I have a confession to make. This year, I did not bake Scott's birthday cake from scratch. It's the fourth birthday confection I've baked for him in the years we've known each other, and it's the first time I didn't start with raw ingredients and a recipe. Instead, I used two boxes of Naturally Nora's cake mix and saved myself a whole lot of prep time. No one at his party had any idea that I hadn't slaved over the cake, measuring flour, beating egg whites and creaming butter. I got a million compliments and as I received each one, I just smiled and said thanks (as I write this, I'm beginning to feel like a 1950's housewife), mentally forwarding them to Nora herself.
The thing is, I don't feel bad about passing off that cake as my own. I did bake it up in the big aluminum pan I inherited from my great-aunt and I sweated over the frosting. It's just not always possible to bake a cake from scratch, and it's awfully nice to know that there's a dependable, natural cake mix out there among all those chemical-laden ones that is just as easy and tastes really good.
So next time you have to make cupcakes for a school party and you find yourself running short on time, grab one of Nora's mixes (they come in five flavors) and let yourself off the hook.
10 More Dirty Restaurant Tricks
5 Things You Didn't Know About Turducken
10 Catchiest Food Jingles We Love to Hate
