Disaster

Tomorrow is the clambake tailgate. I’m going to the Patriot’s game with my sister Lindsay and her new husband Padraig, and apparently the first 4:00 home game of the season marks the annual clambake tailgate. Even though Lindsay and I had unwittingly planned a Mexican feast for this tailgate – well, a fiesta really – I am totally on board with the clambake. You will never see me turn my nose up at lobster. Never. It’s just not done.

So instead of fajitas and margaritas and flan (oh my), I revised my plan to include New England Clam Chowder, corn on the cob, garden salad (because let’s face it, most tailgates lack vegetables) and cupcakes. I know, cupcakes don’t have much to do with a clambake but I figured it was an all-American dessert and that was appropriate enough.

Here it is Saturday, the day before the big game. The cooking is done. And let me tell you, it’s not good.
I am thisclose to throwing my America’s Test Kitchen cookbooks right out the window.

I got my recipes for the chowder and cupcakes from the ATK’s family and baking cookbooks, respectively. Neither recipe worked.

I’ll start with the chowder. It’s fine really, probably passable. Well, it is if you were looking for a milk based clam soup. The bacon never crisped (and the recipe called for way too much in my opinion), and the cream didn’t thicken – perhaps because there was only 1 cup of cream to 5 cups of clam broth. I even tried adding some Wondra and mashing up some of the potatoes hoping the extra starch would do the trick. Nope, uh uh.

Not being able to deal with the chowder for now, I turned my attention to the cupcakes.

I’ve never made a cake from scratch before (other than carrot and cheese cake), so I really didn’t know what to expect. The batter looked absolutely nothing like the box mix does. I had no idea if this was okay or not, so my only acceptable course of action was to bake it and see what happened. The recipe made 24 cupcakes, and instead of cooking one pan (12 cupcakes) at a time, it called for cooking both at once and rotating them halfway through baking. While it’s a miracle that I haven’t cut a finger off with my new knives, it’s no surprise that I managed to burn one while attempting to rotate the cupcake pans. (Those oven gloves are too cumbersome and the pot holder not protective enough.)

The cupcakes took a few minutes longer to cook (probably because I doubled up in my crappy oven instead of cooking them in separate batches), and they didn’t have much rise to them. They did manage to brown – although not evenly, but enough to look right. I patiently waited for them to cool so I could try one. If these cupcakes are great, then my chowder might be acceptable (“fine” will be okay as long as my cupcakes are “fantastic”).

So, how were the cupcakes, you ask? Hmm. Not really sure. They baked perfectly (with the exception of that lack of rise), but they don’t have much taste. They aren’t very sweet and they have a slight cornmeal taste. (I swear, there is no cornmeal in the batter.)

Now I’m pissed. I followed the recipe to a tee. I even weighed the flour and sugar instead of measuring it – just like the experts advise (and by expert, I mean Alton Brown). And I have a bowlful of homemade chocolate frosting ready and waiting.

There is no way I can show up at this tailgate with crappy chowder and bland cupcakes. It’s just not okay. And don’t even try to tell me that I still have the corn and salad. Shucking corn and tearing lettuce are not culinary skills that impress. Trust me. If they were, my parents would have sent me to culinary school instead of a business college.

Now I’m panicking. It’s 9:00 on Saturday night – too late to start over and too late to order the chowder from Legal Seafood like Hailey suggested. (I literally scoffed at her when she said I should buy it instead of make it. Like I would ever buy chowder instead of make it! Damnit me and my need to make my own mistakes instead of learning from others!) I can get away with the cupcakes, but I can’t serve the chowder.

And showing up without chowder is not an option.

I finally swallow my pride and get in my car – to the grocery store I go. I buy 6 pounds of frozen chowder and channel my inner Sandra Lee instead of my inner Top Chef. Semi-homemade it will have to be.
The homemade chowder is down the drain (literally, garbage disposal whirring as I type), and the frozen stuff is defrosting on the stove top and being doctored with fresh herbs and extra clams (that I fished out of the homemade chowder before I sent it down the disposal).

And don’t worry. I won’t try to pass it off as my own. I couldn’t even if I wanted to – Lindsay reads this, and so does my friend Eric who works with Padraig. They’d rat me out before I even had the chance to lie about the origins of the delicious store bought clam chowder.

I’m hoping the frosting saves the cupcakes. If not, I might claim I bought those too…