Sweet Creamy Cake

 I've learned a new bundt cake, this one from Food52 called the Sweet Cream Bundt.  It's got an eggy texture and a scent like a Chinese egg custard tart.  So far each member of my family has had two pieces!  And I'm taking it to an informal gathering later this evening.  Should be fun. . . We've had a few during COVID, one for my birthday and a few on Zoom.  We might scarf paint later this summer.

Sweet Cream Bundt

1 1/4 cups sugar

• 1 1/4 cups flour
  
• 2 tablespoons baking powder
  
• 4 large eggs
  
• 1/2 cup cold water
  

Combine the sugar, flour, and baking powder.  Separately, combine eggs and water until smooth.  Then add egg mix to dry mix and mix until smooth.  Bake at 350F for 25 minutes or until golden brown.  Keep in bundt pan and pour into cream mix while still hot.

• 1 1/2 cups heavy cream
  
• 2 tablespoons butter
  
• 2 tablespoons sugar
  
• When you take cake out of the oven, combine the above cream, butter, and sugar and microwave until hot but not boiling (under 2 minutes.)  Pour into cake still in bundt pan and let sit for 15 minutes.  Then loosen the cake and turn it out.

• Maple drizzle
• 1 1/2 cups powdered sugar
  
• 2 tablespoons butter, melted
  
• 2 teaspoons maple extract
  
• 2 tablespoons milk, plus more as needed to yield a thin icing
• When cake is cooled, you can mix this glaze and drizzle over cake.  

Cake, Cats, and Crochet

Yesterday, I satisfied a craving for cake that I've had.  I don't know why, but I've had cake on the brain for weeks.  I tried a new recipe from the NYTimes--the chocolate cake made with mayo instead of eggs and oil.  While it was baking, I worked on the crocheted pocket scarf/shawl that I'm making for Mama Teacher, with our sweet Hermione curled up next to me.  A lovely morning.  And yes, I had a cuppa.   All I needed was the snow that is falling today instead of yesterday.

NYTimes One Bowl Chocolate Mayo Cake

**I used Constant Comment tea and orange extract.

¾ cup/180 milliliters boiling water, or use hot coffee, Earl Grey tea or mint tea

¼ cup/25 grams unsweetened cocoa powder (Dutch-processed or natural)

1 to 2 ounces chopped bittersweet chocolate (optional)

⅔ cup/160 milliliters mayonnaise

¼ teaspoon kosher salt

1 ½ teaspoons baking soda

¾ cup/150 grams granulated sugar

1 teaspoon vanilla extract, or a dash of bourbon or whiskey (optional)

1 ½ cups/190 grams all-purpose or cake flour

 Confectioners’ sugar, for finishing

To a large mixing bowl, add cocoa powder and chopped bittersweet chocolate (if using). Pour in boiling liquid, and let it sit for a few minutes, then whisk until smooth. The chocolate will have melted, if you used it, and the cocoa dissolved.

Whisk in mayonnaise, salt, baking soda, 3/4 cup granulated sugar until smooth. Then whisk in a teaspoon of vanilla extract, if you have it (or a dash of Bourbon or brandy or just leave it out entirely). Finally, whisk in 1 1/2 cups flour (either all-purpose or cake flour), mixing vigorously to eliminate any lumps.

Grease an 8- or 9-inch pan (square, round, star-shaped, anything is good). Pour the batter into the pan, and bake at 350 degrees for 22 to 40 minutes, until the top springs back when the center is lightly pressed. The deeper the pan, the longer it will take to bake through.

Let cool, and sprinkle with confectioners’ sugar to finish.

Snacking

We went to the store today because  . . . well, I wanted to make a cake and needed an ingredient for a revised version of the filling.  And because we wanted to get out.  I hadn't been shopping, really, since March 13, fully two months ago.  It made me nervous.  We were masked--with filters, even--and had our hand sanitizer.  The store wasn't crowded and there were arrows to direct flow.  Everyone was masked and we all stayed 6' apart.  And yet.  Breathing through the masks made me breathe harder, or the anxiety did. Even breathing, perhaps especially breathing, felt risky.  And my hands felt dirty and contaminated the whole time.  How easily I have gotten out of the habit of being around strangers! Target, which is such a familiar and safe place for me, felt alien and a little scary.  And rationally, I don't even believe it's that dangerous, with the proper precautions, which we were all taking.  Still, I was uncomfortable and ready to get home.  I wonder how long it will be before going to the store feels okay--not safe, just okay.  I think I was surprised by how anxious I was.  I'm just going to have to practice, not often, but intentional.  

