The Number One Hurricane Survival Item

Well, Florida threw us another curve ball in the form of Hurricane Nate this past weekend. I've been slowly amassing my hurricane preparedness kit since Irma couldn't make up her mind last month. Battery-powered lanterns? Check. Tons of flashlights? Check. Enough bottled water to bench press my weight in? Check. So much ramen in my pantry it looks like six college students live here? Check. I had literally everything I thought I needed, down to extra dog food (...for the dogs, not me). I had a lingering feeling I was forgetting something, so I hearkened back to the last several insane winter storms that trapped us in our house for a few days (Clovis was a magical mix of Narnia meets Antarctica during winter). It was then that I remembered the number one item I need in my survival kit: cake. I was still pretty miffed that after spending several hours putting up my Halloween decorations on Monday (and getting sunburned because Florida is just that out of line) that I had to take them all down for this stupid hurricane. This was my first official foray into "spite baking," so naturally my cake needed to be extremely Halloweeny to compensate for my favorite month of the year failing to live up to my expectations down here. And so, out of repugnance and macabre, this ghastly slime cake was brought to life. Or death, really, since it's a ghost cake.

The horror...my poor ghost has a broken arm.

Remember the last time I made a surprise inside cake? When it almost failed terribly and I then decided that making these types of cakes are way too stress-inducing and absolutely ridiculous? Yeah, well, apparently I didn't. I'm told time heals all wounds, and I suppose this applies to cakes that make you want to cry while baking them. I did quickly remember my shortcomings last time and tried my best to overcome them only to be met by different obstacles with this cake. I mean, clearly we can all see it turned out okayish, but it was touch and go there for awhile. I was really glad that baking a cake within a cake at least yields a ton of cake scraps for me to eat my feelings aplenty during baking. But in the end, this creepy, wonderfully Halloweeny cake is a yummy mix of chocolate and white cake with a vanilla pudding topping. And since I went the low-cal route, each slice is only 209 calories for a total of 12 slices. It's nice when the shock and horror is related to the spooktacular decoration and not the calorie count.

I buy my black gel dye in bulk during this time of the year.

To make both cakes, you will need to scoop up the following:

• 1 box of white cake mix
• 10 ounces of diet creme soda
• 2 egg whites
• 1 box of chocolate cake mix
• 10 ounces of diet root beer
• 2 egg whites
• Black gel dye

To make the slime topping you'll need:

• 1 box of sugar free vanilla instant pudding
• 2 cups cold skim milk
• Lime green gel dye 
• Optional: spooky sprinkles for topping

Now, this is a cake that comes together over the course of 24 hours because you'll need to do some freezing. Start by baking your white cake. Mix together the creme soda, two egg whites, and white cake mix for 2 minutes on medium-high in your stand mixer. Grease a 9x13 pan very, very well (especially if your humidity is a balmy "we're on the bad side of a hurricane" level). Pour into the pan and bake at 350 for 20-25 minutes. Cakes will always cook quicker when you use soda, so keep that in mind.

Hindsight: literally the pumpkin or the cat would've been a better choice.

Once your white cake has baked, let it cool in the pan for 10 minutes and then turn it out onto a cooling rack. Place this in the freezer. Your cake needs to be mostly frozen to cut out the ghosties. I got an absolutely adorable set of three Halloween-themed cookie cutters from Amazon because even though I live within 10 miles of a Walmart to both my east and west, I simply refuse to go there because it's bad for my incarceration-free lifestyle to deal with other people once inside of one. 

Sigh, I still thought I knew what I was doing...

Here is where all my plans began to fall apart. See those tiny little cute arms waving in adorable terror? Yeah, they're a reallllll pain to cut out of a soft cake and keep intact. I knew I would need 6 perfectly-shaped ghosts to fill the inside of my cake, and I also knew I would be able to cut out 8 total. I considered the first two practice ghosts. My cake was not frozen enough for practice ghost number one, and he looked like he had died of some sort of wood chipper incident. While my cake was frozen enough for ghost number two, he lost both his arms in an unfortunate out of body experience because my cake was just too moist to pry him out of the cookie cutter. Should you choose to use the ghost with his delicate little birdlike arms (clearly he never hit the gym when he was alive), spray your cookie cutter with so much cooking spray you can taste it in the air. This is the only way to cut out a ghost and allow him to not be a double amputee.

He seems appreciative because he can still high-five you with either hand.

You'll only end up using about a third of your white cake to get six ghosties, but you will completely demolish it, so you can either toss the rest out or save your scraps. We had some scraps with a little bit of lemon curd on top, and it was delightful. Put your six ghosts onto a sheet lined with Parchment paper and leave to freeze overnight. After about 8-12 hours (I literally baked this first thing Sunday morning because I have a real problem with age-appropriate responsibilities), the ghosts are frozen enough to handle being baked again. Mix the chocolate cake mix, 10 ounces of root beer, 2 egg whites, and a large dollop of black gel dye on medium-high for two minutes. Side note, 10 a.m. is way too early to drink the leftover root beer if you've just consumed an apple cider donut.

