A Little American Dessert

Well, here’s your progress report on the week. I’ll start by picking up where I left off with the work injury. Rest assured, my fingers did NOT fall off and I have no alien infection despite all concern on the part of BMW nursing. I must report, however, that BMW’s response time to my small mishap was remarkably fast. The next day at work, just before lunch, a BMW safety worker found me in the labs and gave me a pair of safety gloves. He went on for about 10 minutes about the strength of the fabric, the chemical resistance ratings, and the extra super sticky grip they had. He was quite proud of these gloves and also quite anxious to see me wear them for all further auto body work. Funnier still is that he proceeded to have the entire department fit with the gloves. I had to laugh when I looked around and saw EVERYONE wearing gloves for the first time. I guess someone had to “make the cut” to set the precedent.

In other exciting news… this week was going to be my chance to throw a little reverse culture into the department. I was going to take on the daunting task of replicating my mother’s AMAZING dirt cake and bringing it to work. This is one of my absolute favorite desserts at home, and I thought I’d show my colleges the power of an Oreo. Unfortunately, on my shopping trip to get ingredients, I ran into to problems. Problem one… there is absolutely no Cool Whip in Germany. I’m not sure how they live over here… I settled instead for regular whipped cream. I found the Oreos in the foreign food section, so at least we had those. Problem two… everything here is in grams, so I had to figure out what a cup, an once, and a half-stick of butter were in the overly simplified European measurement system. In the end, most of the dirt cake was made with the “mix, taste, mix some more, taste some more” method. Making deserts is dangerous business.

So despite not having proper measuring devices, mixing bowls, and ingredients, I was able to complete the masterpiece. I personally don’t think it turned out too shabby.

I brought the “Schmutz-Kuchen” into work today, and I think it was a big hit. I’m pretty sure they had never heard of or tasted anything like it before. Unbelievable! In any case, the pan was wiped clean, tummies were satisfied, and everyone got a small taste of the sweeter side of the states. Glad I could assist in the most important part of cultural immersion… FOOD.