The illicit cake

The thing is, I haven't asked the happy couple if they'd like a cake, nor have I been invited to bake one.  I'm just baking it and taking it.  I figure it may not be the Wedding Cake.  It certainly won't be iced in any kind of fancy way.  It may not even be liked by many people - I've only met two Americans who like fruit cake and they are in their 70s.  But Andy will like it.  He will eat a good portion of it.  And it's for him.

While I was looking for ingredients, I also wanted to find a proper cake tin.  Preferably spring-form.  Though Target ended up having all the ingredients I settled on, I had a feeling that $20 was more than I needed to pay for a tin.  At K-mart they were $10 but I still wanted to find a lower price.  America is great for deals and I wanted mine.  So I asked some friends to take me to Walmart.  Low and behold, I found three for $10.  !!! 

I'm still nervous about baking New Zealand recipes with American flour so I bought cake flour.  Instead of using measuring cups, I weighed it.  In fact, for the first time, and on Julia Child's advice, I weighed all my ingredients.  This cake is for a wedding, after all, even if it is an illicit cake for an unexpected wedding, it should still be as good as possible.  Of course, it won't have six weeks to mature but Jbird suggests I spend the week aggressively soaking it in rum to make up for it.  

It will bake for three hours at 300 degree Fahrenheit.  It's a tricky medium, I don't want to burn the edges, dry it out, OR leave it uncooked in the middle.  But I have two layers of brown paper and then baking paper thickening up the edges to help slow the outside down.  There are many intricacies to consider every time I do this.