But we got the marshmallow cream for the Twinkie Cake I'm making.  See, I shared the Smitten Kitchen recipe on my FB page and a friend encouraged me to make it.  But, referencing the Seinfeld episode about Elaine deeming men "sponge-worthy" or not, I said I wasn't sure if the cake was "flour worthy" because I was careful with my less-than-one-bag remaining.  So the friend offered to find flour and to share if I would make it.  Low and behold, she did!  A bag of flour appeared on my doorstep yesterday.  And so I'm making the cake today.  I told her I would share anything I made with that bag of flour.

It's a good thing she found some, too, because Target was out of flour!  And anything with alcohol (first aid wipes, hand sanitizer, rubbing alcohol), toilet paper, almost all paper towels, any vegetable seed packets, cleaning spray or wipes like Lysol or Chlorox.  It was surprising, even two months on, to see so many bare shelves.  And the arrows, the plexiglass protecting the employees, the long line of people which was then directed to the right open check out (instead of choosing your own line), marks on the floor where to stand, masks on everyone.  But no masks for sale.  No hand sanitizer to use. And you can't use your own bags so we're all back to plastic, which we'd made such in-roads into avoiding.  

I suppose the Twinkie Cake will be my reward tonight (I'm saving back a few pieces for the family and giving the rest away), a reminder of childhood and simpler times when we drank out of outdoor water hoses, rode in cars without seat belts, sat on the tailgates of moving trucks, didn't have helmets for anything, wandered around without cellphones for contact until the street lights came on, ate Twinkies, who knows what else.  Mercy, if this virus had hit during my childhood, I think we would have all just died--laissez-faire 70s parenting wouldn't have embraced quarantines and distance learning and all that.  Though, there would be fewer objections to vaccines than now.  

I remember when we thought Twinkies were going to disappear, years ago.  Mama and I even bought a pack for the kids to try so they would know what they were.  It was good childhood memories (if not good snacks) for Mama and me, but the kids were nonplussed.  They couldn't figure out why we'd eat such things.  Not just Twinkies but those orange Hostess cupcakes and Ding Dongs and Snoballs and the other snack desserts we brought home.  I liked chocolaty Little Debbie Star Crunches a whole bunch too, but don't remember HoHos or Devil Dogs much.  I do remember that the kid who had any of this in their lunch was the lucky one.  And it was rarely me.  I only remember getting those snacks on car trips when you'd stop at the gas station to use the restroom and fill up.  These weren't the big, fancy convenience stores at gas stations we have now, but sometimes just a rack of chips and a rack of Hostess, and one fridge area for Cokes.  Later there were Corn Nuts.  Today is a veritable travel snacker's paradise.

And yet, I find myself making one homemade. . . . 

Twinkie Bundt
Inspired by, but not the recipe from, Pure Vanilla

Cake
1 cup (225 grams) unsalted butter, at room temperature
1 3/4 cups (350 grams) granulated sugar
2 large eggs
2 large yolks (save the 2 whites for filling, below)
1 teaspoon (5 ml) vanilla extract
2 teaspoons baking powder
1 teaspoon fine sea salt or table salt
2 1/2 cups (315 grams) all-purpose flour
1 cup (235 ml) buttermilk

Filling* I'm using the Fluff recipe.
2 large egg whites
2/3 cup (135 grams) granulated sugar
1/4 teaspoon cream of tartar
1 teaspoon (5 ml) vanilla extract

Heat your oven to 350°F. Generously grease a 10-cup Bundt pan, either with butter or a nonstick spray; I like to use a butter-flour spray and go over the pan twice. Bundts are sticky! Fortuntely, this cake is not.

In a large bowl, cream butter and sugar together until light and fluffy. Beat in eggs, one at a time, scraping down bowl between each, and then yolks. Add vanilla. Sprinkle batter with salt and baking powder and mix briefly to combine. Add about 1/3 of flour, mix to combine, then half of buttermilk, mixing again just to combine, repeating with next 1/3 of flour, remaining buttermilk then remaining flour.

Dollop batter into prepared pan and spread so that the top is smooth. Bake in heated oven for 40 to 45 minutes, or until toothpick inserted into cake comes out batter-free. Let cool in pan on wire rack for 10 minutes, then invert onto rack and let cool absolutely completely. You can hasten this along in the fridge; it will take about 45 minutes.

When cake is completely and totally cool, invert it again. If your cake had domed quite a bit in the oven, you can use a serrated knife to level it a little. Then, using a melon baller (my first choice), small spoon or paring knife, scoop out several mounds of cake through the underside, being sure not to cut through top or sides of cake. If using a traditional bundt shape (as I show), I used the larger bloops in the pattern (there are 8) for mine. What happens to the cake bellies you scoop out is between you and your gods.