Ahh the loaf pan, my worst enemy.

Preheat your oven to 350 and grease a 10x6 loaf pan with all of the cooking spray. Seriously. It's a heavy cake, don't leave it to chance! Take half a cup of cake batter and ladle it into the bottom of the loaf pan. Spread out a bit, and then go grab your ghosts (unlike skeletons, we won't keep these hidden somewhere for long).

They mostly have all their arms!

 Gently place each ghost into the cake batter at the bottom of the pan. Stack them close together. There will be a small gap on each end, and you need it so the ghosts can get completely covered up. It's not really a surprise inside cake if you can see the surprise from, well, the outside.

It turns out prettier, I promise.

Now, continue using a half cup scoop and gently plop batter into the cake pan, working to cover up all the ghosts. I had a few ghosts lose an arm during this process, so take your time and work as gingerly as possible, or in hindsight, just use the pumpkin because it is round and easier to deal with. But if you're a crazy person who loves to defy logic, try pouring batter under the arms before you pour it on top. Use a spatula to smooth out the batter as best as you can when you're done covering up your ghosts. Tap gently on the counter to get rid of any bubbles, and then bake at 350 for 50 minutes.

Not a giant bowl of boogers.

While your cake is baking, get out a medium bowl and dump in the pudding mix, 2 cups of cold milk, and a squeeze of lime gel dye. Whisk for two minutes, cover with plastic wrap, and let set in the fridge for a few hours so your slime can firm up. No one wants runny slime...this isn't the Nickelodeon Kid's Choice Awards, after all.

Ahh yes, a perfect black void made of cake.

Once your cake has baked, leave it in the pan and place on a cooling rack for 10-20 minutes (or the amount of time it takes you to get completely soaked while taking your dogs for a walk during the tail end of a hurricane because they are super annoying when they don't get one. Judging by how wet we were, I assume we were gone for 15 minutes). Take a butter knife and gently run it around the edges of your pan to ensure no sides are sticking. Lay a towel out on top of your cooling rack, and place this on top of the cake. Flip everything over carefully, and gently slide the loaf cake out of the pan. It will be upside down at this point, so prepare a cake board or large platter and place this on the bottom of the cake that's facing up at this point. Quickly flip everything over so your cake is right side up. Transfer your cake to the freezer for several hours so it is completely cooled.

Basically, make sure in the end your cake looks like this when its on a prepared surface. Otherwise your ghosts will be upside down, and it's probably not as easy to haunt people if you're not right side up.

 Once your cake is totally cooled, remove your pudding mix from the fridge. Load up a piping bag or plastic baggy with half of the pudding. Save the other half to eat later, torment people with by acting like you sneezed out a booger, whatever your heart desires. Snip the tip off of the bag, and pipe a layer on top of the cake:

Greener than Shrek!

 Smooth out a bit with an angled spatula. Once topped, take your piping bag and drag it up and down the sides of your cake to create slimy drips:

It should look oozy and gross.

 Bonus, the grosser and oozier it looks, the less like you will have to share your cake with anyone else!

Sprinkles: because everything deserves to feel a little pretty.

I finished by smattering some Halloweeny sprinkles on top (the colors bled into the slime, but it looked even cooler) and then set into the fridge to finish thawing out from the trip to the freezer earlier. You will want to keep this cake refrigerated since it is topped with pudding. This will also keep any potential hauntings relegated to the inside of your fridge and not your entire kitchen. Fact.

What horrors lie beneath the surface...

I'm always really worried when I cut into a surprise inside cake that the surprise inside the cake will be that I completely screwed it up. Have we talked about my low level of self-esteem lately? No? Well, too bad, because this is a cake blog, so self-loathing must remain relegated to said cakes.

He's more like a spectral blob.

Well, you can tell they're ghosts, sort of. My arms broke off in a few places causing my ghosties to look more like ethereal shapeless figures, but it still works. In all seriousness, surprise inside cakes are a bit of work, but the end result is always a lot of anxiety fun. At this point, I'm running out of new ways to bake Halloween-themed desserts after blogging for several years, so I have to go for broke. But does broke ever taste delicious! This cake tastes like a marble cake thanks to the combination of vanilla ghosts and chocolate cake. I'm really late to the party when it comes to pudding...I hated the texture until my late twenties, so naturally I'm eating it as much as possible to make up for lost time. It's a nice sweet addition to the cake, and it does help to keep things from getting dry or stale. But what I love best is that the combo of chocolate cake and vanilla pudding make it taste like you're eating a giant Oreo. Since I spent half of the baking process in sheer terror, I feel it's definitely an appropriate Halloween dessert, blobby ghosts or not (seriously, just go with the pumpkin shape). Don't worry, I've still got another one up my sleeve to celebrate the season, so as long as Florida stops actively trying to kill me, I'll be back with hauntingly awesome desserts soon. 'Til next time, my fellow eaters!

I' just ooooozing with anticipation...