On Saturday we had our first house party. About 20 people were invited and 12 showed up, so it was a good mix. We had 2 cases of beer, a 5 liter box of wine, juice for those who don't drink, and food.
We wanted to make American foods for our guests. So I said I would bake cupcakes. It seemed like a basic and easy thing to offer. But, as Kerry said later, "Why is everything harder in Africa? You put in 3 times the effort and only get half the result!" At that point, I whole heartedly agreed.
Let's first acknowledge the two things I did right. The first was that over a month ago I downloaded an app for my ipod that converts basically anything to anything. And the second, was I left the butter out over night so it was at room temperature.
So Saturday afternoon came, and I started. We did not have vanilla, and since both the milk and the butter have what can only be described as "an animal" flavor, I used almond extract to mask it. The sugar was only sugar in the raw, and I had icing sugar for my icing. The flour was opened, and discovered to be yellow. I think it's corn based, but it's my only option so I continue.
I now realize that I need to measure out my ingredients... and that we have no measuring cups. So as I'm guessing "Is this mug a cup or 3/4 cups?" I remember that we do have a teaspoon measurer in our sugar bowl! So I get my ipod and convert- 1 and half cups of flour = 72 tsps. I also was fortunate to have the weight of the butter, 125grams needed, I have a block of 500 grams, so 1/4 of the block.
My next obstacle was that we don't have a mixer. We have a hand blender, which I gallantly tried, but after 5 seconds it started smoking so I gave up. And used a whisk.
Well my corn-muffin like cupcakes turned out alright. And my green icing was delicious. So all in all, a success. But not one of my more delicious cakes. I look forward to investigating further flour options this week...
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