I wouldn't have guessed that Ina Garten was a cake-mix kind of gal, but I suppose that once you have your own line of boxed mixes, your perspective probably changes somewhat. Ina's Barefoot Contessa mix line includes brownie and cake mixes, frostings, fillings and even a pie crust mix. The mixes aren't entirely new, but this is the first time that I've seen so many of them, so perhaps their original distribution was limited to a few specialty stores.
The appeal of Ina's recipes is that she manages to make them look better, as well as more indulgent, than anything you could get at a bakery. The fact that her famous coconut cupcakes are now in a box... makes them lose a little something, especially since they claim to come with a cream cheese frosting mix, to which you have to add cream cheese.
Products like sauces and preserves make sense, since even if Ina isn't in the kitchen making them by hand, you can feel confident that it is her recipe. But to convert one of her cakes into a mix really looses the homemade appeal, which is what made Ina a success in the first place.
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