Combine egg whites, sugar and cream of tartar in a heatproof bowl and place this over a pot of gently simmering water. Whisk constantly until sugar dissolves and whites are lukewarm to touch, about 3 minutes. Remove bowl from simmering water and use an electric mixer to beat with a whisk attachment on low speed, gradually increasing to high, until stiff, glossy peaks form, about 4 to 7 minutes. Add vanilla and mix to combine.

Scoop filling into a large piping bag fitted with a large, round tip or plastic bag with the corner cut off and fill the indentations of the cake. Center your cake platter over the cake and invert your filled cake back onto it. If desired, dust lightly with powdered sugar before serving.

This cake keeps at room temperature for up to 3 days. I keep mine under a cake dome.

* A few ways to approach the filling:

• Make the recipe as above. The filling will be a bit soft, but very marshmallow-like. Plus, I’ve engineered the cake to give you the spare egg whites you’ll need.
• Go in a different path. The next two things I’d have auditioned as fillings are Swiss Meringue Buttercream, which I know to be fairly stiff (I’d halve the 4 egg white-level frosting, and see if I could get away with just 8 tablespoons butter) or, as suggested by a clever commenter on Instagram, ABC Kitchen via Martha Stewart’s Marshmallow Frosting which is set with gelatin, which is, I think, exactly what this cake would need as you could keep the great marshmallow frosting flavor but not the softness.
• ***Get real and just buy a jar of marshmallow fluff. Seriously, Sever knew what she was talking about. In her recipe, you beat a 7.5-ounce jar with a 1/2 cup softened butter and 1 teaspoon vanilla and I believe many headaches can be avoided this way. Also: yum.

Christmas Baking

It was our annual holiday party for volunteers at the historic house, with delicious food and friendly faces.  So I made a cake!

As a little girl, I remember our family getting boozy cakes in a box--rum and amaretto, I think--tender, moist, strong, small.  They might have come from Foley's.  I loved getting a little piece of them.  I haven't had a boozy cake in decades.

So when I saw this recipe in Taste of Home AND needed something to take to the party, I chose this cake.  And it was delicious, even though I rushed the glazing--I baked it this morning, kept it in the pan, poured half of the glaze on the cake about 20 minutes after it was out of the oven, and then took the cake out of the pan an hour later and glazed the top.  Yum!

I can't wait to try it with Amaretto and perhaps almonds.

Rawhide's Whiskey Cake from Taste of Home1 package spice cake mix with pudding (regular size)
1 package (3.40 ounces) instant vanilla pudding mix
3/4 cup 2% milk
1/2 cup canola oil (I used grapeseed oil)
3/4 cup whiskey (I used bourbon)
4 large eggs
1-1/3 cups coarsely chopped walnuts, divided 

GLAZE:
1/2 cup butter, cubed
1 cup sugar
1 teaspoon water
1/2 cup whiskey

Preheat oven to 300°. Grease and flour a 10-in. tube pan.

Combine the first six ingredients; beat on low speed 30 seconds. Beat on medium speed 2 minutes; fold in 1 cup nuts. Pour batter into prepared pan; sprinkle with remaining nuts. Bake until a toothpick inserted in center comes out clean, about 60-65 minutes. Cool in pan.

For glaze, mix all ingredients in a small saucepan; bring to a boil over medium-high heat. Reduce heat; simmer 10 minutes. Cool 3 minutes. Pour one-third of glaze over top of cake, allowing some to flow over sides. Let stand 1 hour. Remove from pan to cool completely; cover.

The next day, reheat glaze; brush half over cake, cooling before covering. Repeat the following day, using remaining glaze. 

Yield: 16 servings.

Tea and Cake and Sympathy

Been a quiet couple of days around here.  Mama back at work; kids back at school.  Chores to do but not much else.  So I sit and drink my favorite Taylor's of Harrogate Rose tea in my new-to-me "vintage" 1988 Japanese Shafford creamware teapot and my NYC Starbuck's mug, both of which I got this weekend.




And notice that my sweet couch buddy, who kept me company everyday after my surgery, is gone.

Thankfully, Mama Teacher came for a visit today and we had a wonderful, comforting chat . . . and cake!  This delicious Orange Marmalade Cake from the NYTimes (I'll grab the recipe another time.)  It was even better than the Orange Poundcake I like so much (that was definitely fine, dense poundcake; this was coarse, buttery yellow cake.)  It was great to try the cake and have such a good friend with whom to share it.  A recipe for healing, for sure.


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Orange Marmalade Cake
adapted from the NYTimes (I changed the zests)

2/3 cup coarse-cut orange marmalade, divided (though plain ol’ Smuckers Sweet Orange Marmalade is what I had and it worked)

12 tablespoons unsalted butter, softened, plus 1/2 tablespoon for glaze

¾ cup granulated sugar 

2 ½ teaspoons orange zest

3 large eggs, at room temperature

2 tablespoons fresh orange juice

1 ½ cups all-purpose flour 

1 ½ teaspoons baking powder 

¾ teaspoon fine sea salt 

4 tablespoons confectioner’s sugar

Heat oven to 350 degrees. Grease a 9-by-5-inch loaf pan.

