Tag Archives: cake

Frosting a Cake

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Never one to shy away from publicizing my failures, missteps and adventures in the kitchen, I decided on Monday to film my attempt at frosting a layer cake.  Having only done this a few times before, it was … quite a production.  But as long as I can learn lessons from the experience (and eat the mistakes!) then that’s the important thing, right?

The cake turned out looking okay, if a little lopsided.

The reason for the cake was my birthday, which I share with several other people.  I celebrated in conjunction with Jason, an Australian friend who turned thirty this year.

Our little dinner party group.  From left to right:Benji, Matt, Kobfa, me, Jason, Bundit, Zenya and Tawn.

Jason and I have blown out the candles and prepare to cut the cake.  Speaking of the September Issue, you can probably tell that one of us is a bit more of the fashionista.

Oh, the sad thing is that I made a mango coulis to go with this, poured it into a squeeze bottle and placed the bottle into the refrigerator to chill, subsequently forgetting to serve it with the cake.  D’oh!

Italian Almond Cake

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After a few attempts at baking macarons, my refrigerator still holds a good supply of almond flour.  How to use it?  How about some Italian almond cake?  This rich, dense cake uses ground almonds instead of flour, making it gluten-free.  The seven eggs make it even richer.

Unfortunately, the recipe calls for a 9-10 inch springform pan.  I didn’t realize that my springform pan is only 8 inches.  This caused an unanticipated problem.  The cake was supposed to finish baking in about 30-40 minutes.  After 50 minutes, a toothpick inserted into the center of the cake was still coming out with uncooked dough attached.

The cake was so deep that it wasn’t cooking through!

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I finally gave up and pulled the cake out of the oven at an hour and ten minutes.  After letting it cool, I sliced it open and, sure enough, the center was still very dense and not entirely cooked.  The outside edge was a bit overdone.

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Serving it up with some fresh mango, the cake was still tasty, but I had to eat around the undercooked part.  I’ll have to try an alternate recipe, maybe one that makes use of a little flour.  I’ll also have to either not fill the pan so high or will need to buy a larger springform pan.