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How hard can this be? Dan thought.
He surveyed the items laid out before him on the kitchen counter: butter, eggs, milk, cocoa, flour. He'd run down to the market that morning to buy a cake pan, and had decided to leave the frosting and filling up to Betty Crocker. He was willing to go out on a limb with his limited culinary skills to make the actual cake, but no way was he even going to think about attempting the chocolate ganache filling that went with the recipe.
Thank god for joyofbaking.com.
"I can do this, right?" Dan asked a silent Ceazar and Babbette. The llamas looked back at him with all their implacable llama confidence. "My mom does this all the time. How hard can it be?"
He'd deliberately chosen the easiest recipe he could find. Melt'n'mix, they'd described it, just mix, stir, pour and bake. To illustrate this fact they showed a picture of a luscious-looking chocolate cake sitting atop a glass cake stand, iced to perfection, with a generous wedge of said cake sitting on a china plate next to a steaming cup of coffee. It all looked very pretty and Martha Stewartish.
Thing is, now Dan had all the ingredients assembled and the oven was preheating to 350°F just like the recipe said it should, he wasn't so sure about the cooking thing at all. The most extravagant thing he ever cooked on a regular basis was pancakes. Now he was attempting chocolate cake. From scratch. No packets involved.
Maybe he should go back to the store. Get a box of cake mix to go with the tub of frosting sitting on the counter.
"Should I go back to the store?" he asked the llamas.
It wasn't too late to go back to the store. He had the whole day to do this, because it was his day off and no one was expecting him to go into the studio. Casey was dealing with writing the show with Dan's stand-in. Admittedly, by calling Dan every hour or so to bitch about the poor guy's grammar, but he was dealing. So really, there was nothing stopping him from going back to the store and buying a box of cake mix, throwing it in the bowl with the prescribed amount of eggs and milk, scraping it into the cake pan and letting the oven do its thing.
"Nah, you've come this far, Danny boy. Gotta keep going."
He got a large bowl out of the cupboard and grabbed the set of measuring cups he'd bought with the cake pan. When he was buying the pan, the lady behind the counter at the store had asked if he had proper measuring cups and when he'd answered in the negative, she'd added the set of cups as well as a set of measuring spoons to his purchases.
"You can do what you like with most cooking," she'd told him, as she rang it all up, "but baking cakes is a science."
She was so serious Dan didn't have the nerve to question her.
Combine one cup of self-raising flour, a quarter cup of cocoa and one cup of caster sugar.
Hmm, caster sugar. Not something he'd ever had to deal with before. Wasn't all sugar the same? He'd thought so until he'd read the cake-making notes on the website. Always use the type of sugar given in the recipe they told him, otherwise your cake won't turn out properly.
He really wanted this cake to turn out properly.
Dan measured the dry ingredients into the bowl and frowned. It didn't look like enough to make a cake the size of the one in the picture, but he had to believe that it would all turn out okay.
"It's a science," he reminded himself. "Science experiments always start out weird, but they come together in the end."
He gave the flour/cocoa/sugar mixture a bit of a stir, then went back to the recipe.
Melt four ounces of butter. Add to dry ingredients with half a cup of milk and two lightly beaten eggs. Stir until smooth.
Well, that seemed pretty straightforward.
"You know, I think we can do this," he said confidently to the llamas as he bent to get a small saucepan out of the cupboard.
He set the butter to melt over a low heat on the stove, and while he waited he grabbed a beer from the fridge and popped the top.
It wasn't like it was the first time he'd made a cake. Or attempted to, at any rate. When he took Home Ec in junior high, they'd had to make cakes for one class. Not that his had turned out looking like a cake anyone would actually want to eat or anything, but he had attempted the cake thing prior to this.
However his mom - his mom loved to bake and she always made these fantastic cakes for birthdays and special occasions. Everyone in the family had a special cake for their birthday. David like carrot cake, while Dan was always partial to sour cream and cherry cake. On the other hand Sam was the recipient of this wicked dark chocolate cake. Oddly enough, his dad's birthday cake was a strawberry cream cake. Getting that cake on his birthday was the only time Dan could remember seeing his dad really, truly happy about something.
Like a lot of things in their family, the birthday cakes had stopped sometime around Sam's death, but Dan could still remember the taste of sweet-tart cherries and the way the white frosting drizzled down the fluted sides of the cake.
A sizzling sound pulled him out of his reverie and he grabbed the now melted butter off the heat. He peered into the pan. What was all that white stuff? Was it supposed to look like that?
Hoping he was doing the right thing, he poured the melted butter into the bowl, added the milk and eggs and began to stir.
It started out looking kind of weird and lumpy. Certainly not like any cake batter he'd ever seen. But he persevered, and pretty soon it started to look more like cake batter and less like a bowl of lumpy greasy stuff. Five minutes later he had a sore arm and a reasonably smooth looking cake batter.
Pour mixture into an eight inch cake pan that has been greased and lined with parchment paper.
No one told him he had to line the pan with parchment paper. If he'd known he had to line the pan with parchment paper he would have bought parchment paper to line the pan with when he went out for the sugar.
Dan gazed wildly around his kitchen, looking for something, anything, that might do instead. But aside from his phone bill that was stuck to the fridge with a Sports Night magnet, nothing even came close.
He could call his mom and ask her what to do, but then he'd have to explain why he was making the cake in the first place, and he wasn't quite ready for that particular conversation.
Dan gazed at the batter then at the cake pan. The label on the pan declared it to be 'Non-stick for fuss-free baking!' He would just have to take it at its word, he decided as he smeared it with a generous amount of butter.
Bake in a moderate oven for fifty minutes or until cooked when tested.
Dan placed the cake in the oven, sat back on his heels and wondered how the hell he was going to keep himself occupied for the next fifty minutes. He could sit there and watch the cake, he supposed, but a) that'd be more boring than listening to Jeremy and Casey talk about the weather, and b) does a watched cake ever cook?
Dan stepped away from the oven, pondered his options for a moment, and began tidying the kitchen.
~*~*~
Dan couldn't quite believe it. He'd made a cake.
"I've made a cake!" he exclaimed to the llamas.
Dan stared at the cake that was cooling on the cake rack he'd bought along with the pan. There were a couple of cracks in the top, and it was a little lopsided, but other than that it had risen quite nicely and it smelled divine.
"I made a cake!" he said again. Ceazar and Babbette signalled their silent approval.
Dan reached out and poked the top with his index finger, smiling when it bounced back. About the only thing he remembered from the cake class in Home Ec was that a cake was cooked if the top sprang back when lightly touched. At least, that's what Mrs Knight had assured him. He hadn't really been that interested at the time, but now it made sense in some weirdly obscure way.
He reached out to poke it again, but was distracted by the ringing of the telephone.
"'Lo."
"The man has no idea how to use a semi-colon," Casey said without preamble.
"What are they teaching kids in schools these days?" Dan replied with a chuckle.
"How am I supposed to work with a guy whose idea of grammar is ending every second sentence with a preposition? He can't tell the difference between 'their', 'there' and 'they're', Danny. How can a guy go through life and not know the difference between an adverb and a possessive pronoun?"
"Casey?"
"Yeah?"
"You know how you told me to tell you when you're being annoying?"
"I'm just saying…"
"I know you are, but you're being annoying, so stop it. Not everyone knows what you know, Casey, and he's new at this, so give the guy a break."
Dan paused for the half-expected rebuttal, but Casey must have been feeling magnanimous because he just snorted a little and asked, "Are you dropping by later?"
"Nah, I think I'll bum around at home," he replied, glancing at the cake.
"Well, think of us poor slobs out earning an honest crust when you're lounging on the sofa eating bonbons."
"Bonbons?" Dan snorted. "What is this, nineteen fifty-five?"
Casey laughed.
"You're coming over tonight, aren't you?" Dan asked.
"Got nothing better to do," Casey replied easily.
"Bring beer."
"You want me to pick up some bonbons as well?"
"I'm hanging up now."
Casey was still laughing as Dan hung up.
A quick glance at the kitchen clock told him it was just after one. The cake was still too warm to do anything with, and it'd be hours before Casey finished work.
"What are we going to do, eh, guys?" he asked the llamas. They didn't have much to say in reply.
Suddenly inspiration struck. Or, more to the point, nature called, and when he walked into the bathroom to take care of business, his near to overflowing laundry hamper reminded him that it'd been quite a while since he last did a load.
He gathered together his laundry, his iPod, a battered copy of The Green Mile, a bag of Cheetos, and a beer, because who could eat Cheetos without beer?
"Okay, I'm going to go fluff and fold for a while, so I'm leaving you guys in charge," he said to the llamas. Ceazar and Babbette gazed at him unquestioningly. "I want no llama high jinks while I'm gone, okay?"
The llamas declined to answer.
~*~*~
Split cooled cake in half. Sandwich the halves together with one third of the chocolate ganache. Spread remaining ganache over top and sides of the cake. Decorate with chocolate curls if desired.
Dan was stretched out on the couch in the darkened living room when a key turning in the front door lock startled him awake. He'd dozed off just after the show finished, exhausted from a long day of cake making, laundry folding and channel surfing. He blinked a couple of times and squinted at the DVR clock. The little red numbers told him it was about ten minutes to one.
Casey tiptoed into the living room, shoes in hand and obviously trying hard not to make any noise.
"Hey."
Casey swore and dropped his shoes. "I thought you were in bed," he said, flipping on a light.
Dan raised himself into a sitting position, blinking at the sudden light. "I said I'd wait up."
"No, you said bring beer." Casey gestured to the six-pack he was carrying and gave him a pointed look.
"I did say that, didn't I?"
"Yes, indeed you did."
"Oh. Okay."
"You watched the show?" Casey asked as he shucked his coat.
"I watched the show."
Casey looked at him expectantly
"And it was okay," Dan added.
"Just okay?" Casey asked, looking vaguely miffed.
"I thought Tim…"
"Jim…"
"…Jim did a great job - for someone who hasn't quite got a handle on how to use a semi-colon."
"You noticed that too, eh?"
Dan grinned at him. "Oh, yeah."
Casey held up the six-pack. "Beer?"
"Why the hell not."
"Why the hell not, indeed."
Casey removed two beers from the pack, setting them on the coffee table, and turned to take the remainder into the kitchen.
It took Dan a minute to remember what awaited Casey in the kitchen.
"Casey, wait!"
Casey turned back. "What?"
"I…um…" Dan had pictured this elaborate unveiling of the cake in which Casey would be amazed at his culinary skills and thoughtfulness, despite the fact that in reality Casey would probably laugh at him for being such a sap.
"Danny?"
Ah, to hell with it, Dan decided. He was going to see the cake sooner or later, although knowing Casey he probably wouldn't notice it if it leapt off the counter and smacked him in the face.
"Nothing," he said and grabbed his beer as Casey moved into the kitchen. He was just raising the bottle to his lips when there came a confused-sounding, "Danny?" from the kitchen.
Obviously, tonight Casey was not going to be playing true to form.
"Who said he had the observational powers of a gnat?" Dan asked the llamas as he set down the beer and pulled himself off the couch. Ceazar and Babbette had nothing to say in reply.
"It's a cake," Casey stated as Dan entered the kitchen.
"And who said your powers of observation were lacking?"
"It's a cake," Casey repeated.
"You're also surprisingly prone to stating the obvious."
Casey looked at the cake warily, like it was some wild beast poised to bite his nose off. Dan was pretty proud of how it had turned out after it had been filled and frosted. You couldn't even see the spot where the frosting had come unstuck and he'd had to do a hasty patch job.
"You made this?" Casey asked.
Dan stuck his hands in his pockets and shrugged. "Happy birthday, Casey."
"It's not my birthday," Casey responded curtly, then offered Dan a weak smile and said, a little more gently, "I mean, it's not my birthday yet."
"It will be in five days."
"So why not wait five days?"
"Because in five days I won't have a day off and I wanted to do this."
Casey looked at him uncertainly. "You wanted to make me a cake?"
"I wanted to do something," Dan said, taking a step toward him. "It's not every day you turn forty."
"And so you made me a cake?"
Dan looked at the cake, then back at Casey. "Yeah."
Casey considered it for a moment. "Chocolate filling?"
"Naturally."
A slow smile spread across Casey's face as he turned to Dan and tugged him close.
"Happy birthday, Casey," Dan whispered again, right before he kissed him.
FIN