2661.