Tastes So Sweet Makes A Grown Man Cry

There are some things I am good at. Baking is not one of those things. But I have short term memory issues. So it makes sense that I would forget the fact that I, myself, cannot bake and would enter my child in a competitive baking contest at our County Fair. Judged on baking skills. HIS baking skills, because we all know how those six-year-olds are in the kitchen. Creme brulee? Pass him the torch! I thought cooking together would be a good bonding experience. And frankly, we are running out of things to amuse us this summer.

The prize for first place was $10 and a ribbon. The former competitive equestrienne in me is a sucker for any event involving the distribution of shiny, satin ribbons. We (I) decided to make a pie. I mean, how hard can it be to make a pie? Turns out, making a pie is not that hard. But making a pie that actual people with tongues and taste buds will eat? Willingly? Well, that part is a bit harder.

The first step involved selecting the ingredients to put into a pie. In my mind, cherry, sugar, and some dough. WA LA! Turns out there are more ingredients in a pie than that. Again, who knew? $113.76 later, we had the ingredients to make the best cherry pie this side of that movie Waitress with that chick from that teen show (Felicity?) who had long hair then short hair then long hair again for the movie, the one where she got knocked up and made pies with odd names, like my favorite, Bad Baby Pie. But I did not have the recipe for Bad Baby Pie, so I opted for cherry instead.

After said ingredients had been procured, Ethan declared he was "so worn out" from all that shopping and "waaaaay too tired" to make the dough. I was having none of it.

Oh, we're making DOUGH. Now get your apron on. This will be fun!

Apron? He was confused.

I meant that metaphorically. We don't own aprons. We do, however, own old t-shirts. Get one. And wash your hands first!

Something got lost in the translation of the clean hands dictate. Apparently, when one is a six-year-old boy, freshly soaped hands are an invitation to go mining for nose gold. While I appreciate his efforts to add secret special ingredients to our creation, I am nothing if not a stickler for hygiene. When he was sent back to the bathroom to rewash his hands, I was declared "the meanest mom ever." I found that hard to stomach. Meanest mom on our block? OK, maybe. But, ever? That is some high praise. I told him I was flattered.

Once he reemerged from the bathroom, he was too exhausted from the hand washing to continue baking. To recover, he laid prone on the floor before he was able to resume the exhausting task of measuring a cup of flour. After about an hour of prostrate floor time, all the while moaning about what hard work this all was, there was a knock on the door. To my relief, it was not Child Protective Services investigating my son's complaint of child labor abuse, but the neighbor who wanted to see if he could come out to play. Miraculously, he perked up and went outside to run around in 95 degree heat for two hours. This activity proved much less strenuous than measuring that cup of flour.

Upon his return, we finished the pie. The dough ended up just like I had planned - slightly burnt and crisp on top, but semi-raw in other parts. The filling was ... unique. It looked pretty. Ethan said it tasted like "that medicine you give me when I have hives." Mmm, Benadryl pie. Exactly the flavor I had been striving for.

We abandoned pie efforts and aimed lower on the baking food chain. Muffins. Pumpkin with chocolate chips. The recipe involves many secret ingredients and tricks that I do not want to leak onto the Internet in case some day I decide to start a pumpkin-chocolate muffin empire.

But here is the gist:

Open can of cooked pumpkin.

Glop pumpkin into bowl.

Throw in chocolate chips.

Throw in sugar and flour.

Pick child up from ground and perform mouth-to-mouth since the act of completing all of these steps has caused multiple muscular failure and he is too weak to stand. He is not, however, too weak to complain, repeatedly, about how HARD all of this is.

Bake.

Ask child if he would like to sample a delicious, warm muffin.

Be happy when he reports that "this one does not taste like medicine, but kind of like ... I'm not sure ... maybe horse feed?"

PERFECT!

So we entered the Pumpkin-Chocolate Horse-Feed Muffins into the fair with high hopes of emerging with an offer for a million dollar cooking show contract on the Food Network.

Two days later, I marched Ethan into the Baked Goods tent to show him his winnings. My little competitor was distraught that after multiple MINUTES of domestic labor, he failed to emerge victorious. ALL THAT WORK AND I DON'T EVEN GET A RIBBON. Hmph. He pouted for at least three seconds. Can we go on the ferris wheel now?

Affirmative. It was the least I could do after subjecting him to sweatshop conditions.

But first, he needed to be clear on just one thing. Mommy? Now that this contest is over, you're not going to make me eat any of those desserts ever again, right?