Life is Good: blow out the candles & make a wish!
Ever since we found out that our eldest son was severely allergic to eggs (when he was nine months old), making cakes and cupcakes has been a challenge. Early on, I made carrot cakes and carrot cake cupcakes. I felt like they were healthy for cake and they seemed to please everyone (except one little partygoer who seemed to like fewer things and fewer people than any other kid I'v known). As our kids got older, they wanted other kinds of cakes and I figured that out as well as I could but getting the cake dense enough without being too dense was always a challenge. A couple of years ago, our Big Kid asked for a white cake and so I turned to a "wacky cake" or "Depression cake" recipe to make it happen. He was happy, but was not satisfied. I started a quest to find the best recipe. And I think I found it in a thread on an allergy website.
The recipe was posted by "Kathy P" and I am ever so grateful. Her original recipe is great. Since then, I have adjusted the flavoring a little and this cake is finally one that I don't judge over and over in my head as I watch people eat it. The flavoring is my attempt at what my Grandma's secret ingredient wedding cake tasted like. It's not exactly like hers because I don't use that secret ingredient. Because, well, that would not be secret, right?! But it's close...
One of the differences in this recipe versus other wacky cake recipes is that most of the recipes ask you to make holes in the dry ingredients and pour the wet ingredients into the holes. This recipe mixes the wet ingredients in a separate bowl and then mixes them with the dry ingredients to combine. For some reason, this makes the batter look different and the cake taste different. I hope you enjoy it!
Ingredients:
1 1/2 cups flour
1 cup sugar
1 t. baking soda (make sure it is fresh)
1/2 t. salt (I use pink Himalayan)
1 T. white vinegar
5 T. vegetable oil
1 t. vanilla (I use Madagascar)
1/2 t. lemon extract
1/2 t. almond extract
1/2 t. lemon extract
1/2 t. almond extract
1 cup cold water
Preheat the oven to 350 degrees.
1. Mix the dry ingredients together.
2. Mix the wet ingredients together.
3. Mix wet and dry ingredients together with a spoon until smooth. Do not use a beater or mixer.
4. Pour into an 8 inch square or round cake pan OR muffin/cupcake tin (this recipe makes twelve cupcakes).
5. Bake cake for 35 minutes (check often as ovens vary) or approximately 20 minutes for cupcakes.
We celebrated our Big Kid's ninth birthday (NINE!) once already. He asked for "Captain America's shield". Ugh. It's his birthday, it's my "humiliate yourself by showing off your lack of the cake decorating gene" day!
I was slightly less embarrassed about this decorated cake, though since it was just a couple of frosted rings and a star. I used a saucer as a guide for my first ring around the cake, which made the subsequent rings easier to keep even. I used a star cookie cutter as a guide for my star and then added some layers around that to make it bigger.
Next up...a trio of cakes for our family birthday celebration. The Big Kid wants a baseball cake, a basketball cake, and a Pokeball cake. WISH ME LUCK!
