Baking and desserts are my absolute favorite things to make. I love to see the looks on people's faces when they take a bite and say 'wow'. I also enjoy making comfort food - anything that brings someone to mind the thoughts of childhood, home and family. My favortie reason to cook is to make others happy. For that reason, I enjoy trying new things if I know someone is having a craving. My first cheesecake would have to be my biggest triumph so far. It wasn't the most difficult or the fanciest, but it was one of the recipes I feared the most. Though I know it to be inevitable, I have a hard time trying new recipes if I know that I may have to have some failures along the way - I just want it to be right the first time. So, I finally decided to face my fear and risk sacrificing a load of cream cheese and other ingredients. I read several recipes and countless reader's notes on those recipes and finally decided on the recipe and the method. I measured carefully, mixed cautiously and baked precisely. The results? It probably could not have turned out any better than it did - only one tiny crack in the top of the cake and a wonderfully creamy texture - it was a hit. As a result, I'm feeling better about trying some more of those recipes that have frightened me in the past. The most recent - I was preparing a flourless chocolate cake, but didn't have any cake pans on hand, so I used a loaf pan. The pan was new, and I had sprayed it with baking spray so it was a bit slippery. Everything was fine until I pulled the cake out to check and see if it was done. I used a skewer and saw it wasn't quite done yet, so I went to put it back in the oven. That's when the pan slipped out of my oven mitt covered hand and flipped upside down onto the open oven door. Since it wasn't done yet, it was still runny inside and came completely out of the pan. I scooped up what wasn't instantly baked onto the door and threw it back into the pan - a lumpy mess. I was quite upset, but decided to try and salvage what I could. I served spoonfulls of the partially baked cake, topped with the chocolate ganache topping and called it Chocolate Disaster Cake. It was actually quite good and was similar to a Chocolate Molten Lava Cake. Moral of the story - use 2 hands, just to be s