Yesterday we celebrated the cat’s birthday, and not because we’re going stir-crazy during a pandemic, but because we always celebrate the cats’ birthdays. And I baked the cake from scratch, which is more than I usually do for any of my human children. We only had one cake mix in the house, and it was a chocolate one, and I’d already gotten my mouth set for yellow cake with chocolate frosting. So I went to the post about good chocolate cake, and found the comment I was remembering from Adi, who was answering another commenter’s question by asking if this King Arthur yellow cake recipe would work. That’s the one I made, even though it took FOUR of my precious, precious eggs (the cake mix called for three eggs, so the recipe was really only one extra egg).
It was good! I’ve made two or three different yellow cakes from scratch before, and what I remember about them is that they were stodgy and flour-flavored, which is why I (temporarily, as it turns out) gave up making cakes from scratch. This one didn’t make me swoon or anything, but it was non-stodgy and, most importantly, a good transportation device for the frosting. The flavor wasn’t “Yellow” like a box cake, but it also wasn’t “Flour” like some of the other recipes I’ve tried; I would describe the flavor as “Cake.” Overall I still prefer a yellow cake mix, but I was pleased with this yellow scratch cake and I saved the recipe for future cake-mix-less occasions.
I notice right now I have to do a fair amount of thought-triaging. The biggest pile is the one for “I am going to have to wait to worry about that.” Types of thoughts that go there: trying to plan for fall when we have no idea what that will look like or what will happen/change between now and then; wondering how college is going to work now; wondering if certain businesses will go out of business because of this; wondering what will happen if certain industries collapse entirely; worrying how the world will manage the recurring isolation schedules if we can’t find a vaccine.
I know from long experience that “Just don’t worry about it!” is not an option—but I have had some success with “I am going to have to wait to worry about that.” Like when I’m lying awake two hours past bedtime and my brain decides NOW is the moment to work on our household’s fire safety plan, and it supplies me with a dramatic vision of how it might go in the case of a real fire. If someone said to me, “Just don’t worry about that!,” that would be unhelpful and also invalid: every household needs a fire safety plan, and a certain amount of worrying is what leads us to make good plans and notice things that need fixing (like how long has it been since we changed the smoke detector batteries). Buuuuuut…do I need to worry about it RIGHT THIS MINUTE? In the middle of the night? Instead of sleeping? I can’t do what I really want to do, which is to call the household together and show them the escape routes and remind them where we would gather, and then add the right kind of smoke detector battery to the shopping list and get them the next time I go to the store and then replace them—so right NOW I can go to sleep, and I can worry about this in the morning.
Or, I remember sometimes while postpartum, I would suddenly learn something new, such as that in our school system the kids choose an instrument in 5th grade. I’d start worrying about whether we should force the child to do it or let it be their own decision. But even I, world-class fretter, would soon think, You know, we don’t have to think about that RIGHT NOW, when the baby is three weeks old. We CAN’T even really think about that right now, because so much is going to happen and change between now and then, and so many necessary factors are unknown. It wouldn’t help if I told myself to just not worry about it, but it DID help to think that TODAY’S worries could be the cradle cap and the umbilical stump and the nursing latch, and the band instruments decision could WAIT until more information was available and the fretting could be more productive/useful.
Society/plans/systems have been DERAILED for the moment. We can’t figure out right now what will happen if the kids can’t go back to school in the fall or what will happen if certain industries collapse: “school in the fall” and “industries collapsing” are band instruments in 4th grade, and the baby is still only three weeks old.
My daughter wanted to make a cake. We have time. I nearly always bake from scratch.
Anyway. I found, in my house, I think from my aunt, two dessert cookbooks from 1962ish. Paula Peck and Myra Waldo. Peck has illustrations. Waldo just has names and instructions so you have to know, going in, what the finished thing is and what it looks like.
Anyway. Fascinating in their own right. We found a cake. Leavened only with eggs, warmed in a double boiler with the sugar and WHIPPED until it was like marshmallow. It was heavy in the egg (like 6, I need cemetery chickens) But so good. The whole book seems a little willy nilly with the eggs. Maybe recovery from rationing Anyway. Ermine frosting because magic. So good. It was white/yellow cake with white frosting. We are contemplating frosting flavors for future. Fun experiment though. And the cake was great.
It started with me wanting to recreate the seven layer cake from the Milleridge Inn on Long Island. A deep dive revealed it is likely a princzregententorte and that takes EIGHT eggs just for the cake and the filling is butter cream plus pastry cream. So it has been tabled until chickens or no pandemic, whichever comes first.
