Cakes

EGGciting Rosemary Angel Food Cake with Lemon Glaze

Apr 17, 2013 By Love & Flour in Cakes 1 Comment Tags: egg whites, oxo, rosemary

The second of three EGGcited posts features an angel food cake I made with the help of OXO’s 3-in-1 Egg Separator. I have used my fair share of egg separators over the past few years, but nothing could beat the good old fashioned use of my hands to remove an egg white from and egg yolk. Still, as much as I do not really mind using my hands, I would prefer to use a tool of some sort to get this done.

Enter the 3-in-1 Egg Separator. This little gadget did not disappoint. I liked the way it hooked onto the side of both my thick- and my thin-edged bowls. I had to give it a gentle tap or shake from time to time, but that was only because some of the egg whites were simply thicker than others. I even went a little wild and put two eggs in at one point simply to see what would happen. I would not recommend that, as the bottom yolk wants to press out through the edges where the whites slip through.

My favorite part of this gadget was the edge that let me crack the eggs right there on the separator. Every other tool I used required I crack my egg on the side of the bowl or another edge, then quickly move it up to the separator. I never lost more than a few drips of egg white this way, so I would not categorize that as a major issue, but I do like that edge. I could basically do this whole egg separating process with one hand – just crack and drop. Now, on to cake!

Angel food cake made a fair number of appearances in my childhood home. More often than not, my sister would request an angel food cake for her birthday. Sometimes the angel food would be speckled with funfetti (my personal favorite), and it would always be served with whipped cream and berries on top.

For this version, the cake is very lightly flavored with bit of vanilla and almond extracts and speckled not with funfetti but rosemary. None of the flavors are overwhelming, but they work together just enough. Every now and then you get a bite coated in the tart, flavorful lemon glaze and are transported to a happy place. In hindsight, I imagine the cake would taste quite nice if flavored with lemon extract as well.

Now for a word on baking. While you do not need an egg separator to create this recipe, you most likely need an electric mixer. Preferably, a stand mixer. However, I did this whole thing with a hand mixer, and as you can see it turned out just fine. It took a bit of time, but that was by no means a deal breaker. I’m sure angel food cakes were made before electricity was popular, but I don’t love it enough to figure out how that happened. Probably with a hand-cranked egg beater not nearly as nice as OXO’s.

I used my egg separator 11 times to get the amount of egg whites called for in this Rosemary Angel Food Cake recipe, so it was certainly well worth it.If you need something to do with the 11 to 12 egg yolks you will have left after baking this cake, here are my best ideas from this blog:

French Buttercream (5 egg yolks)
Twinkie Bundt Cake (4 egg yolks)
Egg Yolk Cookies (3 egg yolks)
Boston (in our hearts, thoughts and prayers) Cream Pie Cookies (2 egg yolks for the cookies, 1 for the cream)
Tropical Pound Cake (French Toast) (2 egg yolks)
Chewy Honey Cookies (1 egg yolk)

You can also make some candied lemon slices to use as a garnish if you like. That link also includes a recipe for rosemary and lemon shortbread cookies, so if you are digging the flavors but not so much in angel food cake form, perhaps those will strike your fancy. If you are not a baker, you can still get great use out of this tool for all of your egg white omelets. Or other omelets.

Now that omelets are on your mind, I will share the recipe I made with the Flip & Fold Omelet Turner in just a couple of days. In case you missed it, I made Bombay-Style Curried Eggs with the help of the OXO Egg Beater earlier in the week. In the meantime, if you are too EGGcited to wait for my final egg recipe, head on over to OXO’s We’re EGGcited Pinterest board to see more great recipes bloggers have cooked up in recent weeks. Enjoy!

OXO provided their egg separator to me free of charge, however, the opinions shared in this blog post are my own.

Rosemary Angel Food Cake with Lemon Glaze

Author: Sweet & Skinny by Marisa Churchill

Ingredients

For the Cake
1½ cups egg whites (approximately 11-12 eggs), at room temperature
1½ teaspoons cream of tartar
¼ teaspoon salt
1½ cups granulated sugar
1 tablespoon finely chopped rosemary
½ teaspoon pure vanilla extract
½ teaspoon pure almond extract
1½ cups cake flour, sifted
For the Glaze
½ cup powdered sugar, sifted
½ teaspoon lemon zest
1 tablespoon lemon juice

Instructions

Beat the egg whites at high speed until they are foamy.
Add the cream of tartar and salt to the mixing bowl with the eggs.
Continue to beat on high speed while adding the sugar a tablespoon at a time.
After all of the sugar is incorporated, continue to beat the mixture until soft peaks form. The mixture should look glossy, and the peaks will gently curl over themselves when the beaters are lifted from the mixture.
Mix in the rosemary, vanilla extract and almond extract.
Sift one-third of the cake flour over the mixture and use a spatula to gently fold the flour into the meringue. Do this two more times until all of the flour is mixed into the batter.
Spread the batter into a 10-inch angel food cake pan.
Bake at 325 degrees F for 20 minutes, then increase the temperature to 350 degrees and bake for 20 minutes more. When done, the top of the cake will be light golden brown and spring back when touched.
Allow the cake to cool and remove from the pan.
To make the glaze, simply mix the powdered sugar, lemon zest and lemon juice together until smooth.
Spoon the glaze over the top of the cake and allow to set, about 30 minutes.

