We made this two-layer chocolate cake for dessert to serve to our guests today. We had grand plans of making a beautiful chocolate cake with a layer of cream filling, covered in fluffy homemade frosting.

We don't have any cake pans (aside from our springform pans, which are all different sizes!), so we put the batter on a jelly roll pan, planning to cut the cake in half and stack it up after it was cool.

The jelly roll pan buckled while baking, so the cake came out very not-level. That might have been workable enough, if Eliyahu (2) hadn't decided to pick in the cake as it was cooling on the counter. Cakes with holes in them tend to fall apart when being moved.

Our filling didn't turn out (new recipe we were trying), but the frosting did. We stacked and frostened the cakes as best we could.

When our guests arrived, we informed them that we had a disaster to serve for dessert, and told them of the many things that had gone wrong with our lovely cake.

After we ate, Joshua put the cake on the table to be cut. Our (kind) guests suppressed their laughter, and one even remarked, "It doesn't look bad!"

Joshua and I were rolling with laughter at that comment/compliment, so she added "Well, I mean... after how you described it, I was expecting something a lot worse!"

It did taste good. I think we're going to give up on two-layer cakes until we get some better pans. Our last two-layer cake (a few weeks ago) was made in our springform pans and looked almost as laughable -- though it tasted fabulous. (Recipe coming later today if I have time!!)