Tuesday, August 27, 2013

Pin Win Birthday!

This could have so easily ended up as a Fail but it didn't!!

Hubby's birthday is the day after mine, so Monday this year, and he was all bummed that his birthday was going to be lame.

I have extra personal and vacation days, so I concocted a plan.

I secretly took the day off to bake a cake and cook him a nice meal. I picked some recipes from pinterest and even found a "from scratch" recipe for Funfetti (his favorite). (An all pinterest recipe meal could've easily been a fail, but I had read over the recipes ahead of time and felt certain that they would turn out at least okay.)

The pinterest board of recipes I used: Smashed Red Potatoes, Crusted Parmesan Zucchini, Confetti Cake and Balsamic Roast Beef.

I got up when I normally do to head to work after he does, started the crock pot and baked the cake. The first cake was burnt (my gas stove's fault, not the recipe's), so I cut the edges off and dumped in a bowl to maybe make cake pops later. The second turned out okay.

As I was washing the mixer to start the buttercream frosting, the water made a nasty gurgly noise and just up and quit! I run outside and lo, and behold, the water authority people are racing down our street to the bridge construction site. Seems the crew hit a pipe. I was without water until after dinner.

Fortunately, my friend was headed over right then so we picked up some spring water jugs and then she iced the cake for me while I worked on the dishes using a 2.5 gallon jug, and started the potatoes. (Meat and potatoes, my man.)

She left before hubby got home to a nicely set table and delicious aromas. I even timed it so that he could just zone out on the couch for a little while dinner was finishing up. I had a very happy hubby.

The recipes all worked out quite well! The roast was perfectly flavorful and tender. The zucchini and potatoes were cooked through perfectly. The cake was a little too dense for my taste, but still pleased all.

Sorry for the blurry cell pic. We were both quite hungry and in too much of a hurry to take a non-shaky photo.

Oh, and the cake:

He was ecstatic. This is a reference to one of his favorite shows, a British comedy called the IT Crowd about two IT geeks who work under a clueless manager.

Here's the clip: