Friday 30 November 2007

Fun, Fun, Funfetti!

I'm a keen baker. I aim for Domestic-Goddessery. I do not use packet cake mixes. For me, the packet cake mix belongs in some kind of culinary purgatory, inhabited by jars of Dolmio pasta sauce, tinned carrots, and 'Smash' instant mashed potato.


What then has brought me to this? A morning happily spent mixing, baking, icing and finally eating a large slice of a Pillsbury 'Funfetti' cake. Once again I can quite happily blame some of my fellow food enthusiasts who have raved about this cake, and persuaded me to throw aside my prejudices and try it.

I purchased a box of Funfetti cake mix, along with the accompanying tub of Funfetti Frosting (in for a penny, in for a pound...) on my last trip south of the border, adding it to the list of groceries stockpiled in an already full-to-bursting car. Even if I had not previously been primed to purchase this cake the jaunty box and, most importantly, the picture of the vibrantly-coloured cake would have been enough to land it in my trolley. The claim that 'a cup of pudding' was a part of the mix only added to the intrigue. How sweet is that Pillsbury man?! (Mind you, having read the ingredients, I can now only assume that the cute little chap is formed from pure lard). He had been peering at me out of the kitchen cupboard for far too long, so armed with my new sillicone bundt pan, I felt the urge to bite the bullet and bake the cake.






As you can see, the baked sponge looked gorgeous, even to me with my inate distrust of blue food...


I went for the 'artfully casual' style of icing the cake (cake-decorating not being one of my culinary strengths) and had great fun literally throwing the sprinkles at the sides of the cake. I will be finding them on the kitchen floor for weeks I'm sure.



And the proof of the pudding? Well, I actually thought it was quite nice! Teeth-achingly sweet, as Nigella would doubtless say, but deliciously moist, vanilla flavoured and excitingly speckled with colour. I'm not sure I would go out of my way to purchase it again (and considering that I need to drive to a different country to buy it, it would be quite far out of my way) but it has been hugely fun to try.

7 comments:

Georgina Ingham | CulinaryTravels said...

Looks delish Norm.

Loving your blog, it's wonderful :)

George x

Sandy said...

You know, you can buy another brand of this cake in Canada! As much as I love domestic godessery also, I need the occasional cake mix fix!

Anonymous said...

Really Sandy? I've never seen it here... will have to look (now I fear I'm liking more than I thought I would...!)

Sandy said...

I've picked it up in Walmart. I, I mean the BOYS, just love it! :)

Anonymous said...

OOOOO minger - what a colourful cake. You've really cheered me up reading this - was feeling hopeless, tired and a little lost, but now I want to take photos of things that I like in my kitchen!!! Really can't wait for you to get home next year...

Family First said...

Lovely! And cake mixes can be your saviour in times of unexpected guests!

Shannon said...

I love it! Funfetti cakes are my favorite (well, visually anyway, I still go for chocolate cake above anything else!), and I love how the frosting matches.