Cakes

It was Canadian Thanksgiving last weekend and I decided to make fruity dessert rather than a traditional pumpkin pie.  I found a good recipe for a Cranberry Upside-Down Cake on the Martha Stewart website.

The cake tasted great but did not look as good as I wanted it to.  I made it in a 9in spring form pan eventhough the recipe called for baking it in an 8in baking pan.  It would have been nice if there was more cake to fruit ratio but the flavors together worked really well and I would probably make this cake again.

I decided to add some slivered almonds to the top of the cake with the cranberry mixture.  The flavor and texture of the almonds was good but the almonds kind of stuck to the bottom of the cake pan and didn't give the cake a very appealing look.  I also did not have any allspice so I substituted nutmeg instead.  The nutmeg flavor was a bit overwhelming and I should have used less but overall the cake tasted good.  I posted the link to the recipe above for you to try as well, enjoy!

This recipe is great for a Thanksgiving dinner or a Halloween treat!  I used my pumpkin bread recipe for the cupcake base and baked them at 350F for about 20min (or until a toothpick inserted in the middle comes out clean).  I made mini cupcakes but you could also make regular sized ones and just bake them for a bit longer.  I used a basic cream cheese frosting on top and then decorated them with edible pumpkin candies.  The cupcakes themselves are very moist, I kept them in the fridge because of the cream cheese frosting and they tasted great.  Happy Thanksgiving and Enjoy!

I had some friends over for a big salmon dinner last week and I couldn't decide on what to make for dessert.  My friend Evan doesn't like chocolate and my friend Lindsay can be picky when it comes to dessert.  After searching the web, I found lots of cake recipes using soda pop.  My favorite type of pop is root beer but I didn't think Lindsay would like that so I decided to go with pink cream soda because 1) cream soda is awesome and 2) I thought it would be cool to have a pink cake to go with the pink salmon dinner.  The cake turned out really well, I served it plain with ice cream and it tasted like a cream soda float.  The cake itself was moist and didn't have an overpowering cream soda flavor and came out a light pink color.

Pink Cream Soda Cake

1 Box white cake mix
4 Large eggs
10 Oz. of pink cream soda
1 Tbsp vanilla extract
(you can add a few drops of red food coloring to it if you want the cake to come out more pink but it will still go a light pink color without it)

1) Follow the cake mix box instructions (I used a bundt cake pan but you can use anything just follow the baking times and temperature on the box)
2) Follow the cake mix box directions (mine said to mix all the ingredients together on low speed for 30sec. then continue blending on medium speed for 2min)
3) Pour cake into prepared pan and bake according to cake mix box instructions (I baked mine at 325F (because I used a dark non-stick pan) for about 30min or until my toothpick inserted in the middle came out clean)
4) Let cake sit at room temperature and serve plain, with ice cream, or make some icing to go on top and enjoy!

I stole this recipe from my mom's collection...we'll she knows I took it, so I guess it's not really stealing but she doesn't know that I want to keep it forever because it's so good.  It's such a great sour cream coffee cake recipe but I slightly modified it (when do I not change the recipe?) by adding crushed up Iced Oatmeal Cookies within the cake and on top of the cake.  The addition of the cookies adds an extra sweetness factor and a nice crunchy texture that goes well with the moist, soft cake.

Cookie Crumb Coffee Cake

20-30 crispy cookies, crushed up by hand (so you have both big and small pieces)
2 Cups all-purpose flour, sifted
1 tsp baking powder
1 tsp baking soda
1/2 tsp salt
2 Large eggs
1/2 Cup shortening
1 Cup white granulated sugar
1 tsp vanilla extract
1 Cup sour cream

1) Preheat oven to 350F and grease a 9" spring form pan
2) In a large bowl, mix together sifted flour, baking powder, baking soda, and salt
3) In a separate bowl, beat together eggs, shortening, sugar and vanilla until smooth
4) Separately add both the sour cream and flour mixture into the shortening mixture in two equal parts alternating.  (Add half of the sour cream first, then half of the flour mixture, then the remaining half of the sour cream, then add the rest of the flour mixture blending each time after adding each addition to the shortening mixture and until smooth.)
5) Evenly spoon half of the cake batter into the prepared pan, then sprinkle with half of the crushed cookies
6) Add the remaining cake batter on top of the crushed cookie layer evenly (the batter is a bit sticky but try your best to cover the cookie crumbs), then sprinkle the remaining cookie crumbs on top of the cake
7) Bake for 34-45min or until toothpick inserted into the cake comes out clean
8) Cool 10min before removing the cake from the pan, then enjoy!