Extravagance

Sometimes you give in and make an extravagant purchase.  Extravagance is relative.  It means different things to different people.  To me it can mean seeing something and not being able to forget it till it's mine.  Sometimes I can talk myself out of it but my baseline is, "will I have a bigger headache if I DO it or if I DON'T?"  Sometimes I just can't stop thinking of it and so give in. Not always, but sometimes.

 That's what happened with this pan.  The company knew what they were doing when they waved this in front of me.  I'm in my bee mode.  Lately, bee things just jump in front of me.  This pan was not something I've ever seen before but I'm a baker and this is made by a very reputable cake pan company and for a couple of weeks I tried to talk myself out of it.  By my standards it was an expensive extravagance.  I looked on Amazon and they weren't offering it for any less.  They were offering silicone forms for very cheap and I bought one.  You do get what you pay for. I sent it back the minute I opened the package. I took the leap and sent for this.  Then I got baking.

 This was the cake made from the recipe that came with the pan.  I wasn't excited about the look. Because it was a very spongy cake the definition of the bees and combs was too vague.

 And it made a huge amount of batter thus a very tall cake.  I had batter enough left over for a whole other layer cake. 

 This was the result from the recipe that was on the King Arthur website that featured the pan.   I knew not to fill the pan so full and there wasn't as much batter with this recipe.  Both are glazed with a honey lemon glaze.

 I sent the results down the street to my taste testers - my daughter and son-in-law.  They liked the texture of the lighter cake but the taste of the darker one. They hid it from the girls. No sharing.

 Then I tried a shortbread cookie recipe and it was the clear winner.  When I sent a couple of the cells to work with my daughter she said she ate both of them immediately and then after the event I made them for she took the rest home. 

As a treat I frosted the bottoms with two icings, one chocolate and this one, slightly lemon.  and no, I didn't use it for Easter.