Root Beer Float Cake

Ingredients:

2 1/2 cup flour
1 Tablespoon baking powder
3/4 tsp. salt
1 1/2 cup sugar
1 1/2 cup root beer (I used A&W)
1/4 cup canola oil
2 tsp. root beer extract
2 eggs

Topping:
2 cups heavy cream
2 tsp. root beer extract
4 Tablespoons confectioners sugar

1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees.

2. In a medium mixing bowl, mix together flour, baking powder, salt.

3. In another medium mixing bowl (I used my KitchenAid) cream together sugar and eggs.  Add root beer, canola oil and root beer extract.

4. Add half of the dry ingredients to mixing bowl and mix until combined, add second half of dry ingredients and continue to mix until well combined.

5. Pour batter into a 9x13 pan.

6. Bake at 350 for 30 minutes.

7. Let cake cool completely on a cooling rack before covering.

8. To make whipped cream, whisk together at medium speed, heavy cream, 2 tsp. root beer extract and confectioner's sugar until a stiff consistency.

9. Top with a dollop of whipped cream before serving.

This cake couldn't taste more like a root beer float.  The whipped cream tasted just like the last of the root beer float when the ice cream has melted and melded perfectly with the last sips of root beer.  This cake will be a winner with any root beer float lover.  Happy Spring!

Thrift store find

Nordic ware, $4.99

St. Patrick's Day Cake

I have been most addicted to Pinterest lately.  I've been pinning projects to do with kids, decorating tips and a ton of cakes!  When I found a pistachio cake pinned I knew it would be the perfect cake to make this week!

I didn't get creative and used this recipe instead for Pistachio Bundt Cake.  Because I had my cousin's boy and two of my own kids joining me for this cake, it made sense to beef up the amount of food coloring to really celebrate the holiday, so I added 7 drops of green.  And because I wanted a little extra goodness in my glaze I added a 1/2 tsp. of almond extract.

This was not a difficult cake, perfect to make with kids and it was delicious!  I don't like to use box mixes for cakes, but I did make an exception in this case.

Apple Cake

Chocolate and bundt have been causing a bit of a rut for me.  So it was time to mix things up a bit.  Enter, fruit.  It was time to mix things up a bit here in the oven but I don't know anything about baking with fruit so I consulted Melissa Gray again.  Her cookbook, All Cakes Considered is now one of my favorites.

I tried out her Fresh Apple Cake recipe, but I didn't have the Granny Smith apples that she used, so I substituted Pink Ladies.  I also didn't like that the recipe called for 1 1/2 cup of vegetable oil.  I decided to risk it and I only added 1 cup of Canola Oil. (I almost always use canola instead of vegetable since it's a healthier choice for the hearts in our house.)

The batter was still quite oily:

In my oven this cake should have baked for 70 mins.  The recipe called for 60 and the boy who was waiting for cake before bed convinced me to take it out after 58.  This meant that the center of the cake was not baked enough, however the cake was still plenty tasty.  The cinnamon and nutmeg flavors came through and the apples and walnuts made for wonderful texture.  The best part about this cake was the top of it had the texture of a giant cookie.  We will make this cake again in the fall during apple picking season.  I wonder how it will taste with my very favorite apples, SweeTangoes!



Booze, Coffee and Chocolate = Joel's Bundt

This week's cake is a tribute to my late father-in-law.  I broke out his bottle of whiskey from our liquor cabinet and thought of Joel while I baked.  I thought about taking a shot to honor him but thought better of it.

The cake is incredibly moist and only has a small hint of the coffee and whiskey flavor.  I was hoping that the flavor would be more intense but the chocolate flavor is super.  The cake is airy, moist and has such a clean flavor.

Ingredients:
Cooking Spray
1 cup unsweetened cocoa powder (I used Ghirardelli); plus 1 tablespoon for dusting
1 cup medium roast brewed coffee
1 cup Whiskey (I used Windsor Canadian)
2 sticks unsalted butter
2 cups sugar
2 cups flour
1 1/4 tsp. baking soda
1/2 tsp. salt
2 eggs
2 tsp. vanilla
2 tbls. confectioners sugar

Preheat oven to 325°F. Spray pan to coat and then dust with cocoa powder.

Heat coffee, whiskey, butter, and 1 cup cocoa powder in a saucepan over medium heat, whisking until butter is melted. Remove from heat and add sugar, continue to whisk until sugar dissolves. Transfer chocolate mix to a large mixing bowl.

In another bowl, mix together flour, baking soda, and salt. And in a third smaller mixing bowl, whisk together eggs and vanilla. Incorporate egg mix into chocolate mix. Add flour mixture slowly and whisk to mix, the batter ends up being pretty thin. Pour batter into bundt pan and bake 1 hour. 

Cool cake completely in pan on a cooling rack.  Use a knife to loosen the edges before turning over.  Dust with confectioners sugar.

Angel Food

 I've heard from many people that they have never made a homemade Angel Food Cake.  Why is that?, I wondered.  So I set out to find out why and compare the two.

I started with the boxed cake by Better Crocker.  It was a cinch to add a bit of water to the box ingredients and mix.  But what was in the box mix? Sugar, Wheat Flour Bleached, Egg White, Corn Starch, Leavening (Baking Soda, Citric Acid), Modified Corn Starch, Calcium Chloride, Modified Soy Protein, Salt, Cellulose Gum, Dextrose, Maltodextrin, Artificial Flavor, Sodium Lauryl Flavor (A Whipping Aid), Nonfat Milk. And the box cake was just 2.79 at my grocery store.

We ate the cake served with strawberries and cool whip, Angel Food is always one of my favorites and I enjoyed every bite.  The texture was airy and spongy, if a bit on the sticky/sugary side.  The outside was a touch crunchy making a great contrast in texture.

 Next up, I separated 12 egg whites from their yolks.  I decided this was the reason that most prefer the boxed method.  Now, I knew I would have 12 yolks that I would have to make.  I solved that issue with a Greek Avgolemono recipe I had on hand, but still only used 8 of those yolks.

Whipping the egg whites was my favorite part of making the cake from scratch.  Check out these peaks:

The homemade version turned out beautifully.  The advantage was that I was able to easily adjust the flavor by adding orange extract and vanilla extract.  The texture was a bit more dense than the boxed version, the flavor better, but it was missing the crunchy outside.

My version of the Angel Food was more expensive but I was also able to control the quality of the ingredients.  I prefer to use organic sugar and cage-free, organic eggs ... I'm just guessing these aren't Betty Crocker's choice.

I can't tell you that I prefer one method over the other, they both have their purpose.  If I were to frost, the homemade cake would hold frosting better.  If I wanted strawberry shortcake I would choose homemade because the denser cake would hold more of the strawberry's juices.  If I were to eat plan, I'd prefer the boxed version and also if I needed a cake in a hurry.

Each cake has a purpose and I won't ever feel like I'm cheating if I break out Betty's box now and then. Stay tuned for my Angel Food cake recipe, coming soon.

Cream of Tartar

My next post will be all about Angel Food Cake, I've been bakin' up a storm this week.  I'm guessing you thought I was going to give up on my experiment but really I did double duty this week so stay tuned!

But in buying ingredients for the Angel Food I needed to find Cream of Tartar.  I didn't really thing much of it, I've never used the ingredient before but I just thought it was a spice of some sort.  And then when I got it home I realized that I was using it as an egg white stabilizer, but what WAS it?

I've since learned that it is potassium hydrogen tartrate, an acid salt.  Cream of Tartar is actually formed from the sediment left over in wine barrels. Every time I pull out a cake pan and put on my apron I realize I'm in for a chemistry lesson.