Baking Bites was nominated for the “Best Food Blog” in this year’s Blogger’s Choice Awards!
As of writing this, the blog with the most votes in the food blog category has just under 250 votes, and I know that we can do better than that! So, I’d like to take a moment to encourage all of you readers to head over and vote by clicking this link or the button in my sidebar!
The polls close on June 2nd.
Cooks Illustrated is known for their willingness to exhaustively test different recipes, ingredient combinations and kitchen gadgets in their pursuit of the very best. When it comes to their recipes, I have been known to disagree with them from time to time when their perceptions of what a recipe should be differ from my own, but they tend to be very close to the mark on the gadget and kitchen tool front. And I’d rather take their advice than testing out ten types of salad spinners in my own kitchen. In the last issue, they rounded up their top 18 kitchen tools in a list that was complete with tips on why you need each one and why they liked the particular brand of tool. Unfortunately, they didn’t include a list of the tools that they didn’t like, so we don’t know which ones they recommend avoiding, but here are the top 18:
When it comes to baking, no matter how many batches of chocolate chip cookies I make, I’m just not quite a traditionalist. If I were, I would have made a basic red velvet layer cake by now, instead of making red velvet cupcakes, red velvet sandwich cookies and, now, a red velvet roll cake. That said, I’m not exactly on the cutting edge of innovation, either. If I were, I would have forsaken cake entirely and tried for a red velvet flan.
This is a jelly roll-type cake made with a chocolate sponge cake rolled around a rich cream cheese filling. The cake, although it looks quite elegant, is fairly easy to make, thanks to the fact that the cake itself is both moist and sturdy. It is basically a sponge cake, but like all red velvet cakes it contains the requisite combination of cocoa, buttermilk and baking soda. The chocolate flavor is mild and the cake is quite tender, especially after it has been filled with cream cheese frosting and left to sit for a few hours (time that allows the flavors to blend).
Because this is a sponge-type cake that gets its structure primarily from beaten eggs, it is important to make sure your eggs are at room temperature when you start to work with them, so remember to take them out of the fridge at least 45 minutes before you’re going to start cooking. Many recipes that call for cake flour require that it be sifted before measuring and this one is no exception. Sifting helps to prevent lumps, large or small, from forming in the fine flour and creating pockets in your cake. Simply spoon a moderate amount of flour into a fine mesh sifter, sift onto a sheet of parchment paper and gently spoon back into your measuring cup when ready.
One other thing to note about this recipe is that the color is variable. I like my red velvet cakes/cupcakes to have a relatively subtle color, but if you prefer a brighter hue, simply add more red food coloring. An additional teaspoon or two will not throw off the recipe in any way. The color might darken (i.e. look less bright) after baking, so keep that in mind, too.
Anna Ginsberg, author of Cookie Madness and winner of the last Pillsbury Bakeoff, has the amazing ability to do some really creative things with food. I’m not talking about tracking down truffles or whatever the latest high-end ingredient du jour is, but using fairly ordinary, mainstream products in new ways. This talent serves her well in cooking contests, where you are usually required to take an assigned product (or products) and put a completely original spin on them. Anna’s Bakeoff recipe, for instance, for Baked Chicken and Spinach Stuffing used frozen french toast as an element in the filling.
To test your own skill at doing this and to get a chance to win $5,000, you might want to think about entering the next Mix It Up With Betty! contest. It asks participants to use Betty Crocker cookie mixes with other ingredients of your choosing to come up with new and inventive cookie-type desserts. Anna’s recipe, which was the grand prize winner last year, was for Chocolate-Topped Peanut-Toffee Bars (pictured), if you need some inspiration. The new round, unfortunately, doesn’t start until this fall, but that does give you plenty of time to come up with a winning entry and test lots of (hopefully) homemade goodies in search of inspiration and techniques that will transfer to the cookie mixes.
Reading a food blog about cakes and baking could be deemed “virtual baking,” but even though you can often see the process from start to finish, it’s a pretty passive experience. To get your virtual hands a little dirtier, you might want to check out a game called Cake Mania. It’s a computer game (now available for Nintendo DS) where you run your own virtual bakery, trying to help your character, Jill, save her grandparent’s family bakery. The game lets you bake and decorate cakes, but to move on to the next level you must cater to an increasingly demanding customer base. As a time-killer, it’s highly addictive, with over 40 million downloads so far.
The DS version will be at 10,000 demo stations in retail stores starting in the next month or so, so you can stop in a get a taste of the virtual action before committing to the full game.