Notes

When making the glaze, take care to sift the powdered sugar in order to avoid unsightly lumps in the glaze.

Tropical Pound Cake French Toast

Feb 28, 2013 By Love & Flour in Cakes 1 Comment Tags: banana, breakfast, orange, pineapple

Using Bundt pans, or loaf pans for that matter, is just not my thing. Every time, I wait too long or not long enough before I try to remove whatever it is I baked from the pan. This inevitably leads to problems getting the delicious stuff out of the pan in one piece.

Baking things in pans is sort of like the role softball plays in my life, while baking things on sheets is like volleyball. If I have to put some sort of equipment between myself and the task at hand – a bat to connect with a ball or a pan to protect a cake - I can’t do it.

If I can make a direct connection – like smacking a volleyball with my hand or picking a cookie right off a sheet – I’m good. I suppose this will remain one of life’s many little mysteries.

Adding to the “tough pan” aspect of this pound cake was the pain-in-the-buns recipe itself. Sixteen ingredients. Two types of flour. Potato starch. Is all this really necessary?

Why do I need to add two tablespoons of whole-wheat flour to a recipe that already calls for 2 1/2 cups all-purpose flour? Is it really going to make that much difference? Why not just add an extra two tablespoons of the all-purpose flour I already have out?

And potato starch? What else am I going to use that for? Since I do not typically keep potato starch on hand, I used cornstarch instead. However, I have it on semi-good authority that Bob’s Red Mill makes a good potato starch in case you are in the market.

As you have likely deduced, this cake took a good bit of time to pull together. In addition to making it while you are in a patient mood, I also suggest waiting to mix things up when you have help with the dishes. You’re going to need it for the no less than three dirty mixing bowls that will happen. A stand mixer will also come in handy, but I used a hand mixer with relatively little inconvenience.

Despite all the negativity, this pound cake was just too good not to share. It’s soft, yet dense, and the pineapple, banana and orange bring the flavors of Hawaii-meets-Florida to your kitchen. That’s pretty hard to argue against at the end of a dreary February.

The original recipe suggested adventurous types slice the pound cake and make French Toast. I was feeling more of a need to figure out what to do with a semi-mangled pound cake than an adventure (baking this cake was adventurous enough), but I took heed of this suggestion as well. For my French Toast batter, I simply mixed one egg with a quarter cup of milk and a dash of salt.

If you have it in your mind to bake this recipe solely for the French Toast aspect, you may want to split the batter between two, six-cup loaf pans. The pound cake called for a 12-cup Bundt pan, so the two loaf pans should work.

The Joy of Baking Pan Size list is helpful for figuring this out. While you are there, the Joy of Baking Ingredient Substitution list is also a good go-to source of information. Then come back and start to work on this little taste of sunshine. Enjoy!

Pina 019 Edited Tropical Pound Cake French Toast

Tropical Pound Cake French Toast

Author: CakeLove in the Morning by Warren Brown

Ingredients

½ cup (1 stick) butter, softened
1½ cups granulated sugar
5 eggs (3 whole eggs, 2 egg yolks)
DRY Ingredients
2½ cups all-purpose flour
2 tablespoons whole wheat flour
½ cup dried pineapple, roughly chopped
1 tablespoon potato starch or cornstarch
2 teaspoons orange zest
½ teaspoon salt
¼ teaspoon nutmeg
WET Ingredients
2 large and very ripe bananas, mashed (about one cup)
1 orange, peeled and segmented
¾ cup milk
¼ cup sour cram
1 tablespoon pure vanilla extract*

Instructions

Cream together the butter and sugar until light and fluffy.
Separate two of the eggs, and one at a time, add only the yolks to the butter and sugar mixture.
Next, add in the remaining three eggs, again one at a time, and continue to beat until well incorporated.
In a separate bowl, whisk together the dry ingredients (flour through nutmeg).
In yet another separate bowl, stir together the wet ingredients.
Starting with the dry ingredients followed by the wet ingredients, add these ingredients to the butter, sugar and eggs in three separate additions. Continue to mix to incorporate the ingredients into the batter after each addition.
Pour the batter into a greased Bundt pan. If desired, you can sprinkle the pan with coarse or Turbinado sugar after greasing.
Bake at 325 degrees F for 45-50 minutes or until the cake is golden brown and a wooden toothpick inserted in the center comes out clean

Notes

*The original recipe called for 1 tablespoon of dark rum and two teaspoons of vanilla.

