and the rest of the story.........................

31° at 3:20 AM. We are going to have a glorious day of spring-like temperatures...high 50's then another cool down, typical Ozark weather.

and here is the rest of the story about the banana cake day:

Just so you all won't think I am this super cook with nary a failure or catastrophe, let me share the entire day of the Banana Cake cooking.

I took the long, tiring walk. I am still waiting for the ”feeling more energetic after exercise” to kick in.....what I felt was exhausted!

Cooking while tired is not really a great idea.

First I got the pizza dough going in the food processor. I just leave it until I am ready for it, mixed in fp and left there, ergo, one bowl, a very good thing.

Preheated oven to 350°. Made the cake, got it out of oven, placed on rack to cool. While it was baking I made the icing (see how organized I am).

Then made up the pizza. It makes two. Rolled out first crust, placed on corn-mealed peel. Slid into oven preheated to over 500° onto the stone. Cooked it way too long. Should have just done on 12 minutes and began watching. I am so used to the JennAir which probably never reached that temp because of the ill-fitting door.....I set it for 20 minutes.....way too brown, but edible.

Made second pizza, cooked about 12 minutes. Pushed peel under it and it was so cripy that it slid to back of oven and cracked off about ¼ of the pizza which then dropped upside down on the bottom of the new oven floor! I almost had a heart attack thinking about that tomato sauce etching itself to the oven floor. All I could do was turn off the oven and wait for it to cool down.
I should have taken pictures but I was in shock. I did call in the help mate to see and he just shook his head......well, he made a comment but I won't share it here!

I am happy to report that when the oven was completely cooled down, the blob slid off with just a spatula under it and cleaned up quickly with just soap and water. I didn't want to use the self clean....I think it ruins the oven walls eventually.

I did have to scour the rack pretty intensively.

At least the cake was good. Well,the pizza was too if overcooked.

My sis called and she had had some cooking difficulties too. It either runs in the family or it is an age thing! She doesn't make bread nearly as much as I do.....but she had a recipe she liked but couldn't remember why she had cut it down in volume the last time so thought she would just make the entire amount this time............soon she remembered why.

She has a new HD KA mixer with the huge bowl, but using the l0 or so cups of flour required caused the dough to climb up the hook into the base of the mixer.. She had to add a little more flour and mix slowly to get it back down. Then she dumped all onto the board and kneaded by hand! I think I have heard others complain about this mixer....I didn't tell her that. She wanted me to get one but I am holding out for the Bosch (when Mom's old KA dies).

I will just be doing egg salad sandwiches for lunch today! We are going into town to visit with the in-laws and take them some cake. We didn't get into town....

Random Picture

This will be one of the first blooms I will see. It is from my friend Barb and will always be know as Barb's iris.

From Iris