Beat together softened butter, sugar, and orange zest until light and fluffy, about 5 minutes. Beat in eggs, one at a time, until incorporated. Beat in 1/3 cup marmalade and the orange juice.

In a separate bowl, whisk together flour, baking powder and salt. Fold dry ingredients into wet until just combined. 

Scrape batter into prepared pan. Bake until surface of cake is golden brown and a toothpick inserted in the center emerges clean, 50 to 55 minutes. Remove from oven and transfer pan to a wire rack.

Cool 10 minutes; turn cake out of pan and place on rack right-side up. Place a rimmed baking sheet under rack to catch the glaze. 

GLAZE:

Heat remaining 1/3 cup marmalade in a small pot over low heat until melted; whisk in confectioners’ sugar and 1/2 tablespoon butter until smooth. Slather warm glaze over top of cake, allowing some to drizzle down the sides. Cool completely before slicing. 

Taking the Cake

Tonight, the historic house hosted its annual holiday celebration for volunteers and supporters.  As usual, the board members brought all the food.  There were the usual kielbasa in mustard, veggie triangles, endive with roquefort and apples, meatballs, and a selection of cookies and other sweets.  This year, there were great pistachios cookies, like Mexican wedding cookies but with pistachios instead of pecans, and also delicious pie dough cookies (with brown sugar, butter, and chai spice spread in the center of store-bought dough then rolled like a pinwheel and sliced.)  Sis and I made Orange Poundcake, based on the recipe for lime poundcake in the book Tangle of Knots (from our book club), which in turn is from Real Simple.  I found the glaze via Pinterest, from Two Peas and Their Pod.  We doubled the recipe so that we have cake to take to the piano recital on Sunday (it's unglazed and in the freezer.)  And I started daydreaming about other possibilities--the cranberries mentioned on Two Peas and Their Pod, or maybe mini-chocolate chips, or lime, or lemon poppyseed. I can see it being our go-to poundcake--it's got good structure and flavor (though, I think I slightly overbaked it.)

Even better than the desserts was that my friend Miss J was recognized as Volunteer of the Year.  I know she teases me when I congratulate and thank her for the work she has done.  She stepped in so quickly when I had surgery and then really went above and beyond just covering for me and really made the spring and fall tour seasons her own.  (I know she sometimes reads this, too.) I hope the historic house does appreciate her, for she brings great energy, knowledge, ideas, enthusiasm, and networking, plus a real dose of humor and practicality, to the organization.  And I'm not just saying that because I want her to keep being in charge, and not just because I burned out (and really do hope to start actively pursuing hospice chaplaincy soon.)  I really do think she is what the historic house needs right now.  Congratulations, my friend!!!  Very well deserved.



Orange Poundcake

4 large eggs
1/2 teaspoon vanilla extract

2 teaspoons grated orange zest

2 tablespoons orange juice
2 sticks unsalted butter, at room temperature, plus more for the pan
2 1/4 cups granulated sugar
1/2 teaspoon kosher salt
2 cups all-purpose flour

1. Heat oven to 325° F. Butter a 9-by-5-inch loaf pan.
2. In a small bowl, whisk together the eggs, vanilla, and zests. In a large bowl, with an electric mixer on medium-high, beat the butter for 2 minutes. Add 1 1/4 cups of the sugar and the salt and beat for 2 minutes. Slowly add the egg mixture. Beat for 3 minutes. Reduce speed to low and slowly add the flour. Transfer the batter to the prepared pan. Bake for 60 to 70 minutes.
3. Transfer pan to a wire rack to cool for 10 minutes. Using a knife, loosen the cake from pan. Invert it onto the rack. Turn it over again onto a serving plate.
4. Cool completely before glazing with Orange Glaze below.
5. Optional:  serve with spiced cranberry sauce on the side.

For the Orange Glaze, combine:
1 cup powdered sugar, sifted
1 1/2 tablespoons fresh orange juice
1 teaspoon orange zest

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Miss JA's Party Meatballs

The meatball recipe is very difficult. I go to BJ's and buy a 5 lb package of Swedish meatballs. Then I take two cans of jellied cranberry sauce and 2 jars of Heinz chili sauce ( it is with the ketchup). Heat them together until the cranberry sauce melts. Pour over meatballs and I heat them in a crockpot Recipe is on both cranberry sauce and chili. Good luck!

