Damn, good trick!

I'm not sure what came over me this past weekend, but I was overcome by the need to bake. I needed the security of a good solid recipe, guiding me step-by-step through a hit or miss process. I craved the stickiness of batter, the cozy heat of the oven, and the mouth watering smells of a homemade creation.

I pulled out a Weight Watchers cookbook, which usually sits neglected on my shelf. I don't follow the program, but figured that it can't hurt to have healthy recipes on hand for those times when I want to have my cake and eat it too, in the truest literal sense. I flipped through the book and finally settled on banana bread.

I pulled out my ingredients and measured out the first two: Butter and sugar. The following instruction read "With a wooden spoon, beat the butter and sugar until creamy." I pulled out my wooden spoon and got started. Any other time I have creamed butter and sugar as the first step to some wonderful creation, I have used some sort of electric mixer. As I hacked away at the butter and sugar, I could feel the muscles in my arm start to ache. I switched the spoon from my right hand to left hand. Left hand to right. The sugar was slowly beginning to melt and yield into the butter. Minutes more went by and my arms began to hurt a little more with each passing second. Eventually, with my arm burning after what seemed like hours of stirring, the butter and sugar were at a point where I deemed it to be creamy enough.

Suddenly, it occurred to me. Damn, Weight Watchers, with all the wooden spoon hacking, stirring, and whipping, they had actually tricked me into exercising! Sly one, Weight Watchers.

Lucky me though, surely all that exercise earned me another slice of banana bread!