Mom's Chocolate Pecan Cake - My Favorite Birthday Cake
Mom’s Chocolate Cake – Dec. 22, 1999
1 box of cake mix
1 stick of butter
3 eggs
1 1/4 cups of water

Cream butter and eggs. Add cake mix. Add water while mixing so that batter won’t be to thin.

Icing
1 box of powdered sugar
3 heaping teaspoons of cocoa
1/2 stick of butter
3 handfuls of chopped pecans

Add a little milk – if too thick add more. Be careful not to add too much. Icing should be thick. Doesn’t take much milk.

Grease two cake pans with butter (use a lot).
Pour in half of cake mix in each.
Put in 360 degree oven until brown and fork comes out clean. Don’t overcook.

Take cake out. Run knife along edge of pan and flip out on a plate.
Put sugar on another plate (to prevent sticking).
Flip second cake layer on plate.

Put icing on first layer. Turn over second layer on first. Put icing on rest of cake.
How I found this recipe

    On Wednesday morning, October 3, 2007, I was thinking about my mother, in particular about all the suffering she had gone through because of her situation and because of some of the people who were her caregivers. I felt bad because I felt that I had betrayed her trust in me after having made a promise to her never put her in a nursing home and the idea of that feeding tube which she hated and I grew to hate also. With all of these feelings burdening a sorrow filled heart, I picked up the large velvet rose I had placed next to her that last Christmas, held it close, and prayed. I felt better and those bad thoughts and feelings left me.
    Later that afternoon I was sitting on my bed wondering what I should do with my time when I noticed a plastic organizer I had bought at Wal Mart several days earlier. It was still in the bag where I had put it down. Half-heartedly I got it out of the bag and thought - I bought this so I’d better put it to some use. I had a couple of cigar boxes with ink pens, paper clips, cards, and a mix of items.
    As I went through the first box, while sorting through some papers and cards, to my astonishment, in my hand was a recipe for “Mom’s Chocolate Cake – 12-22-99” I have no recollection of writing it down, but there it was in my own hand writing. I believe that she had her first stroke in June of 1999, so I had written this down a few days before Christmas when she was recovering. It made me feel good to have this in my hand.
    Of all the things that my mother ever cooked or baked, this one was my favorite from childhood. She knew how much I loved her chocolate pecan cake, and she would make one especially for me on my birthday. At that moment I felt that my prayers earlier had been answered and that my mother’s love for me had been somehow expressed to me by this simple chain of events.
    Everything has a purpose on this earth. As I would often say to my mother when visiting her in the nursing home, “Mom, God has a plan. We don’t know what the plan is, but we know that He has a plan for us.” Somehow saying this would make me feel better about everything.