Carrot Cake

In my efforts to explore and taste all the different types of food in the world, I made a vow to myself that I will try at least one new recipe each week. Sometimes, there are exceptions when I just don't have the time, or don't have the ingredients. Sometimes, the results are absolutely delicious, and I put that recipe into a special file labelled 'Good'. Other times they are quite disappointing. Then there's recipes which I couldn't give a damn about. It may not be a bad recipe, just one that doesn't appeal to me, for some reason or another.

Such recipes include yesterday's carrot cake. I was browsing recipes for bundt cakes to bake in my fluted tube pan (yes, I'm still psyched). I made a list of cakes that I want to bake, and I was planning on having some sort of Bundt Cake Marathon. First up was a carrot and walnut bundt cake, with cream cheese frosting, from Epicurious. I had no idea what carrot cake tasted like, and after extensive research, I gathered it did not taste anything like carrots. I then bought a carrot slice from the school's canteen, but that tasted random. I reckoned it tasted bad because it was filled with artificial crap.

I'm still learning the ins and outs of my fluted tube pan, and still haven't managed to find a reliable technique to stop things sticking. Before, I've buttered it and floured it, but that didn't work. This time, I sprayed it with cooking spray, but a piece of cake still stuck to the pan. I've got a feeling that this contributed to my neutrality to this cake. I was glad the glaze/frosting covered up the cracks, but it was tooth-achingly sweet. When I was pouring the 3/4 powdered sugar over the measly-looking pieces of cream cheese, I said to myself, 'This is gonna be sweet!' Guess what? I was right. The lemon juice and zest cut off a bit of the sweetness but ow it was sweet. I hope the rest of my cakes turn out better.

Recipe

Obtained from here.

Makes 8 servings.

Carrot Cake

1 1/4 cups all purpose flour
4 teaspoons ground cinnamon
1 1/4 teaspoons baking soda
1/4 teaspoon salt
1 1/4 cups sugar
3/4 cup olive oil
3 large eggs
1 1/2 cups grated carrots (about 3 large)
3/4 cup chopped toasted walnuts

Cream Cheese Icing
 
3/4 cup powdered sugar (I'd put less)
3 ounces (85 grams) cream cheese, softened
1 tablespoon fresh lemon juice
1 teaspoon lemon zest
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
1/4 cup (or more) whipping cream.


1. Place rack in center of oven and preheat to 350°F.
 
2. Grease 12-cup nonstick Bundt pan.
 
3. Whisk flour, cinnamon, baking soda and salt in medium bowl until well blended.
 
4. Using electric mixer, beat sugar, oil and eggs in large bowl on medium speed until pale and fluffy, about 5 minutes. Add flour mixture, beating just until blended.
 
5. Fold in carrots and walnuts.

6. Pour batter into prepared pan. Bake cake until toothpick inserted near center comes out clean, about 50 minutes.

7. Cool cake in pan on rack 1 hour.

8. Meanwhile, blend softened cream cheese, sugar, lemon juice, lemon zest and vanilla until combined. Add enough cream to form a thick but pourable icing.

9. Invert cake onto plate. Cool completely. Drizzle icing over top of cake, allowing icing to flow down sides.

Sour Cream Coffee Cake

So it's officially Autumn now, here in Australia. We were introduced to this new season with three days of heavy rain and a huge flood up in Queensland. But to me, that is good news. I'd prefer a rainy overcast day over a bright sunny day, any... day. Autumn is the season of browning leaves and cool weather, and is the season of apples! I look forward to apple turnovers, apple crumbles and apple bundt cakes.

Anyways, enough about autumn. I finally used my fluted tube pan to make something! I didn't make monkey bread but I did make Sour Cream Coffee Cake. I was tossing over two recipes - one with (wal)nuts and without. My family likes things with nuts in them, so I thought it would be better for everybody if I went with the one with walnuts. I obtained the recipe from 'The Modern Baker' by Nick Malgieri. I keep hearing that cakes with sour cream have wonderful texture and are really soft, so I thought why not?

A vein of cinnamon and walnuts streusel runs through the cake, but apparently my folks haven't tasted cinnamon before. They thought I had put too much baking powder or baking soda. Oh, speaking of putting too much, I greased the pan with too much butter. Before I attempted baking with my fluted tube pan, I had done a lot of research and found that people like to butter they pans first and sprinkle with some flour, even if it is non-stick. So that's what I did, except I put too much butter and just dumped flour into the pan and shook out the excess. That's why my cake unmoulded perfectly, but it had yellow patches on top. I was scared to tell them that it was just butter and flour, or they'd get a heart attack just by knowing. I dusted some sugar on top and that hid the butter just fine.

I couldn't get a shot of the full cake because it was getting late and my sister just wanted cake. Oh well, it tasted great anyways.


Recipe

Makes one 10-inch (25-cm) tube cake, about 24 slices

Cinnamon Sugar Nut Filling

1/3 cup granulated or light brown sugar
2 teaspoons ground cinnamon
1 cup (about 4 ounces/100 grams) pecan or walnut pieces,
coarsely chopped

Sour Cream Cake Batter

2 cups all-purpose flour
(spoon flour into a dry-measure cup and level off)
1 cup sugar
1 teaspoon baking powder
1 teaspoon baking soda
10 tablespoons (1. sticks) unsalted butter, softened
2 large eggs, at room temperature
2 large egg yolks
1 (8-ounce/225-gram) container sour cream


1. Set a rack in the lower third of the oven and
preheat to 325°F (160°C).

2. For the filling, mix the sugar, cinnamon, and nuts in a small bowl and set aside.

3. For the batter, combine the flour, sugar, baking powder, and baking soda in the bowl of an electric mixer. Stir well by hand to mix. Add the butter. Beat the mixture on low speed with the paddle until the mixture is a
smooth, heavy paste, 1 to 2 minutes.

4. Whisk the eggs, egg yolks, and sour cream together. On medium speed, beat 1⁄3 of the egg mixture into the flour and butter mixture. Beat for 1 minute.

5. Stop and scrape the bowl and beater, beat in another half of the remaining egg mixture and beat for 2 minutes. Repeat with the last of the egg mixture.

6. Remove the bowl from the mixer and using a rubber spatula give the batter a final mixing.

7. Scrape half the batter into the prepared pan and smooth the top. Scatter half the sugar and nut filling on the batter.

8. Scrape the remaining batter over the sugar and nut mixture and smooth the top. Scatter on the remaining sugar and nut mixture.

9. Bake the cake until it is well risen and firm, and a toothpick or a small thin knife inserted midway between the side of the pan and the central tube emerges dry, about 1 hour.

10. Cool the cake in the pan for 5 minutes, the invert a rack over it. Invert and lift off the pan, then cover the cake with another rack or a cake cardboard and turn it right side up again. Cool the cake completely.