You guys know I’m a make it from scratch kind of gal. Usually if I can make something from scratch I usually try to.
One of my big exceptions is cakes. I admit it, I’ve never made a cake from scratch! I always start with a box mix. You see cakes can be finicky things, and they used to “fall”. That’s when the center collapses in. Do any of you remember that? I have memories as a young child of my mom sending us outside to play while the cake was baking because she was afraid that the five of us thumping and bumping around would make the cake fall.
Well, the reason you don’t hear much about cakes falling anymore is because the box cake mixes are formulated perfectly so that it doesn’t happen. Yay for technology!
That’s a long way around of saying that I actually am a fan of box cake mixes. Pillsbury and Walmart offered me the chance to try out some of their new summer flavors. Last year they had introduced “Pink Lemonaid” as a seasonal flavor, and this year they added a few more seasonal flavors:
They have both Key Lime and Orangesicle in cake mix, cookie mix and “Creamy Supreme” icing, and they sent me one of each to try. As I said, I’m a cake mix user–but I usually don’t use cookie mix. However it had been a long time since I made cookies for the kiddos so I figured “what the heck!”.
The cookies came out great. They were simple to make and tasted great. I liked the Orangesicle best but the kids enjoyed the Key Lime.
And although they were very tasty plain, I did try spreading some of the matching icing on a few cookies. Those were decadent, so we only ate a few that way 🙂
I’m going to save the Key Lime cake mix until Buddy’s birthday next month–for his tenth we are going to do a “Minecraft” theme–and a green Key Lime cake will be perfect–I’ll decorate it up as a “creeper”.
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Disclosure: As a participant in the Walmart Moms Program, I’ve received product samples and compensation for my time and efforts in creating this post. All thoughts and opinions are my own.
I love the minecraft reference, I think all of us with kids in 8years and up bracket have been dealt minecraft! I really want to try the orange one, to make my cake recipe, will buy and save until I can use it!
Had those Orangesicle cookies (minus the frosting) a few weeks ago at church – DELICIOUS! I highly recommend giving them a try. But they are plenty sweet, so I think they icing might be a bit overkill.
I also have memories of my grandmother making us walk very gently, not shout, and she would open the oven door oh-so-gently to take her cakes out of the oven when she made them from scratch. I love baking cakes from scratch, myself.
I do agree scratch cakes can be daunting. If you want to learn to make them yourself, do so when there is no pressure (i.e., you do not have to take the finished cake to a party or gathering). Also, my scratch cakes tend to mound in the center so that they sometimes look like small mountains (the center) surrounded by flat land (the edges). I compensate for this by pouring the batter in the pan so that there is slightly less batter in the center than around the edges.
I really do need to master the cake from scratch thing eventually 🙂 And isn’t it funny how we can forget things like the fact that cakes used to fall?
One reason I like baking cakes from scratch is that I can make lots of cakes that I cannot always find mixes for, such as Italian Cream cake and applesauce cake. Angel Food cake made from scratch is so much better than store bought ones or boxed mix ones, it isn’t even in the same league. I make carrot cake from scratch, because the boxed mix for it is so dull (in texture and flavor) compared to the scratch version. The possibilities are endless and I am free to use my imagination. With scratch cakes, you also limit your exposure to chemical additives (some of those that stabilize cake in boxed mixes sound pretty scary.) If you are nervous about baking cake from scratch, start with cupcakes, which are smaller (and thus there is less waste.) You can halve a recipe if it makes too many cupcakes for your comfort zone to begin with. Read as many recipes for a specific cake as you can, to find one that you feel comfortable with, and give yourself permission to experiment and to make mistakes, because making mistakes is part of the learning process. Basic yellow, white or chocolate cakes are good ones to start with, and you can dress those up a bit (or a lot) as you become more comfortable with them. . Don’t try the Angel Food until you’ve had some experience, because it can be challenging. Keep in mind that once you have your feet under you (so to speak), baking from scratch is a great skill to teach your children!
Here are some links that may help you:
http://www.hgtv.com/entertaining/bake-a-cake-from-scratch/index.html
http://baking.about.com/od/cakes/ss/basiccakemaking.htm
This is going to be a topic in my current book, by the way. Hope this is helpful.