How to test an oven's temperature to confirm that the oven is working properly? The answers I found on Google appeared pretty straight-forward. I just needed to put an oven thermometer into the oven, set the oven to 350 degrees, turn the oven on, and when the oven beeps saying it believes it's 350 degrees, I check and see if the thermometer agrees. If they don't agree then either the oven isn't working, the thermometer isn't working, or both. But which one is right? Sounds like I'm back to my original question, but now my thermometer may be on the fritz too.
The web cooks I consulted said to buy a good oven thermometer. Sounds pricey. They also instructed how to remove control knobs and reset the temperature gauge. Sounds easy. But my oven lacks knobs, it's flat-screened. Some web cooks said the temperature in a working oven can vary 20 to 50 degrees from the set temperature, and if this is the case, don't mess with resetting the controls; the oven's okay. I like this last answer, - not to mess with it. I haven't messed with my oven temperature controls yet, and we're still eating cooked food. Or are we?
The safety of my cooked food was questioned last night in an animated debate between my stomach and the science adviser who resides in my brain. My thought manager did her best to moderate the debate, but she finally had to shut down the discussion. My stomach was too septic to be civil. And here was the cause of the argument: A flourless chocolate cake. Click on "continued reading..." for a recipe and debate transcript.
I found the recipe in the cookbook Bluephies New American Cooking. Jake Gundy created this flourless chocolate cake recipe in 2001, and it has been loved by Bluephies patrons ever since.
Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Heat the coffee and sugar in a medium saucepan until the coffee comes to a boil and the sugar dissolves. Put the chocolate in a heat-proof mixing bowl. Pour the boiling coffee over the chocolate and stir until the chocolate is completely melted. Add the melted butter to the chocolate. Stir to combine. Add the whisked egg yolks to the chocolate mixture. Stir to combine. Let cool so it sets up (thickens a little). Spray a springform (cheesecake) pan with nonstick spray. Scrape all the filling into the pan. Bake 35-45 minutes. When the cake is done, the top won't jiggle and a crust will have just begun to form. Cool completely. To unmold, run a wet, hot knife under the cake to loosen it from the bottom of the form. You can use more filling to make a bigger cake, but you'll need to increase the cooking time. You can also substitute semisweet chocolate for the bittersweet, but if you do, omit the sugar. Dust the cake with cocoa, or drizzle with chocolate sauce before serving. Makes 1 cake, 8-12 servings.
As you can see from the recipe, the ingredients are few and delicious. Eating this cake is essentially eating a super-duper candy bar. No wonder it's such a popular dessert at Bluephies Restaurant in Madison. The directions are so simple, that entry points for production-errors are virtually non-existent. None-the-less, I seem to have found one.
I baked my cake for the specified 45 minutes, and it looked done. But I should have suspected that I had under-baked it because when I flipped it onto the serving plate, a 1/4-inch layer of moist cake remained stuck to the pan's bottom.
But did my friend, Kay, and I show concern? No, we got excited! Free food! - No calories in chocolate left on the bottom of pans. We scrambled to gobble up that thick, gooey layer of flourless chocolate cake. The cake on the serving dish cut well and took a nice picture, especially after Kay decorated it with colorful M and M's.
It was only after we sat down and began eating our official pieces of cake that we began to evaluate it. Kay poked at hers with her fork. "It has a pudding consistency," she said, concern coming through in her voice.
"Yes, but it tastes really good," I said, enjoying every bite.
"There were five egg yolks in it." She poked some more. "Do you think they cooked enough?"
"Well, it was in the oven for 45 minutes at 350 degrees." I answered.
"That would cook the egg yolks," added Dan. "They would be safe if cooked that long at that temperature."
Kay left the cake on her plate. Dan, now chewing on Kay's seed of doubt, took just a few bites of his. I ate my whole piece. Then about 1:00 am I wondered how Kay and Dan were sleeping because I wasn't.
Although we had dropped the egg-yolk discussion at the table, I had recognized the unvoiced crux of the issue. Was this cake actually cooked at 350 degrees? My stomach was alerting top management about its digestion struggles. "She's about to blow," warned Scotty the Stomach. "Cap'n, I canno' hold 'er any longer!"
"What are your symptoms?" I asked.
"We're turning over. We're up to our eyeballs in acid!"
I pictured those 5 uncooked egg yolks. I consulted my mind's science adviser, "Do you think it's food poisoning?"
"Food poisoning usually occurs within an hour of eating. It's been four hours. There's been no vomiting or diarrhea. The acidity could be partially accounted for by the two glasses of wine which were drunk with the overly-rich meal."
I tried to reassure my stomach. "It's likely not food poisoning, just a rich meal."
"Well, la-dee-da, you brainiacs!" my stomach retorted. "You're not riding seasick on a typhoon. Kay warned you about those egg yolks! You should have listened to her. She knows a lot more about nausea than you do! She's written medical-journal articles on nausea! She's given talks around the country on nausea. And she didn't eat that cake!"
I considered the truth of this argument. But I also considered that while it is impossible to talk oneself out of food poisoning, it is possible to imagine it so vividly as to talk oneself into it. I wondered if Stomach was heading in this direction. "What do you think?" I again consulted my science adviser.
"The symptoms just don't add up," it responded. "But maybe you could tell Stomach that because you washed the cake down with wine, the alcohol in the wine killed the bacteria on the way down, thus rendering the cake rich but safe."
"You think Stomach will believe that?" I doubted. "I thought that was an old wives' tale."
"We did hear something about it being true on public radio," my adviser reassured.
"Yes, but was that in a news interview or a comedy show?" I like knowing where I get my information from before I repeat it as gospel.
"It doesn't matter," urged my adviser. "Stomach will believe it."
"Sounds like you have a pretty low opinion of Stomach," I observed.
"On the contrary, Stomach is unparalleled at digestion. But this jumping to conclusions that nausea equals food poisoning is histrionic. You have to use emotion to combat emotion. Try it."
"Stomach," I called, "Even if those eggs weren't cooked enough, the alcohol in the wine killed any harmful bacteria. The cake was safe to eat; you're probably just dealing with a combo of rich food, wine, and a late night. But how about we compromise and don't eat any more of that cake?"
"Uh-huh.., you just wait and see what you'll be eating tomorrow," snarled Stomach. "You'll be lucky if you're swallowing boiled rice..."
At that point, I cut off discussion, rolled over, and tried to sleep. If Stomach was right about things to come, I'd better sleep while I could.
At 7:00 am all was back to normal; Stomach was sleeping, and I was craving coffee. But I think I will test that oven temperature. And once I get it figured out, I'll bake the cake again. It's deep-chocolate flavor was too decadently delicious for even this non-chocoholic to pass up.
Of course there are easier ways to satisfy chocoholics. Here are some of the finest chocolates created, and they're made by gourmet chocolatiers in Wisconsin.
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Luck of the Irish Creme de Menthe Marble Fudge
Chocolate Covered Cherry Cordials
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