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Miss JR's Pie Dough Cookies

Roll out store-bought pie dough. Spread with butter and sprinkle with brown sugar and Wildtree chai spice. Roll like a Swiss roll and cut like pinwheel cookies. Bake at 350F until golden brown.

A Trio of Treats

Yesterday, I finished off three books through which I have been working my way.  The first was a Twinkie read, Susan Wiitig Albert's Tale of Hill Top Farm, which is a delightful and simple romp through the Lake District with a fictionalized version of the author/illustrator, her new neighbors, and all of their talking animals.  It wasn't much of a mystery and talking animals are a bit precious, but I enjoyed the ambiance . . . I even learned about arval, or funeral, cakes, and other details of rural life at the turn of the 20th century.  I had started the book during my long test at the doctor's office and finished it off yesterday.

I also finished another book I had read at that long test at the doctor's office (I got tired midway and changed genres), Vivian Swift's watercolored memoir, When Wanderers Cease to Roam.  Swift, who had traveled extensively, settled down in Pelham, NY, and recorded both her observations of life in her village and reminiscences of her world travels.  I liked the little illustrations and her art journaling of types of mud in March and snowflakes in December and her "memoir in five moments" where she reflects on different times she's been on a beach or been in the rain.  And she likes cats.  I've been experimenting with different kinds of journaling, having recorded my days each evening or so for years and also learned more doodling.  It's best to read her book a page or two at a time, or just a month; I read too much of it in one sitting, which didn't invite close looking.  I'd actually discovered it because I loved Susan Branch's A Fine Romance, an illustrated memoir of her extended travels through England and readers recommended Swift.  Of the two, I still prefer Branch, but I plan to read Swift's memoir of France soon.

Lastly, I also finished Lisa Graff's A Tangle of Knots, which was our mother-daughter book club read this month.  I'd actually started it just a day or two before and had tried to read it during an insomniac bout but found it too complicated.  There are a dozen or so characters whose lives are, unbeknownst to them, entwined--I just got confused at 3 a.m.  But in the light of day, it was a great story.  Each of those characters (well, most of them) has a special Talent, which is almost a magical ability to do something--whistle, tie knots, hide between walls, knit, even divine a person's perfect cake.  There are even cake recipes interspersed between the chapters.

So when our book club met this evening, we sampled a few of the cakes.  Three, to be exact:  yellow cake with chocolate frosting, peanut butter cake, and lime pound cake.  Beautiful and delicious (I had a bite of each, smaller than my thumbNAIL, just crumbs really, and will be curious to see if I suffer for the gluten and dairy.)  The recipes are in the book--and on the author's website.  We also played a game at the end--guess your mom's perfect cake.  A couple of the girls guessed "nutcake," which struck me as funny, and none of them guessed correctly, and then Sis stood up and said, "My mom's perfect cake is orange chocolate."  And you know what?  She is right.  I guessed that Sis would be either chocolate molten lava cake or yellow cake with frosting--she clarified that the frosting would be melted chocolate chips.

Which we had just made yesterday!  We tested a GF (gluten-free)/DF (dairy free) King Arthur Flour yellow cake, made into cupcakes.  Wonderful!  And not just wonderful for GF/DF.  (Or I've gotten desperate in 2 weeks.)  I had mine with marmalade and Sis had hers with . . . melted chocolate chips. It was nice to bake together, which is one of our favorite shared pastimes.   Sis has been great about the whole restricted diet thing.

And it helps that there is cake.

Nuts!

The kids always like to nibble after church on whatever is served in fellowship hall--fresh fruit, cookies, cheese, crackers, almost anything.

Almost anything without nuts.

Now, they aren't allergic, but, because they were sensitive to dairy, wheat, eggs, and soy until they were almost 3, we didn't give them nuts.

And now they won't eat them.

Trust me, we've tried, both directly and, well, indirectly.

So I kept my mouth shut tight as Sis got a piece of cake at church that I knew to be almond-flavored.  There were no nuts in sight, though, and she probably couldn't identify the flavor.  She loved it!

And so I sought out the congregant who'd made the cake, especially because I liked it, too.

Lo and behold, it's right off the Solo almond filling can!

I'll be making this again soon, but solo, so they don't catch on.

