A Humble Beginning, or, a Study in Chocolate

I am a lucky girl.

I love my job, I love my neighborhood, and I'm fortunate to live with and work with people who inspire and support my creativity.  At the end of last summer, my employer came to me with a proposal:

Make the cakes.

I work for a locally-owned company that treats its employees like family.  And when an employee works on her or his birthday, well, we get cake.  My boss asked if I would be interested in baking these cakes for a few months, to see how it would work out.  I said yes immediately.

Chocolate Chocolate Chocolate Cake for Jenn's Birthday

This first assignment was September 19th, and the birthday girl requested one thing and one thing only:  chocolate.  I pulled together my favorite chocolate cake elements, inspired by both Joy the Baker and Julia Child.  The result was a dense chocolate cake, filled and spread with chocolate buttercream, and topped with a helping of chocolate ganache and sprinkles.

The birthday girl was pleased.

The boss lady was also pleased.

I then signed up for cake decorating classes.