Betty Crocker to the rescue!

We recently had dinner at my sons' home with his family and in-laws, Keith and Nina Brown. Billy grilled our dinner and I included my version of Morello's Chicken Hooters and Nina brought a wonderful Bundt cake with a blueberry Sauce. After dinner, we got into a discussion about baking and making candy. I will not lie to you! I am terrible at making candy and baking and therefore do very little. If the recipe calls for more than three ingredients or needs a double boiler, I bypass it.

Betty Crocker and Duncan Hines are my best friends. I am a firm believer some women are born to bake and make candy and I am not one of them. My greatest baking achievements include dump cakes and poke cakes. I no longer waste money or time on expensive ingredients for candy. This past Christmas, I made chocolate-covered peanuts in a Crockpot. When I pulled out the Crockpot liner, some of the candy and nuts in the bottom were burned. All you had to do was mix it and put it in the Crockpot and I still burned the candy.

I attempted skeleton fingers for my clients a few years back for Halloween using melting chocolate and pretzel sticks. What a messy expensive disaster. I had chocolate all over me and the counter and it literally just globbed up on the pretzel stick until it no longer looked like a finger. I got smart and decided to buy my candy from that point on. This past Christmas I had a niece do candy and cheeseballs for me for the holidays (Heather Sanders, Hardin County schoolteacher). My brother pays a good friend of his to do our fudge, divinity, and cake for Christmas dinner. (Barb Jones from Equality, excellent baker and candy maker). These women save me so much time and money that would be wasted if I tried it myself. I had a good friend, Kathy Travelstead from around New Haven, that I bought candy and cakes from for years. She usually sets up at the SIC Heritage Festival and sells out early. In the past, she made an orange fruitcake with walnuts that she saturated in a sweet orange and buttery sauce. You cannot imagine how wonderful and rich it was. My son always loved her white chocolate and orange fudge.

I am sitting here thinking of all of these goodies and watching an episode of "Cake Hunters" on the Cooking Channel. This one is labeled "My Wild Glamourous Greek Wedding". The bride wants flowers, jewels and gold filigree decorations reflecting her Greek heritage on her wedding cake and her fiancé likes the outdoors and wants the cake to reflect this. I truly do not know what gets into people's minds, and I am no baker, but this couple and their cake spelled disaster to me. Sure enough! That's what happened. They chose the baker that suspended their multi layered cake from a hammock frame that was decorated to sort of look like a tree. The cake layers were painted in garish cabbage rose flowers dripping with gold filigree decorations and jewels and then had a 200-pound brown elk seated on the floor next to base of tree. Next, there were brown and black birds and tree limbs suspended on the cake layers. It was one of the most bizarre wedding cakes I have ever seen.

I find no fault with the baker considering the time that it took to make the cake, and it was based on what the bride and groom wanted. Someone (such as their parents) probably paid a couple of grand for that cake. Go figure! You should have seen their expressions on first sight of the cake. You would have thought it was a Michelangelo masterpiece. If it was me, I would have gone to my cake appointment alone and picked out a traditional cake without the fishing poles and brown bears hanging from it. Most men don't care about the particulars of a wedding and only want to know where to go to get fitted for a tuxedo and what time to get to the church. I knew it was time to flip the remote when the next couple came in with the baker showing a beautiful white layered cake with edible butterflies floating between the layers. She had masterfully made beautiful white roses tinged in pink for the middle of the cake. The bride spoke up and asked if a tree limb with its bark and leaves could be placed between the layers and the fiancé asked for a layer of the cake to be orange in color. What is wrong with them? Did they come to this appointment under the influence of strong codeine or cold medicine?

I got smart and turned the TV off. Watching money going down the tube for such an important event was more than I could handle. I realize I am old fashioned and I can remember my reaction to someone having a white-and-black wedding. Now you see everything in the universe including camo prints (puleez!). I go blind just thinking of how things have changed in the last 50 years.

How about a recipe for one of my favorite poke cakes? This cake is versatile and can be decorated for different holidays. I like to fix it for Easter and then decorate it with a green-colored coconut nest in the middle with robin egg blue malted milk ball eggs for the nest.

Bake in a 9x13 clear glass dish a white cake mix according to directions on box. While hot from oven poke holes in cake with a utility fork or handle of small wooden spoon. Pour over cake a blended mixture of a 14-ounce can of cream of coconut and 14-ounce can of Eagle Brand Milk. Cover and cool cake in fridge. When chilled, smooth over cake 1 thawed container of Cool Whip and sprinkle on 8 ounces of flaked coconut. If making a coconut nest, place a cup of coconut in Ziploc bag and add a couple drops of green food coloring, zip up bag and toss coconut around in bag until fully coated in green. Carefully sprinkle in circle in middle of cake and add jelly beans or robin blue malted milk balls. Keep cake refrigerated and covered until service.

This cake is sweet and wonderfully moist. Usually tastes better the next day. If keeping in fridge for extended time, add the nest and eggs prior to service. Please enjoy.