Simple Carrot Cake

Although I don't eat it often, I love carrot cake. It was actually one of the first "difficult" things I baked for Easter a few years ago. No food processor to grate the carrots, no spice grinder to grind the cinnamon, and no mixer to cream the butter. Everything by hand. I also learned the valuable lesson of not making a cake the morning you're planning to serve it because even after hours of cooling, your cream cheese frosting will probably melt :). But the cake was delicious just the same. And when I saw Old Fashioned Carrot Bread show up on my RSS feed from Mary at One Perfect Bite, I knew I had to make it for Thanksgiving.

Peaches and Cream Cake

Making my mother her birthday cake is something I take great pride in doing, and though it never does, it's something that I always want to turn out perfect (I don't have the decorating skills to actually accomplish this). I always try to make my family something special for their birthdays but my mom is the only person I bake a cake for. It's one of my more stressful endeavours, purely because of the pressure I put on myself, but I do it because it's for my mother (insert joke about Italian sons and their mothers here :)).

My mother has always been the type of person who puts others ahead of herself. Even on her birthday she is more concerned with everyone else being happy than with herself. As far back as I can remember the only gifts she ever asks for are a clean house and not to cook dinner (not that we would let her if she wanted to and lets just say we typically purchase her gifts :)). It's for these reasons that I bake her cake. I guess it's the adult Adam equivalent of a macaroni card.

Chocolate Banana Cake w/ Peanut Butter Frosting

As a kid I was never very creative with food, which is odd since my mother experiments with food all the time. Not me, I was the kid that ate a peanut butter and jam sandwich every day for a year, I never put chips in sandwiches, or mixed cereals together. For the most part I wasn't picky about what I ate but I liked what I liked, and felt no reason to mess with that.

I remember going to a friend's house one afternoon in elementary school and fixing some PB&J sandwiches for a snack. Bread, peanut butter, strawberry jam, done... but then I watched as my friend pulled out a bottle of Nestle Quick Syrup and poured it all over the sandwich. I couldn't believe it. Isn’t that for milk? Is this allowed? I was no stranger to peanut butter and chocolate but this was unheard of and it tasted awesome.

I think every PB&J sandwich I made for the next few months included chocolate syrup.

Toblerone Almond Cake V2

It's not often that I revisit a recipe unless I truly love it. The Toblerone almond cake that I made a few weeks ago did nothing but confuse me, which for some reason had the same effect. I just couldn't get it out of my head. And so, one week later and after making my pie, I was chopping up Toblerone again.

I'm still a bit confused. Kinda.

However, this time it turned out more as I had originally expected. I upped the chocolate a bit and reduced the butter by half. I also took the flour back down to the original amount as I had increased it because of how lose the batter seemed. All this is good, all this made the recipe better... and then... *sigh*

Toblerone Almond Cake

This is the first thing I've baked in a few weeks. With the trip to Vegas and just the general craziness of leaving and coming back, I haven't felt up to it. But more than that I haven't really felt inspired by anything. I see things that I want to bake, but nothing that makes me want to turn off my TV and move into the kitchen. That all changed when I saw a recipe for a chocolate buckwheat cake the other day. I'm not sure why, but images of a Toblerone cake began dancing in my head.

Coconut Strawberry Coffee Cake

The inspiration for this recipe was a result of a recent trip to the Pancake Factory. I walked in a few weeks ago with apple cinnamon pancakes on my mind only to find out that they now offered coconut pancakes. Given my now feverish coconut obsession, I had to try them. As I placed the order I was told by our waitress that using jam instead of syrup was exceedingly good. I was skeptical, but with five gigantic pancakes coming my way, I could surely spare one.

When my pancakes arrived I dove right in. As is customary (for me) I ate the first one sans syrup. The pancakes were fantastic; soft, crispy, and loaded with coconut. I was in love. Could jam possibly make it better?

Firstly, let me say that I love all sorts of jam, but for me strawberry is always king. However, when I reached for the little packet of jam, it dawned on me that perhaps strawberry and coconut wouldn't really pair well together. I figured worst case scenario one of my pancakes was only slightly less awesome than the others. Instead the opposite was true. The fusion of the two was insanely good. The sweet strawberry jam coupled with the rich coconutty flavour was just so good. At that moment, I resolved myself to make a cake or quick bread that would combine the two flavours.