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Solo Almond Bundt Cake

Almond Glaze Topping
1 cup confectioners sugar
1⁄4 teaspoon almond extract
2 tablespoon light cream

Cake
1 cup butter or margarine, softened
2 1⁄4 cup all-purpose flour
1 cup sugar
2 teaspoon baking powder
3  eggs
1⁄2 teaspoon salt
1 can Solo Almond Cake and Pastry Filling or 1 jar of any other fruit filling
1⁄4 cup milk

Chocolate Glaze Topping (no chocolate on the one at church)
1 cup confectioners’ sugar
2 tablespoon Dutch-process cocoa
1⁄2 teaspoon pure vanilla extract
3 tablespoon buttermilk or low-fat milk

Preheat oven to 350° F. Grease and flour 10-inch tube pan or 12-cup Bundt pan and set aside. Beat butter and granulated sugar in large bowl with electric mixer until light and fluffy. Add eggs, 1 at a time, beating well after each addition. Beat in almond filling until blended. Stir flour, baking powder, and salt until mixed. Add to almond mixture alternately with milk, beginning and ending with dry ingredients.  Beat until blended. Spread batter evenly in prepared pan.Bake 50 to 55 minutes or until cake tester inserted in center comes out clean. Cool in pan on wire rack 10 minutes. Remove from pan and cool completely on rack. To make glaze, combine ingredients in small bowl, and stir until blended and smooth. Spoon or drizzle over top of cake. Let stand until glaze is set. Or top with fresh fruit and whipped cream!

Takes the Cake

Specifically, Sis took the cake. To a playdate yesterday. With some of our new kindergarten friends. Well, "new" isn't exactly correct because we've known the families for years but haven't spent too much extra time together outside of the big playgroups of the toddler years or some moms' night out (MNO) opportunities. Anyway, Sis was excited and wanted to take a treat (Bud was excited too but doesn't immediately think of baking!). And so she flipped through her chocolate cookbook and spotted a picture we liked, for Hershey Special Dark Picnic Cake; luckily, we had all the ingredients, including the sour cream which I don't always have on hand (though I've found that plain yogurt works admirably as a substitute). She proudly mixed, poured, and even cleaned up (with lots of licking of bowls first), then later iced the cake and joyfully carried the cake to the playdate. Everyone welcomed it, making her happy. Best of all, it was delicious, just the kind of chocolate sheet cake I have been hoping to find. More than that, it made meeting some new friends who will be in our kindergarten easier than it would be. Chocolate cake makes everything better! (And next time we'll try the cocoa substitution that the online version of the recipe suggests.)

(Bud had a good time too, especially when he got to perform his kung fu forms to everyone's applause. It's just what we needed for school.)

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Hershey Special Dark Picnic Cake

1 cup Hershey Special Dark Chocolate Chips (regular semisweet work too!)

1/4 cup (1/2 stick) butter or margarine

1-1/3 cups boiling water

2-1/3 cups all-purpose flour

1-1/4 cups sugar

1/2 cup dairy sour cream

2 eggs

2 teaspoons baking soda

1 teaspoon salt

1 teaspoon vanilla extract

Special Dark Frosting (recipe follows)

1. Heat oven to 350 F. Grease and flour 13x9x2-inch baking pan.

2. Combine chocolate chips, butter and water in large mixer bowl; stir with spoon until chocolate is melted and mixture is blended. Gradually add flour, sugar, sour cream, eggs, baking soda, salt and vanilla; beat on low speed of electric mixer until smooth. Pour batter into prepared pan.

3. Bake 35 to 40 minutes or until wooden pick inserted in center of cake comes out clean. Cool completely in pan on wire rack. Frost with Special Dark Frosting. 12 to 15 servings.

Special Dark Frosting

1/4 cup (1/2 stick) butter or margarine

1 cup Hershey Special Dark Chocolate Chips

1-1/2 cups powdered sugar

1/4 cup milk

1/2 teaspoon vanilla extract

Place butter and chocolate chips in medium microwave-safe bowl. Microwave at MEDIUM (50%) 1 minute; stir. If necessary, microwave at MEDIUM 15 seconds at a time, stirring after each heating, until chips are melted and mixture is smooth when stirred. Gradually beat in powdered sugar, milk and vanilla, beating until smooth. If necessary, refrigerate 5 to 10 minutes or until of desired spreading consistency. About 1-2/3 cups frosting.

VARIATION: For a stronger chocolate flavored cake, decrease flour to 2 cups and add 1/3 cup HERSHEY'S Cocoa.

Hershey's

The Church Lady Cake

Sis loved this cake at church this spring, made by one of my co-teachers. It is full of chocolatey goodness. And so we are making it today to take to a friend whose husband had an Achilles' tendon repair and is laid up for several weeks, re-learning how to walk. No worries, we're making two small loaves so Sis can have one, too!

(The only worry is that cake mix, purist that I am. But even I am not going to make a from-scratch mix to use in this recipe!)

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Miss J.W.'s Church Chocolate Cake

Devils Food Cake mix

8oz sour cream

4 eggs

1/2 cup oil

1/2 cup water

1/4 cup coffee or liquor

2 tablespoons grated orange peel

1 teaspoon cinnamon

12 oz chocolate chips

Mix all that together and pour in a greased and floured pan. I usually flour it with unsweetened cocoa powder, that way the flour doesn't leave a white mess on the fininshed cake. Bake at 350 for around an hour.

