Baking: The secret family cake
Zola has been begging me for days to make brown-yellow-white cake for her. From her lips, this is quite significant as she doesn't often eat cake. She's not a very sweet tooth. In many ways she is not what you would call average. So as I mentioned tricolor cake is a secret family cake. It's not the recipe that's special, it's the story.
When I was a kid, my grandmother and godmother lived in a very tiny village in the northern mountains. They lived modestly and kindly, and I always enjoyed spending times there. They had stoves in every room and heated with wood. I remember we would often go and all help bring in the wood for the winter fire. We children would carry it in and the adults would chop and split the wood. We also spent a lot of time there in the summer, always going to the "roof". That's what we called the top of the nearby hill. All day long we were out climbing trees, playing in the fields with village children or going down to the nearby river. We lit flowers for Grandma and bright green grass for her chickens. It was very important job for us.
When we were there, my grandmother always cooked delicious meals and my godmother baked delicious cakes. That is where the Christmas recipe came from, from my godmother. She got it from someone and so on. As the years went by we baked less and less of these tricolor cakes, we almost forgot about them, when I was a young adult, then 20 years ago, my mother surprised us with them at Christmas.
Making this cake takes a lot of time, a lot to do and a lot of ingredients. It's very easy to mess up and very hard to do really well. My mom tried for years but the cream always turned out lumpy. She did not like making this cake, of course it was one of our favorites. No mom can say no to three pairs of huge eyes begging kids, even when they are grown. So my mum baked and baked every Christmas, but she got more and more disappointed. Until one Christmas she gave me the task of making this cake for Christmas. I was totally scared, but I couldn't say no either. I tried and consoled myself that even if I messed it up, it would be delicious, just not pretty and not perfect. To this day I don't know what I did differently, but the cream turned out perfect. My mum was amazed. I didn't get all three layers perfect because the white foam was my weak spot. I just can't do it, even to this day. This is not my cup of tea.
Last Christmas, my parents came to spend the holidays with us. We made the cake together. Of course, in addition to the fun we had, we also had a very delicious perfect cake. My mum and I can do anything together. And now Zola is asking for this delicious cake. I took a deep breath and made it.
I have not disappointed myself. The cream was perfect but the foam on top is not. Some things never change but I did my best. I even beat a chocolate santa to death for it because I needed the chocolate sprinkles on top.
The only consolation is that Zola loves it. She says it's delicious and she eats a big slice every day.