Thursday, September 17, 2009

Let Me Eat Cake

Last week, every night, around 10pm, Will and I had a conversation that went something like this:

Me: I want cake.
Will: Ok...
Me: No seriously, why doesn't anyone deliver cake? To my house? At 10pm?
Will: Kim, you are crazy.
Me: But I just want cake! That's all! Is that so much to ask?
Will: Why don't you just make some cake?
Me: ...well...ummm...maybe I will! Ha!

I then proceeded to go to Safeway and purchase not one but THREE boxes of cake mix and THREE containers of frosting, because they were on sale, and altogether it cost me about $8. Muah ha ha, I shall have cake forever!!!

On Sunday night (after his hockey game, and while also preparing a dinner of linguini with canned clams in garlic marinara sauce - delicious and takes zero effort whatsoever), I made cake.

I was feeling bold, and experimenting with parchment paper - I had heard that if you line your baking pans with parchment, you don't have to worry about your cake sticking to the pan. Also, less mess. Which means less cleaning. Which means a happy Kim. Even though Will usually does the dishes. I think you're supposed to cut out a nice little circle with the parchment and just line the bottom...but um...I didn't do that. I was a little concerned, because, well, it looked like this:

Cakes, pre-bake - How will this fadge?

It worked...kind of...As you can see, the cakes turned out a little flat and the sides are a little crinkled. This made for interesting frosting techniques, but really it didn't matter too much. I wonder if the flat-ish cakes are a result of the parchment? Usually, my cakes are just a bit taller. The other thing I noticed was that the bottoms of the cakes weren't as spongy as they usually are. The slickness of the oily parchment seems to have made it retain too much moisture in the bottom or something. More on that later...I tell you what though, those cakes came right out of the pans, the parchment slid right off, and with a quick rinse, the pans were clean!

Cakes, post-bake - crinkle crinkle!

The photo on the left has wax paper strips under it to keep the plate clean while icing. Did your mom teach you that trick? Mine did - and I love it. Thanks, mom! I like these photos because they clearly show the awesome crinkly-ness that is the result of my lazy parchment papering. Hey, when you want cake, and it's 8pm, and you're also making dinner, you do not have time to be messin' with cutting perfect circles out of parchment paper! No siree, you want cake, and you want it now! (actually, I wanted it a week ago, so you can only imagine the impatience!)

I am Cake! Hear me roar! With sprinkles!

The frosting is chocolate chocolate chip - Betty Crocker, I believe. The cake itself (I think) was Duncan Hines Chocolate Devil's Food. I like the little chocolate chips in the frosting - I think they added a nice touch. I would call them a pleasant surprise, but I bought the frosting specifically because it said it had chocolate chips in it.

Cake best served with ice cream, methinks.

The only problem with this cake is that the layers don't really stick together...I'm not sure what that's all about (maybe something to do with the moist-bottomed parchment thing I mentioned earlier?), but when you serve a slice, and you start to eat it, the layers kinda come apart. Not really an issue, I mean, you can still totally eat the cake, but yeah. Not something I've ever experienced before.

This did not stop us from having cake for dinner last night. And it was delicious.

13 comments:

  1. Dude, you are killing me with the mix cake :)

    But you remind me that I've been sitting on my mom's killer chocolate cake recipe long enough - will post soon.

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  2. I know, I know...I have some from-scratch cake recipes I've been dying to try. Sometimes, though, a girl just needs cake, and she needs it fast! ;-)

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  3. One of these days, I'm going to run a cake derby at my house. I'll send my husband to the store to buy a mix while I throw together a cake at home and see who wins. Or maybe I just hate putting on pants that are nice enough to wear in public once I'm home and down for the count... :)

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  4. Now THAT is something I would like to see!!

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  5. Haha, you can do sloppy circles, you know. As long as you get them roughly near the edges of the pan, you should be good. They still come out of the pan super easy.
    The separation thing might be because the parchment was all around the cake instead of just on the bottom, but I don't REALLY know what I'm talking about here. I just make a lot of cakes. :P It could just be the combination of the cake and the icing that you used. The red velvet cake I made separated like that too, but only after I refridgerated it. I think it had something to do with the icing being mostly cream cheese.

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  6. The icing was definitely not cream cheese...it was chocolate stuff from a can. (all the food bloggers who read this are wagging their fingers at me) ;-)

    Maybe I will try sloppy circles next time, when I'm not so desperate for cake-eating!

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  7. Next time just line the bottom of the pan with parchment, and in order for the layers to stick together, the frosting should be chilled first. Also. Dude. No store bought cake. Homemade is so much easier. Have you made the winning hearts and minds cake from Orangette? It's the best.

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  8. I haven't tried it yet...but I do not see how that could possibly be easier than box cake (chopping and double-boilering chocolate? that's a lot of work! Or more work, anyway). Tastier, yes. Healthier, perhaps. More impressive, certainly. But easier? Nothing is easier than "just add oil, water and eggs" cake!

    I am not claiming to have made the world's best cake, here. Just the world's easiest and fastest out of desperation cake!

    That said, I am usually far too lazy to make any cake recipe that involves melting chocolate and fancy cubed butter. I dream of doing such things someday, but I never actually do it.

    I <3 Duncan and Betty!

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  9. Come on people...box cakes are DELICIOUS!!! Jeez Kim, torture me with cake story and photos...set me to craving!!!

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  10. Well, I love all cake and am not biased. I will eat box cake in a hurry, and love to try a cake recipe anytime. I love the decorating of course as you know. Your pictures are fab. and I admire your determination. Yum yum.

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  11. Thanks, mom and Nancy :-) Mom, you are the Master Decorator now! I want to learn how to do flowers like you do...

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  12. 24-hour cake delivery service. Seriously. Necessary.

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