Darren Herman

There’s been a lot of buzz at work leading up to tomorrow’s bake-off.  I guess when you work at a place called The Media Kitchen, you have to assume that you’ll be dealing with food at some point.  Over the past few days, I’ve been consulting with friends and family about what I should bake… cookies, brownies, pie, cake, tarts, etc.   Between my wife’s collection of William Sonoma cookbooks and my mother’s collection of Bon Appetite magazines, there was no shortage of recipes to chose from.

Following traditional “Darren” ways, I traveled the road less taken and found a random recipe online for a chocolate cake and improvised on top of it.  I added a few spices that weren’t on the list, created a fudge topping that has a pudding like consistency, and created a mess in the kitchen that had my wife less than smiling.

I absolutely love to cook.  I didn’t grow up in a house that baked, but we certainly knew how to entertain.  My mother was/is the queen of entertaining and growing up around her was inspiring in the kitchen.  There is a big difference between how the two of us cook:  she follows recipes perfectly and I improvise along the way.

Sometimes my food is terrible and other times, tasty.  I’m hoping that after all of my improvising for tonight’s cake, it’ll go over well for the judges tomorrow and will win.  If not?  Oh well, I’ll try again next year!