If you are so inclined, when the cake comes out of the oven, pour on the following.

1 cup sugar

1/2 cup butter

1/4 cup orange juice or orange liquor

1/4 cup water.

Heat this together until the sugar melts and pour in over the cake while it is still in the baking pan.

Happy baking! J.W.

Cake Talk

This weekend is my second cake-decorating class.  But I'm already have delusions of grandeur for the birthday cake I'll make for the kids this summer.  The theme is animals (yes, again) and I have several possibilities.  Here they are:

• circle cake with 3-D icing-piped animal figures
• shaped cake of animal face(s)
• circle cake with iced sugar cookie animal figures in habitat (green grass?)
• circle cake with flat piped animal figures (based on cookie cutter shapes) in grass
• circle cake with plastic animal figures in grass

I guess it'll depend on how well my meager skills progress in the next few weeks.  You saw the last cake, for my mother's day post, a sad, melting, overly sweet confection that I had lots of "help" with.  I didn't like the cake; I loved the cake.  But I'm doing the next one by myself, with different recipes.

Bungalow Cake

We had a cake I'd never heard of today: the bungalow cake.

The mom of the first birthday boy had mentioned it as if I would know. Do you?

It's one layer of chocolate cake and one layer of vanilla cake, with a filling of fresh strawberries, bananas, and whipped cream, and a whipped cream frosting.

An initial googling seems to indicate that it's a Connecticut thing. Is it?

While I like certain banana desserts--banana pudding, bananas foster, banana breads (might as well be dessert), baked plaintains, fried bananas with honey, bananas in coconut milk--I don't usually like them with strawberries. Especially not as a smoothie. But this really worked. It was almost like a pink banana-pudding-cum-strawberries for filling. The one we had was two layers of vanilla, no chocolate, which I think I might actually prefer. Though, I kept wondering where the coconut was.

I mean, it does sound tropical, right? So, maybe it's a New England way to beat the winter? 'Cos otherwise, when you think Connecticut, you don't think bungalows.

(BTW, Miss T, I think it would make an awesome cupcake!)

Two Cooks in the Kitchen

You've heard me talk about how much DS loves music. Well, it has just occurred to me what DD's obsession is. I mean, she likes animals, reading, playing food, but her most favorite thing to do is cooking. I can absolutely make her face light up by asking her to help me bake something. And in the last few days, she's gotten very serious about it. She asks if we're going to be working on the counter (for Penzey's Cinnamon Snack Cake as well as sugar cookie dough) or on the table (for rolling out sugar cookies and making both Irish brown and soda breads) or at the stove (for Rice Krispie treats and also wonton soup) or at the sink (for washing vegetables for Turkey Chowder)--yes, we've made a lot of things in the last week.

She likes to help me carry ingredients to the right location; she loves scooping with the measuring cups (if DS joins us, and he usually does about 1/2 way in, she lets him do the things with the measuring spoons); she loves turning on the Kitchen Aid mixer (with adult supervision, of course); she loves mixing the dry ingredients by hand; and she loves tasting. Then she'll check in on it periodically as it cooks, reminding me immediately to turn the oven light on. Today, when I told her we were making cinnamon snack cake, she even knew we needed flour and sugar. She then actually opened all the ingredients, like unscrewing the top of the cinnamon and opening the cannister of flour, so that they were ready (she does, however, draw the line at unwrapping butter, which she did last week and didn't like--made her hands too sticky to touch Shirt). And she often asks me what the recipe says, or where I got it, i.e. whose food is it (Gommie and Ar-Ma rank highly and are unquestioned in the kitchen). It's such fun, even when we make an absolute mess or have some trouble (like today, neither kiddo wanted me to bake the cake--they just wanted to eat it raw but I wouldn't let them).

I guess it's taken me a long time, too long, to figure out that this is her favorite activity, her hobby, just like DS loves anything with music (like watching Barney's episode with a brass quintet on demand, which we saw for the first time yesterday, and which was not on the menu today. Oh, how he cried. Oh, how that made DP and I want to cry). So, I think I'll get her some little spoons and cups of her own, maybe an apron and a kitchen towel--not the fake ones sold in a set for kids, but ones she can really use. And we can make her own cookbook with pictures of ingredients for her favorite recipes (she tends to like to bake, or, at least, I do, so that's what we do). And, of course, we'll cook more together.

Hmmmm, I wonder if she'd like to watch cooking shows on tv?

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Just this morning, DD said to me, "Can I bake a cake by myself?" Then she stood up and said she was taller now. And could learn to drive a car.

Cakes are much safer.

