Reactions to home baked cakes

SnowyOwl_2

I really enjoy baking but as I live on my own bring the products of my labour in to work and give it away (otherwise I'll down it all in two days and it never sees the inside of the freezer so no need to suggest that). The reactions I get range from:

No! I don't believe you made this, it's really from Tesco/Sainsbury/cake shop!
Is it difficult to bake?
How do you know how to bake?
Where do you get recipes from?
Oh my God it's fantastic, can I have the recipe? Then on production of the recipe the follow up questions were Is cocoa the same as drinking chocolate? Where do you get condensed milk from? It's OK to use plain flour instead of self-raising flour, isn't it?
Whaaaat, you really baked this yourself...woooow!!!!!!

My baking really isn't that good, but it's the expression of amazement that I bake that amazes me. It happened in England when I lived there, and it's happening again in N.Ireland where I live now. Are these types of reactions normal? How do people respond when you produce something gorgeous out of your oven rather than out of a packet? And does anybody know why so many people think it's amazing when really its not?

Mado

Because...
1. maybe they really don't have a clue
2. They want you to bring more.....and will flatter you to death for a sweet treat!

I'm always amazed when I hear of people who can't bake. Unless your oven is really c@@@, there is not much science. I quite often can't genuinally give a recipe as I invent as I go. The truth is if you start with decent stuff in reasonable proportions, it's never going to taste bad.

I love baking, especially with my kids now. Don't do it often though as cakes don't like my waist a great deal... but I really have fond memories of my mum's baking.
And tell these ignorant people that it can't come from tesco as it tastes miles better.

badgermonkey

I don't bake much but whenever I bring homemade things into work (for the same reason as the OP - otherwise I will eat it all myself!) I get "did you really make this yourself?"

I mean, most cakes are just a matter of having the right ingredients and cooking for the right amount of time. The actual cake-making is never that difficult. The only reasons I don't bake much are that my BF and I would eat 3 days' worth of calories in one sitting and that I always lack some crucial ingredient, like baking powder or eggs or some such. Ingredients for real meals I always have, for sweet treats not so much.

ka7e

When I was a child , the tins at home were always full of home-baked cakes and biscuits. Both my Mum and Gran were renowned for their light sponges and beautiful cake decorations (Mum made and decorated all the family's Christmas and wedding cakes and makes beautiful sugar paste flower sprays and butterflies).
My idea of a treat was a shop-bought doughnut!!

Debt_Free_Chick

Scarily, there's a whole generation of folk who know nothing about food other than that which they can buy in the Supermarket and then eat, with the minimum of "interference" in between those two steps.

Frankly, I'm surprised that some of them had even Plain Flour in their cupboard :eek:

For some "if it ain't ready-made, it ain't ready to eat"

Becles

The school my boys go to often have cake stalls or ask for donations of home baking, jams etc for the summer fayre. They get little home baking and loads of packets of Mini Rolls, Cherry Bakewells etc. I've noticed people go into raptures if you send home baked cakes in for those stalls, and the non-bakers almost fight over the home baked stuff!

I've done a few childrens birthday parties myself for the boys, and made things like fairy cakes, mini quiches and a home made birthday cake. I've had loads of comments about how people couldn't be bothered to spend all that time cooking, but I enjoy doing it. Also all the food goes though, and parents have also commented that they haven't seen their child eat so much before

spendaholic

The person I normally get this kind of reaction from is, surprisingly, my dad. Surprisingly because he's married to my mom who taught me how to do all of this stuff.

The most surprising comment I've heard is: "I don't slave my b****s off all day to put up with home made food. I deserve to eat proper food." This person spends a fortune on eating out.

I think the only time I ever get the wow-did-you-really-make-that is when I'm wearing a jumper I've knitted. Usually the home baked stuff gets they yummy-can-I-have-some response.

Debt_Free_Chick

Becles wrote:

I've had loads of comments about how people couldn't be bothered to spend all that time cooking

This is very sad. I wonder what things will be like in 50 years time? Perhaps there will be no home cooking at all and the only food you can buy will be ready-made :eek:

Glad I won't be around to see it

nicki_2

I regularly bake, always have done since I moved out of my parents place. It started off as just mince pies at Christmas, now I'm experimenting with recipes from here and magazines.

My Christmas cake (my mums recipe from the local paper years ago) is a major hit and the Christmas's we spend at in-laws I am responsible for making the Christmas cake right up to the icing and then we let my daughter decorate it when we get there with their little figures etc.

Last Christmas I made dozens of homebaked cookies (ready-to-make packets though as I ran out of time) for my daughters nursery class plus about 40 fairy cakes. They were a big hit with all the kids and teachers (I made sure there was enough left over for the teachers to have some as well) but this year I'll be making sure that I only use nut/seed free produce so they can still be used. I also made different varieties of bread (also ready-to-make ones but much smaller than the packet said), fruit cake and mince pies which were given as gifts. They were received well and I'll probably do something similar this year as well.

I think I know the reason why my baking goes down so well... I'm the only one in the family (including in-laws) who has the time and patients to bake :rotfl: Funniest thing is that at the weekend we went to in-laws for a family BBQ to which I took 3 cakes to free up some room in my freezer, before anyone else had arrived father-in-law had hidden them so that he could take them to work for lunch instead :rotfl:

rchddap1

When I'm in the right mood i love baking. The problem is my cakes and biscuits never seem to stick around for very long. I leave them on the side to cool down and within seconds my other half has munched his way through a good pile. With a bit of help from me of course.

Murtle

people just don't do it....it's quite scary, but one of my friends at Uni (when I started - I left a number of years ago) at the grand old age of 18 could nearly cook toast!!! I kid you not...if it didn't disintegrate in her hands when it came out of the toaster she'd eat it!!! She had no clue how to cook....where to even start....now she cooks most of her meals from scratch, one of the issues was a confidence problem...."what if it goes wrong" now she knows how to hide the gone wrong moments

I don't remember my Mum baking that much, but birthday cakes were always home made, and there would be fairy cakes etc. If there was a school fete or similar, shop bought cakes were SO EXPENSIVE that you'd have to make your own. Mince pies were hand made every christmas, as was the christmas cake.

However, I must have picked something up, cause I love it....and get similar responses to OP....although most of my friends now know that the cakes I take in our homemade!!! If I have friends round for dinner they are always amazed at the food...as it always starts from scratch!!

I remember seeing a programme, that had the mother cooking dinners, that the family wouldn't eat - they ate burgers and kebabs etc. I thought originally "aren't kebabs only eaten after a few beers.....?" when I saw what she had cooked for the family....it looked like gruel (SP) this grey splodge on the plate...I realised why ANYTHING would be more appealing....it seems that there are people that don't have the benefit of being taught to cook/bake anymore...