<p>Nutella has recently invaded this house. Can buy 2 decent size jars banded together at Costco. At the same time you can buy these wonderful pretzel chips. Recipe: Open bag of pretzel chips. Open one jar of Nutella. Remove one pretzel chip from bag and dip into the Nutella. Devour. Repeat. Repeatedly. Until S#3 goes to the pantry and sees that the first jar of Nutella is almost empty and inquires as to what has happened to it. >>>>Mom slinks away sheepishly>>>>>></p>
<p>Oooh, Consolation… That sounds fantastic. I’ll have to try those suggestions…</p>
<p>Also have added The Cake Bible to my Amazon wishlist. =)</p>
<p>By far the best chocolate cake and chocolate frosting known to man - Hershey’s “Perfectly Chocolate Chocolate Cake” recipe on the back of those tins of unsweetened chocolate powder. Believe me, it will change your life. The secret is the boiling water . . . I make it every Valentine’s Day and every member of the family immediately gains five pounds.</p>
<p>“I HATE frosting”</p>
<p>People often think I hate frosting because I generally eat the cake and leave the frosting behind. No, I’m just a frosting snob. Mediocre cake is well worth the calories, IMHO, but only superior frosting can say the same. Fudge and cream cheese frosting generally justify themselves; that goop from the can and most buttercreams do not.</p>
<p>It goes without saying that the chocolate frosting recipe I posted merits both hands, spoons, pretzels, nuts, and (divine!) dipped fruit. I’m thinking of playing with it this Christmas; I’m betting that using it as the glue to hold together coconut or pecan balls would be insanely great.</p>
<p>Consolation - I think you should adopt me</p>
<p>Hanna I’m with you - store bought cakes especially often have inedible frosting - they taste like oversugared Crisco to me. They set my teeth on edge.</p>
<p>The frosting I like that I never get to make is the one for German Chocolate Cake that’s full of coconut. No one but me likes it.</p>
<p>“It’s also important for her self-esteem to see proof of the excellence of her baked goods, right?”</p>
<p>LOL, ZMom!!! </p>
<p>I admire your noble sacrifice ;)</p>
<p>Of all the things I’ve posted on this site, this is the most embarrassing. I’ve seen, but never purchased, Nutella.</p>
<p>Is it really that good?</p>
<p>Neither of my boys likes cake, so we always had brownies for birthdays. And there is nothing better than uncooked brownies (yes, eggs & all). I take them out of the oven about 10 minutes early - so gooey they must be eaten with a spoon. </p>
<p>My grocery store cuts unsold birthday cakes into slices for 50 cents each. I have been known to eat a slice in the parking lot.</p>
<p>ok consolation…I am one of those I hate frosting/icing people. Haven’t had a bday cake/cupcake since I was 7 and I am (ahem) into an odd numbered decade I hate to mention. 
I have to admit your recipes sound wonderful! Maybe someday I will find a cake I like as much as a fresh loaf of bread!!!</p>
<p>I know I’ve already been accused of taking the fun out of canned frosting, so it’s with some trepidation that I move on to Peeps … Am I the only one who thinks they’re disgusting? Sorry if I’m offending anyone, but honestly – they’re gross! Have never, ever bought them, and don’t plan to start. Nutella, OTOH – oh yes; the large size, double package at Costco. Had to make a concerted effort to avoid that aisle since it all disappears way too fast in this house.</p>
<p>Hmmm, chocolate frosting ON the peeps, now that’s an idea!</p>
<p>maysixxmom-
Nutella is chocolate hazelnut spread. Itis simply divine. There are other “imitations” but none are anywhere near as good. Try it and report back!</p>
<p>I also had the dog who ate the cupcakes problem, a german shepherd who ate not just the cupcakes but also the aluminum foil cupcake cups around them. On another occasion she manged to eat half an angel food cake, all she could reach. And she never got sick.</p>
<p>I don’t get the allure of Peeps, but I buy them for my kids every Easter.</p>
<p>Also, just wanted to add that you never know when a post you start will take off! :D</p>
<p>CBBB, that’s ok. I think Nutella is disgusting. French friends and relatives live by it, but I just can’t deal with it. It’s all a matter of taste. Then there is that typical French afternoon kid’s snack of a piece of fresh baguette with real butter and a square of wonderful chocolate. Yum!</p>
<p>Mathmom wrote:
<<store bought=“” cakes=“” especially=“” often=“” have=“” inedible=“” frosting=“” -=“” they=“” taste=“” like=“” oversugared=“” crisco=“” to=“” me.=“” set=“” my=“” teeth=“” on=“” edge.=“”>></store></p>
<p>That’s because Crisco and sugar is just about precisely what supermarket icing is made of. Not a jot of butter to be found.</p>
<p>A lot of professional cake decorators who charge $5 per slice and up use icings made mostly with “shortening” and confectioner’s sugar. Many of them also use cake mixes, either plain or doctored. It’s what people are used to, and many prefer it.</p>
<p>True scratch bakers are far and few between. </p>
<p>Just as truffles made with good chocolate, real cream, real butter, and natural ingredients such as real fruits and liqueurs are not common. Look at the ingredients label on a box of Godiva some time. You’ll see all kinds of “fake fats”–not just cocoa butter and cream. They used to be good several decades ago, but now things have changed. It’s all for shelf life and low production cost.</p>
<p>I have to confess that I really don’t like Nutella either. [hides head in shame] It’s because I’m really not a big fan of hazelnut flavor.</p>
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<p>That’s such a shame. There’s such an astounding difference between good bakers and bad bakers. When my husband and I (both of us love to cook and bake) went cake tasting for our wedding, we were flat-out disappointed with the first few people we took a look at… We didn’t have anything in mind other than we wanted the cake to taste good, and we wanted the decorators to have fun with it. No bridezilla dictating what we wanted-- they’re the artists, we wanted them to have fun with it (our “color palette” was a Monet Waterlilies painting, and we played fast and loose with all the colors in the painting, which turned out gorgeous). The first several bakers just flat-out panicked, had no idea how to go about decorating it (really? isn’t it easier and more fun to come up with something cool on your own?) and their cakes tasted store-bought. The last one we went to made this:</p>
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<a href=“http://img.■■■■■■■■■■■■■■■/albums/v466/aibarr/248963618_JiJHr-M.png[/IMG]”>http://img.■■■■■■■■■■■■■■■/albums/v466/aibarr/248963618_JiJHr-M.png
![http://img.■■■■■■■■■■■■■■■/albums/v466/aibarr/248963618_JiJHr-M.png[/IMG]](http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v466/aibarr/248963618_JiJHr-M.png%5B/IMG%5D){kind=link}
</a></p>
<p>Mexican vanilla cake with chambord and frangelico filling. It was reeeeally good, and our cake wouldn’t have been one of the most talked-about things of our wedding if we’d gone to a baker that’d used stuff from a box and crisco plus confectioner’s sugar.</p>
<p>Food should be art sometimes. =)</p>
<p>aibarr, that cake looks absolutely amazing! Very akin to the cakes being made on some TV show I remember watching last year. These incredible artist/bakers had to pull together original, imaginative wedding cakes in 8 hours from design to finished product.</p>
<p>My mother still talks 24 years later about how wonderful our wedding cake tasted. Funnily enough while the flavor was what we’d agreed on (white chocolate) the decoration came as a bit of a shock. We’d looked at photos of white cakes with flowers, what we got was a white cake with a solid red top (some sort of rasberry glaze) and white chocoalte piped lattice and other stuff on the red background. It was quite good looking and tasted great, but my first thought was “Oh my, it’s so RED!”</p>