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Penzey's Cinnamon Snack Cake
This is the cake DD and I made today; she loved the crunchy topping (I've never cornstarch in a cake before--very light and fluffy).

1 Cup butter (2 sticks)
1 Cup sugar
1 tsp. PURE VANILLA EXTRACT
2 eggs (if you want to throw caution to the wind, 3 are even better--we used three)
1 Cup flour
1 Cup cornstarch
1 tsp. CHINA CINNAMON
1/2 tsp. baking powder
1/4 Cup milk

Topping:
2 TB. butter
1/3 Cup flour
1/4 Cup sugar
1/2 tsp. PURE VANILLA EXTRACT
1/4 tsp. CHINA CINNAMON

Preheat oven to 350°. Grease an 8x8" glass pan. In a large bowl, cream together butter and sugar, blending on high speed until well mixed. Add PURE VANILLA EXTRACT and eggs one at a time, blending well after each addition.

In a separate bowl, sift together the flour, cornstarch, CHINA CINNAMON and baking powder. It is particularly important to sift cornstarch. Add to the large bowl about a third at a time, blending on low speed to combine. Add the milk and blend until smooth. Pour or spoon into the baking dish and sprinkle on the topping.

To make the topping, cut cold butter into small pieces, combine with other dry ingredients in a small bowl, sprinkle with PURE VANILLA EXTRACT, and rub between your fingers until crumbly and blended. Bake at 350° for 45-50 minutes, until top springs back when lightly pressed or a toothpick inserted in the center comes out clean.

Yield: 16 pieces.
Prep.time: 15 minutes.
Baking time: 45-50 minutes.

Penzey's catalog

It's Her Party

We celebrated our babysitter's 16th birthday this week. She had a huge dance party and we were invited! That's very sweet--it's not often that 16 year olds want to hang with the under 3 crowd (but I bet that's better than the over 30 crowd!).

DD wore her pink party dress, much like the Princess dress, but pink velvet with white. Plus her new sparkly Dora tennis shoes. She carried in a dozen red roses to give to DBabysitter and looked quite the sight. Reminded me of pictures of children presenting Princess Diana with bouquets--DD was so serious and careful and then gave a big smile.

DS was happy in his firetruck sweatshirt, cum lovey. And it took him awhile to warm up to the crowd, the noise, and the lights.

Ah, the lights--swirling, multi-colored dance lights. DD jumped right in and was doing her moves--a kind of Bollywood-inspired, elbow teeter-totter with head shake and butt wiggle (you have to see it). And there I was, with her, trying to dance to music that I have never heard, not being sure about the current dance style, so I tried my mid-80s New Age Mommy Dance. Luckily, all eyes were on the kid. Soon, DS joined us. And DP watched from the sidelines. Waltzing is more her style. Less you think we were hogging the dance floor, it was still that awkward period before anyone actually gets up to dance. We were the only ones.

Between songs, DD and DS scarfed down Swedish meatballs and chicken fingers. And DS loved dipping pretzels in honey mustard.

And then they handed out glow in the dark necklaces--purple--and it was like we'd been invaded by mini-Jedis. DD brandished that stick like her life, and the fate of the Republic, depended on it. DS much preferred playing with the silver beads that the mom of the birthday girl had bestowed upon him.

We danced and ate until well after bedtime, but it's good to celebrate these important milestones.

So we did it again yesterday, with a private party for DB when she came over to sit. I'd baked a white cake in two layers the night before. DD joyfully helped me whip cream while DS waited for me to slice strawberries. We spread jam between the layers and the smeared one whip cream, which also coated the exterior. DS helped me decorate with strawberries--1 for the cake, 2 for him, 1 for the cake, 2 for him--but not DD's side because she didn't want strawberries. Then DD began to play with the remaining whipped cream and got it all the way up her arms and all over her face. At least we'd finished the frosting!

We wore hats, lit candles, and sang "Happy Birthday" when DB arrived, giving her a Dora/Diego pirate ship and a Happy Birthday Thomas train car with her name on the bottom. And then I think they each had 3 slices--DD eating the cream, DS eating the strawberries and jam, and DB eating it all. It was quite the party.

But then, 16 is quite a birthday.

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My Strawberry Shortcake Birthday Cake

1 box white cake, with ingredients to make it
1 pint heavy whipping cream
1 jar all-fruit strawberry jam
fresh strawberries, sliced

Bake cake in two 9" rounds according to instructions. Cool completely.

Whip heavy cream with sugar to taste (I like it less sweet so the cream flavor comes through).

Spread jam on bottom cake layer. Smooth some cream over this. Top with second round.

Cover with remaining whipped cream. Decorate with strawberries.

Serve immediately and keep remainders in refrigerator.