Sometimes it is just better not to try. You try your best and you fail. It happens. But if you had never tried than you could always pretend that you would be Super Mommy if you tried 🙂
I had a playdate that I was going to this week. Usually we all bring a little snacky-snack (10 points to whoever knows what show has been playing in our house lately?) to share. I try to bring something either
a) healthy
b) fun
c) yummy
d) all of the above super-awesome-mommy-of-the-year!
In my wonderful world of organization and being on top of things I like to prepare the snack the night before and then pop it in the oven first thing in the morning and show up with a plate of “fresh out of the oven” zucchini chocolate muffins. Everybody goes “oh la la! I can’t believe you were up baking already.” And I take a bow. Or I would if I wasn’t carrying a toddler, diaper bag and a plate of muffins.
It didn’t happen this week. I worked a couple days, Beardie was away for part of the weekend, Boo is fighting off the tail end of a persistent cold, sleep has been a wistful dream (as in, every night I wish I could actually sleep), we had a meltdown over cheerios all over the kitchen floor (your guess over who was crying), I haven’t been to the grocery store…recently. In a nutshell life is a gong show.
And that crazy people pleaser in me just wanted to prove that I was super Mommy, instead of just super-trying-really-hard Mom.
Desperate scrounging around in the kitchen to see if we have anything that could pass as a snack. Nope, not even a bag of chips. I devoured those over the weekend.
At the back of the cupboard I did find a “mature” box of lemon cake mix….hmmm, this could end up as cupcakes. That would be nice.
One time I threw in some frozen blueberries into a lemon cake mix and it ended up delicious. Thankfully I had the gargantuan bag of frozen blueberries in the freezer. Know what else? If I used applesauce instead of oil we might be HEALTHY! Dun dun duh! Mommy win! Take a bow. *rolling applause*
Get everything out on the counter (with 1 hour to spare before we need to be dressed, fed and out the door. Totally do-able. If I was wearing roller-skates) while juggling Boo’s pleas for “more, more, more”
“More what Honey? I have no idea what “more” you want!”
Run to fridge for the essential eggs…which I now remember we used the last one for lunch yesterday. Ummmm….
“What, more cheerios? More water? More raisins?” More sleep? Yes please!
Google search! (What did we do before internet?) “substitute egg in cake mix”
Weird things that don’t live in my kitchen like flax seed, silken tofu, apricot puree, unflavoured gelatin all came up. Not working for me.
But then this doozy popped up “replace the egg and water in a cake batter with a can of soda.”
Huh? Sounds mystical and strange…like it just might work. And in my forage through the fridge for the eggs I did discover an abandoned can of Mountain Dew. Which is lemony. Lemon cake + Mountain Dew + Blueberries + Applesauce = AWESOME! Yes?
I was desperate and ready to try anything…except for silken flax seed puree.
Here’s the line up all ready to go.
Looks innocent enough. And realistically not really healthy. Well 2 healthy, 2 not.
I tossed the blueberries with the dry cake mix first to try and prevent them from “bleeding” all over the batter (didn’t work!).
Threw in the container of applesauce (minus two bites when Boo decided the “more” she wanted was applesauce).
And cracked open a can of Mountain Dew. Only a super Mommy cracks open a can of pop before she has had breakfast. Then takes two swigs because I only needed 10 oz and the can was 12 oz. Yum! Sugar before breakfast….bzzzzzzzz.
It fizzed up in a bit of an alarming fashion. My cake batter has never fizzed before.
I mixed it all up and threw it into the “mini muffin” pans. Still with the hope that I would win the coveted Super Mommy prize.
Set the timer for 15 minutes which should give me enough time to eat breakfast and maybe get one of us dressed.
I took a tentative peek at 15 minutes only to find *ahk* what is this? Cupcake volcanoes? I left them a little bit longer hoping time and heat would heal all baking mishaps.
Nope, this is as good as it gets.
Flat topped really moist and fall apart cupcakes. *sigh* That was a fail. I scrounged around and eventually found some tostitos to bring for our playdate and left the colossal cupcake mush on the counter. Gave them some time to think about what they did and maybe to improve their appearance by the time I got home again.
At lunch I pried a little “cake-mess” onto a plate
It was surprisingly delicious! Really sweet and had a nice crispy, sugary edging. I may have eaten a few…too many. When Beardie got home he tried them too and said they were really good. Especially when he found out they were made with Mountain Dew. Who knew?
The verdict: It’s worth a try in a weird sort of twisted way. They are really sweet and yummy but look horrible. Maybe if I made them a lot smaller and let them bake a bit more they would have been presentable. Try it! I heard Chocolate cake and Coke is fun. I really prefer subbing in pie filling with cake mix. That is super yummy! But if I remember you need eggs for that. Next time Gadget, don’t forget!
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