So Long Hostess, Hello Twinkies Bundt Cake

Nov 26, 2012 By Love & Flour in Cakes 1 Comment

When I heard the news that Hostess would be no more, I felt momentarily wistful for my favorite snack cake – the Twinkie. Though I have not bought a Twinkie in approximately six years, I still love them. They are better than the chocolate cupcakes filled with cream and topped with a squiggly white line of icing. When those same chocolate and cream filled cakes are coated in wobbly marshmallow and pink coconut to become snowballs, the competition increases. Yet still, the Twinkie comes out on top. Those poor apple and cherry hand pies? They never stood a chance.

I love Twinkies so much that I actually own The Twinkies Cookbook. Here are a few pieces of my favorite Twinkies trivia, direct from that source.

Twinkies have a shelf life of a mere 25 days.
Upon their invention in the 1930s, the snack cakes were filled with banana-flavored cream. The switch to vanilla was in response to a banana shortage experienced during in WWII.
The inspiration for their name came from a St. Louis billboard advertising Twinkle Toe Shoes.
Twinkies sparkle with an undeniable magic. (That is not actually trivia, but it is an exact quote from the book that struck me as funny. Who thinks this stuff up?)

When I came across a recipe for a Twinkie Bundt Cake in Pure Vanilla a few weeks back, I marked it on my “To Bake” list. When I heard people across America were stockpiling Twinkies a few days ago, I thought I had better share this homemade twist on a classic sooner rather than later. Admittedly, the cake is not quite like the Twinkies I remember. The crumb seemed more heavy than spongy, but on the other hand, the filling was remarkably similar.

Preparation requires a bit of forethought as both the eggs and the buttermilk should warm to room temperature. Creating a tunnel to fill with the vanilla cream was also interesting. It was not as difficult as I expected, but I found I needed to shake the cake pan over the sink a few times to remove all of the crumbs and form a clear path. Because this recipe will leave you with four egg whites, I suggest simultaneously cooking an omelet or baking Flourless Chocolate Cookies.

The Twinkies cookbook concludes its ode to the beloved snack cake with this statement, “So let us raise a toast to an American original – the magical, mystifying, magnificent Twinkie. The journey’s been quite a treat.” Indeed it has. Enjoy!

Twinkie Bundt Cake

Author: Pure Vanilla by Shauna Sever

Ingredients

For the Cake
3 cups cake flour
1 tablespoon baking powder
¾ teaspoon salt
6 tablespoons butter, softened
1 tablespoon pure vanilla extra
2 cups granulated sugar
½ cup vegetable oil
7 eggs: 3 whole eggs and 4 egg yolks, at room temperature
1 cup buttermilk, at room temperature
For the Filling
1 jar (7 to 7.5 ounces) marshmallow cream
½ cup butter, softened
1 teaspoon pure vanilla extract
Confectioner’s sugar for dusting (optional)

Instructions

Spray a 12-cup Bundt pan with non-stick cooking spray and dust lightly with flour and set aside.
Sift together the cake flour, baking powder and salt and set aside as well.
Beat the butter and vanilla extract on medium speed until smooth and creamy.
Add the sugar and beat until evenly mixed, about one minute.
Slowly pour in the vegetable oil and beat until light fluffy, about two minutes more.
One at a time, beat in the eggs followed by the egg yolks.
Add the flour mixture and buttermilk in three alternating additions, beginning and ending with the milk,
Continue to beat on low speed until all lumps are removed, then fold by hand a few times before pouring into the prepared Bundt pan.
Bake at 325 degrees F for 60-70 minutes until golden and a wooden skewer inserted into the cake comes out clean.
Allow to cool in the pan for approximately two hours.
To make the filling, beat the marshmallow cream, butter and vanilla together until smooth.
Place in a pastry bag fitted with a round tip (a Ziploc bag with a corner cut off should serve in a pinch).
Use and apple corer or a knife to cut six deep holds into the bottom of the cake. Take care not to cut down through the top of the cake.
Use your fingers to connect each hole by burrowing down into one and across into the other. Dump crumbs as necessary.The goal is to create a tunnel within the cake.
Insert the tip of the filled pastry bag into each hole and gently fill. You should be able to see the filling start to fill an adjacent hole as it moves through the tunnel. If not, gently work the bag back and forth as you fill.
Scrape away any excess filling, invert onto a serving platter to remove from the pan, and dust lightly with confectioners sugar if desired.

Notes

I filled my cake just after the two hour mark. I tend to have the most luck removing cakes (and quick breads) from their pans when they have had a chance to cool but still remain warm.

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