Sunday, September 2, 2007

baconbaconbacon

What dog doesn’t like bacon? And what dog, by golly, doesn’t deserve bacon on his (or her) birthday?


My boss in the Hospitality Office at Cookin’ School mentioned earlier this week that her dog, Munch, was turning 15 this weekend. Fifteen!! That’s like, I dunno, Yoda in dog years. Munch, whom Wiley and I met at a party earlier this summer, is a very sweet dog, and pretty spry for 15 years. I felt she was deserving of a birthday cake.


Behold, the Munch Cake:



It’s a layer cake loosely based on a few different doggy cake recipes I found online. The cake itself I made using a blend of all-purpose and cake flours, plus butter, vegetable oil, eggs, shredded carrots, chicken baby food and low sodium chicken broth. The "frosting" is neufchatel, plain nonfat yogurt (so Munch can watch her girlish figure) and more low sodium chicken broth.


The piping is peanut butter... not just any peanut butter, but organic creamy peanut butter (hey, it’s what I had on hand).


The garnish is, yes, bacon! It’s bacon! Baconbaconbacon!! (Yes, I’m channeling that awesome Beggin’ Strips commercial where the dog desperately tries to figure out what’s in the bag his owner has brought home, at one point looking at the bag on the counter and anxiously exclaiming "what does it say? I CAN’T READ!!" That is my all-time favorite commercial moment.)




I have to say I am pretty damn proud of my bacon roses (close-up above). The whole cake was so much giggly fun to make (and Wiley enjoyed being my taste tester/bacon rose reject disposer) that I didn’t mind staying up past midnight on a school night to finish it.


My boss loved the cake and said Munch absolutely inhaled her first test bite. She promised to take pictures, so I may be posting an update soon. Meanwhile, I’m already working on a Beefcake for Wiley. His 13th birthday isn’t until February, but I’m sure I can find something to celebrate with him before then. Leif Eriksen Day... Halloween... the Autumn Equinox... surely one of those holidays is bacon-appropriate.


Though in Wiley’s mind, Saturday is a bacon-appropriate holiday, as is Sunday, Monday, Tuesday...

4 comments:

Anonymous said...

Good God, I think Wiley has a special full spectrum bacon bark that actually dissuaded me from cooking bacon and bacon like products while he was living with us. I mean, I can certainly appreciate his deep, elemental lust for bacon as I share it completely, but wow, the noise. On the other hand, who could deny Wiley such pleasures...

Anonymous said...

that's amazing. i love the bacon roses. i'm sure my dogs would love this but one diabetic and one weak stomach that can barely keep most dog foods down they are s.o.l. Wiley and munch are some lucky dogs...

The Pastry Pirate said...

Bullock... Wiley didn't make one sound during the entire time the bacon was out of the fridge and uncovered. He just sat there, at my feet, giving me those brown eyes all freakishly huge as if to say "I am but a poor orphan who has eaten nothing but ash for weeks..." and he drooled. Damn, did he drool.

Laura: your pack deserves a bacon rose or two... or ten. I'd send some if I could, but I don't think it would survive the journey. Not that it would go bad. No, I'm sure rabid feral dogs would attack the USPS truck, claw their way inside, rip open the package and feast on the pigflesh within. Jus' sayin'.

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