Apple Coffee Cake

I love apple cakes. A lot. My grandmother’s version is fantastic and lasts about five minutes whenever it’s around. The combination of sweet soft cake, spices, and apples is impossible to resist. And you know what? I’ll say it. I'm not even choosey with my apple cake. If it's there, I'll eat it, and I'll probably enjoy it :). I mean it's really hard to mess up an apple cake. Even bad ones are pretty good.

This past weekend I was actually going back and forth between two ideas (most weekends I can barely come up with one). The first was a bit of an experiment (I guess they all are) and the other was an apple cake, recipe to be determined. You know that episode of the Simpsons where Homer is trying to pick a winner to the Springfield film festival and his dilemma is that “Barney's movie had heart, but ‘Football in the Groin had a football in the groin”? That’s similar to the internal debate I was having. The first recipe was new and a bit different, but apple cake is apple cake. Unlike Homer, I couldn’t argue with that kind of logic.

Small Apple Sharlotka

I was originally going to start this post with a bunch of whining about how things are still sneaking up on me. But I realized I did something similar last year, and probably continued it throughout the year. So I'm going to try to do things a little differently and not do that :).

As soon as I saw this recipe and its image pop up in Google Reader I knew that it was something I had to bake, and quick. Even though I had no idea what a sharlotka was (quite frankly I still don't) the image told me all I needed to know. It just looked and sounded too good to be true. Mountains of apples held together with the most basic cake structure. Truly the "cake" portion of this recipe is the baking equivalent of spackle.

Peanut Butter and Jam Cake

It is amazing to me that it is once again my Mother's birthday. I can't believe it has been a year since making my vanilla bean cake post, and yet, here we are. Despite the amount of stress it usually causes me, I enjoy baking cakes for people. And no matter how stressful, I would never turn down the opportunity to bake a cake for my mother. I mean after putting up with me for 30 years and that whole childbirth thing, I suppose it's the least I can do.

I racked my brain trying to think of what cake to bake. The runner up for last year was a simple yellow cake with a chocolate frosting, but instead I was drawn to the allure of the vanilla bean. This year though I felt like something a little more simple and fun but didn't know what. A single click gave me all the inspiration I would need. Earlier in the week Mary from One Perfect Bite posted one of the most wonderful cakes I had ever seen: Peanut Butter and Jam (jelly) Cake.

Coconut Coffee Cake (No Tea for Me)

I fought it for quite some time. I actively avoided it. I didn't want any part of it. However, this past summer I knew that something had changed. I felt something I hadn't felt before. I convinced myself that it was nothing, probably just a phase. But after New Year's it became evident that it wasn't a phase at all, it was real. A few days later I came to terms with it. I just couldn't fight it anymore.

I enjoy coconut.

Peanut Butter Cake: Revisited

It has returned. A little rounder and more peanut buttery than ever. But at what cost?

Carrot Cake w/ White Chocolate Buttercream

This carrot cake has been a long time coming. I had promised my brother back in June that I would make one for him because he never has any baking requests. I then planned and unplanned it for the next six months. I decided that New Years Eve I was finally going to do it, and when I read about this recipe, I knew it was the one.

One of the problems with carrot cake or more accurately, my brother, is that it is traditionally made with a cream cheese frosting, and my brother is disgusted by cream cheese (yeah, I dunno what's wrong with him). So I needed something else that would pair nicely. Eventually I had the idea of using a white chocolate frosting and was instantly excited about the flavour pairing.

Ginger Spice Cake

I had another craving for ginger, but as I mentioned previously, I couldn't find a ginger spice cake recipe that piqued my interest. So I looked through a bunch of recipes and chose the spice cake that I liked the most, and decided to convert it into a ginger spice cake. I figure even I can manage the addition of a single ingredient :).

Best Yellow Cake

I guess I've been in somewhat of a “plain jane” mood recently, I haven't been baking anything too “exciting.” But sometimes simple is best and with this yellow cake that's exactly what I was looking for.

Cranberry Apple Cake

You know how they say you should never go grocery shopping hungry? My mother is the perfect example of why. A week or so ago she went to the store hungry and apparently developed a craving for apples. This lead to what I can only imagine to be 50 pounds of apples in our fridge, ranging from Empire to Red Delicious, and everything in between.

