Way Back When Wednesday: The Lesson Of Dessert

When I was much younger, lots and lots of our extended family get-togethers (like most people's) involved sharing food. The aunts would bring casseroles and Jello salads and pies and cakes and vegetable dishes that made filling a plate a Logistics Nightmare. Very rarely was there a clunker on the table; besides, my grandfather would eat anything, and plenty of it.

One of my aunts, Aunt Eileen, married into the family, played golf, drank booze, and was fiercely loving.  She also made terrific desserts.  She once brought a towering bowl of butterscotch pudding topped with billowy whipped cream to a family gathering. I kept my eye on that bowl for the entire meal, but by the time I got to dessert, it was gone. My heart is still not healed from that, but it taught me a valuable lesson that I put into practice at a subsequent event.

The family was having a big eat-for-all at my grandparent's cabin, so we went down for the day to visit with the relatives, swim in the lake, and eat a lot. We met first at Grandma's, and my Aunt Eileen dropped my cousin Tim off there to go down with us since they weren't coming. Tim arrived with his bathing suit, towel, and one of Aunt Eileen's double chocolate cakes.

I don't remember how we managed to do it, but Tim and I hid that whole cake from Grandma, my mother, and everyone.  We hid it at Grandma's, and we hid it in the car on the way to the cabin, too.  We probably draped his swim towel over it, but more likely no one paid much attention to us. We sneaked that magnificent cake up into the loft in the cabin, hid it under a bed, and later, when no one was going to notice, we grabbed two forks that we had sneaked up there too and ate gorgeous, chocolatey cake at our leisure and by ourselves.

With absolutely zero regret, shame, or guilt.

And it was delicious.

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