Easy as Pie

This past weekend, a friend of mine asked me to bring dessert to a dinner party. To put this in perspective, I am generally BANNED from bringing desserts anywhere, which possibly stems from a very unfortunate sugar-free cheesecake I once made, which has become legendary for all the wrong reasons, the three years I worked for the American Diabetes Association, or my generally acknowledged ineptitude concerning desserts--once having to pass off cake as "brownies" because it refused to rise and at various times inadvertently leaving the salt, baking soda, and sugar out of desserts. At any rate, that anyone would request a dessert from me for ANY reason made my entire month.

In college, in an effort to impress a guy I was thoroughly smitten with, I attempted to make a banana cream pie from scratch (i.e. no Jello pudding involved). Let's just say that the pie & the relationship ended up in about the same state. On the positive side, my experiences with dessert catastrophes has left me with the following knowledge:

* While it is pathetic to mess up an angel food cake made from a mix, you can make pretty decent cookies from a botched angel food cake mix.

* If it's made with applesauce, the fact that you forgot to add sugar to a coffee cake will be less noticeable.

* If you use enough frosting, no one will notice that a chocolate cake didn't rise--just call it "brownies"

* Baking powder really is necessary in a cake.

* If it's an old refrigerator, the freezer may not get cold enough to freeze ice cream or sherbet

* Chocolate yogurt from the store must contain a LOT of sugar, or be a different recipe than the one I have

* Once you scorch food, throw it away--there is no way to redeem it

* Chocolates freeze fairly well, and serving cold chocolates with coffee can be passed of as a "gourmet" thing instead of an "I-just-botched-the-dessert-thing."

*"Easy as pie" is a very stupid saying