Best Celebration Cake - Take 2

Last weekend was my Mother-in-law's birthday, which, as usual, snuck up on Hubby and I without warning.  We went down to northern NSW for her birthday party - a BBQ at their home.  A BBQ with my parents-in-law is no ordinary affair, after all, my Father-In-Law is a chef and seems to love putting on an awsome spread.

My contribution to the cause was to take down a birthday cake for MIL.  What cake?  Well, to be honest, it was an excuse for me to have another go at smitten kitchen's gorgeous yellow cake.

Despite a momentary set back when I realised we didn't have any caster sugar (thank you neighbours!), preparing the cake went much more smoothly this time around.  Taking my lessons from my first attempt, I didn't overfill the cake pans this time and I also baked them separately.  I still felt like they would NEVER ACTUALLY FINISH baking though... but it's funny what an extra five minutes will do, and soon I had two round cakes and six cupcakes (I had to do SOMETHING with the extra batter) cooling on a rack.

Can I say now, that I am absolutely addicted to the dark chocolate and sour cream icing?  Honesty, it's icing for grown ups in that you get the full chocolate hit without the icing being overbearingly sweet.  Once the icing was ready, I trimmed up the cakes and set to icing them.

This time round I put much more icing between the cakes (that was a bit of a fail last time), and put a thin coat all over the cake, left it for a moment to 'set' and then put another coating over the top.  It worked a treat and looked far more polished this time than last time around.  Perhaps I'm getting the hang of this icing lark?

It traveled fairly well down the coast in a plastic container (Hubby even put a seat belt round the container so it wouldn't move in the car, and I maneuvered the window shade over the top to keep the sun off).

After dinner I finished it off with crumbled up flake and a few sparklers in place of candles - VOILA!

Duck Eggs - Version 1

One of the many things I've learnt from my husband over the last few years is an appreciation for out of the ordinary ingredients.  Through his strenuous coaxing (or, lets face it, occassional bullying), I've tried lots of things that I would never have considered putting in my mouth, from snails in France to horse in Italy and lots of things in between.

Last weekend my Sister-In-Law and her lovely partner took me to the Rocklea Markets.  Closed for months due to the flooding earlier this year here in Brisbane, it's become a regular ritual for them to go at the crack of dawn every couple of Saturdays.

I'm glad I went with two experienced market goers - the sheer amount of fresh fruit and veg (amoung other things) was absolutely staggering, and a concerted effort of scouting the stalls and determining where the freshest and cheapest items were was more than a one man job.

As we wandered amoung the mountains of veggies and fruit, Sis-In-Law pointed out a table set amidst the chaos selling boxes of duck eggs.  She started eating them while working in the UK, and has often told me that they make the creamiest, most amazing scrambled eggs.  Overlooking the steep price tag, and taking stock of Hubbies love to try new things, I bought a box.

The next morning, I left Hubby in charge of toast and sides and set about making scrambled duck eggs for a lazy Sunday breakfast. 

Let me say now.... I love duck - I will hone in on it if we're eating out and it's on the menu and there's never a mouthful left.  In Munich, I gorged on duck in an Oktoberfest beer tent.  It's one of my favourite foods.  So the thought never even crossed my mind that I would have any kind of issue with duck eggs.  After all, the only difference seemed to be that the eggs were bigger, and the shells a pristine white.

The problem arose when I cracked the eggs into a dish.  I was taken absolutely off guard by the strangely pungent smell of the raw eggs, and so began the loss of my nerve.  The eggs went into the  pan with diced bacon, mushroom and onion and cooked up just like chicken eggs, so again, there should have been no issue.  However, when I plated the eggs up (which I did overcook a little in my nervousness), I noticed the colour.  Oh so subtle, but definitely a different shade of yellow from a chicken egg.... with the slightest hint of green.  By now, my nerve has slunk out of the kitchen and out the front door without a backwards glance.  But I manned up and sat down to breakfast and, under the watchful gaze of Hubby, tucked into my much talked about duck eggs. 

They absolutely didn't taste any different from chicken eggs.  Really.  Maybe, at a push, I could say they tasted a bit creamier.  But, with a blindfold on, I couldn't have told the difference.  So why did I struggle to eat them?  Absolutely ridiculous, and proof that the picky child I was is still lurking inside me somewhere.