When I saw this glut of apples I knew that I was probably going to have to use some for baking to prevent any from going to waste. After explaining to my brother that I wanted to use apples, my always helpful sibling responds with “you should make something with cranberries” completely ignoring my apple criteria. He back pedalled a bit and mentioned how well cranberries and apples go together. Ah, inspiration, there you are.

Oatmeal Cake w/ Cream Cheese Peanut Butter Frosting

I love this cake. That's all you need to know. It is the most moist cake you will ever have in your life and as far as I'm concerned the recipe is perfect.

Usually when I mention oatmeal cake I get “a look.” I attempt to eliminate preconceptions by enthusiastically explaining how wonderful the flavours are and how amazing the texture is. It's not too sweet, it's not overly spiced, and it's insanely moist. When you combine all of this with a generous helping of peanut butter frosting, one bite will have you in a state of euphoria.

Funfetti Cake from scratch

Last week was my brother's birthday. ­Normally he wants ice cream cakes, which is just fine, because I'm not going to make one of those (I have enough trouble with icing). This year however my brother called an audible (that's about the only football term I know) and asked for his favourite cake “Funfetti,” aka “basic white cake with sprinkles inside.” I can't figure out why he likes it so much, you can't taste the sprinkles. I think it coms down to the enjoyment he gets from seeing them. That's the type of person he is, happy go lucky (most of the time).

And I know what you're thinking: “Why oh why would he do this again? Why would he bake another cake for someone's birthday?” I don't have any excuse other then my complete and utter insanity. To my brother's credit he would have been happy with a box mix, it's what he likes after all. But during the summer I had made him Funfetti Cupcakes from scratch and I wanted to surprise him with a cake. At this point there was an alarm going off in my head, but like most alarms, I promptly ignored it.

Peanut Butter Cake

Finally! It's here. I know everyone has been waiting. Perhaps some of you thought it would never come, thought that I had overstated my feelings or that my love had wavered. But here, here it sits, a wonderful expression of my love. The coming together of baker and ingredient. Behold the first of many more peanut butter themed recipes, Peanut Butter Cake, named after its mother.

Just a sec, I need a moment... I promised myself I wouldn't cry...

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Okay, I'm good...

Beautiful isn't it?

Chocolate Loaf Cake

Originally I had planned to make this cake while I was at the cottage. Knowing that there would probably be very few baking specific ingredients up there I made sure I packed everything I would need and only left out two things that I felt positive would be there when I needed them, flour and baking soda.

On the Saturday afternoon after a ridiculously filling lunch (as always :)), I began to prep the ingredients for the cake. I pulled everything out of my bag (including my food scale) took the flour out of the fridge, and asked my grandmother where she kept the baking soda. She looks and can't find it, I look and I can't find it. Okay, how about my aunt? She has to have some. So we call up my aunt, and low and behold she doesn't have any baking soda either. At this point I decided that it probably was not meant to be. Granted it was only a ¼ tsp of baking soda, and I could have left it out and increased the baking powder, but I figured I could wait until I got home. Besides there was enough food already, probably best not to add to the pile, especially considering my grandmother was using me as somewhat of a garbage disposal :). (You know that scene in Rudolph where Mrs. Claus is telling Santa to “EAT PAPA EAT”? That's how I felt :)).

Vanilla Bean Cake w/ Chocolate Whipped Cream Frosting & Cherry Whipped Cream Filling

Have you ever taken on a task you know you shouldn't; not because of lack of ability, but because of the mental stress required to reach your goal? For me this stress is completely self induced. When I bake I want things to be perfect, I constantly forget perfection does not exist.

Here's some history: This year I decided I would make my own birthday cake. A right of passage for any baker I think. I found an amazing recipe (Brown Eyed Baker's Peanut Butter-Fudge Cheesecake) and although the cake ended up turning out delicious, when I took it out of the oven I thought it was going to be a disaster. I mean it had the San Andreas running through it. At one point I even threatened to toss the entire thing in the garbage, ridiculous I know since “cheesecake is cheesecake no matter how small”. In the end it turned out really well and I felt pretty foolish about my over reaction (although we'll keep that between you and me).

So, how does someone like me follow up an experience like that? OH I KNOW! I'LL BAKE A BIRTHDAY CAKE FOR MY MOM!

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Brilliant...