The Answer is Cake

Weekend Assignment #331: Cake V. Pie (A Scalzi Flashback)

Which is better -- cake or pie? Explain your reasoning. Will you choose the moist sponginess and frosting-topped goodness of cake? Or will you side with those flaky crust-adoring, fruit-filling fanatics of the pie nation? You must choose one -- and only one! No trying to suggest that Boston Creme Pie is really kind of like a cake, or how cheesecake is actually not unlike a pie. Take a stand! Be true to your pastry orientation!

Extra Credit: Having chosen cake or pie, now admit your favorite variety of the dessert you did not choose. So if you chose cake, tell us your favorite pie. Prefer pie? Tell us your favorite cake. - J.S.

This was slightly more difficult than I thought.  I consider myself a cake person.  Actually, I consider myself a frosting person.  But I am really a recovering frosting person.  The last..half dozen times I have had cake, I have said out loud, "Someone please remind me next time:  I am not twelve years old and I don't really want that much frosting."

I have made a game of testing out every cupcake place in the District of Columbia.  It seems that some have better cake and some have better frosting.

I think part of the reason that I prefer cake is that you generally know what you are going to get.  There are a thousand ways to make a pie.  In fact, the current debate in my family is whether the apples in an apple pie should be mushy or "maintain structural integrity".

The answer is "maintain structural integrity".

I enjoy the fruit of the pie more than the pastry.  In fact, when dessert is ordered at any given restaurant, I often order whatever passes for the apple pie/crisp/cobbler.  And I generally have the same critique:

"Too much pastry, not enough fruit."

And then there is the risk that it is all too syrupy.  I have that problem with the strawberry pie at Baker's Square - which happens to be my father's favorite.  So whatever I order at a restaurant, I am really thinking that I would just prefer a normal slice of cake.  Yellow.  With chocolate frosting.

However, if I can't have that, the apple pie will do.  Heated.  With ice cream on the side.