Clearly I was just itching to talk about this cake. I recommend.
I collect vintage cookbooks, and as you mentioned-it is so interesting to see the recipes especially during WWII and a bit later. Cookbooks truly reflect our history, and I LOVE when they have lots of pictures, showing not only the food but what it was served on. In the late 1980’s, I made a Palmer House Carrot Cake for Easter-it had at least 6 layers! Tried to find the recipe right now, but it seems like it has been simplified. I do now admire my younger self, I would never try that kind of cake now! I may have mentioned this over the years on this site, but I do feel like besides a Texas Sheet Cake, I’ve never made a homemade cake that tastes better than a boxed one. In my hands they end up being kind of heavy. Betty Crocker and Duncan Hines know what they are doing!! Oh, and Ghiradelli cake mixes are AWESOME if you can find them. We had them for a while and then they disappeared.
One thing I continue to do old school, is a buttercream frosting-the recipe on the confectioners sugar box, but most people probably know by heart. That frosting on a chocolate cake trips every comfort memory for me. I went through this phase where I buttercream was lumpy, I had never sifted the sugar before, and finally I did. Smooth as silk!
The cover of the waldo book (the one without any pictures or helpful descriptions on the inside) is wild. Everything looks kinda extra and a little gross, in a jello salad kinda way (There isn’t any jello salad in the book, although now I have to double check, but that picture, Very 1960s) – just too much and the plates! And serving dishes. I’m sure the recipes are fine.
The cake we made was from the Peck book It was pretty light with the marshmallowy egg/sugar part and she specifically instructs you to sift into your measuring cup.
Anyway, fascinating.
My scratch baking is I have the ingredients anyway, doesn’t make sense for me to buy a box of mixed dry ingredients.
This is probably a really stupid question (but maybe because I’m not American) – what is “yellow” cake? Do you just mean plain cake (i.e. with no flavouring, like chocolate or lemon), or is it something particular? If it’s just plain cake (what my daughters used to call “cake-flavour”), I have the easiest recipe in the world (from a kids’ cookbook)… This is in metric (because no one uses imperial but the US and I’m too lazy to convert), but anyway, here goes:
125 g of butter, sugar and flour. Cream the first two, add 2 eggs and beat together, then add the flour (at this point you can also add cocoa powder for the chocolate version). If it’s too thick and gloopy, add a smidgeon of milk until it’s cake batter-y. Pour into a greased tin (or 2 smallish ones for a sandwich cake) and bake for about 20-25 min at 180°C (sorry, no Fahrenheit either). Obviously, you can add other flavours, but the plain version is the one that gets done the most here, and it’s been universally liked, even by French people (I’m British, but in France) used to amazing French pâtisseries which are way, way beyond my skill set…
It’s literally considered a flavor, and I’m not sure how that happened! The box is labeled “Yellow”—similar to if it were “Chocolate” or “Strawberry” or “Spice.” (I don’t know if you can see this link, but here’s a link to a mix so you can see a box.) You can get scented candles called “Yellow Cake,” and it’s a particular THING, not just vanilla. The cake I made yesterday tasted like Cake, not like Yellow; the flavorings in it were 1 tsp. vanilla and 1/8th tsp. almond extract. I suspect the “yellow” flavor comes from some artificial flavoring or even from a preservative, and is probably not possible to duplicate in a scratch recipe.
Basically, standard American vanilla (that’s the flavor) layer cakes come in two standard options: white, which is egg whites only, and yellow, which uses whole eggs. They’re leavened with baking powder and flavored with extract.
Your recipe looks like pound cake, which we’d bake in layers if we needed a certain level of sturdiness. I suspect there are fistfights over whether pound cake should have vanilla or not.
OMG, this blows my mind! Why have I never thought about the difference between white and yellow cake?!? And the idea that people in other countries don’t necessarily refer to them as such? This sounds snarky but I’m absolutely earnest.
It sounds to me the difference we have in Australia between ‘Butter Cake’ and ‘Vanilla Cake’. Basically, butter cake has much more butter and an extra whole egg, vanilla is more sponge and relies on vanilla essence/extract and sometimes beaten egg whites. Butter is easier to make and does better in lunchboxes, it is also yellow.
Our cultures have much in common (more in common than not I think) but on cakes the Australian/US divide is very large :). I’m fascinated and read cake related posts with delight. Also – why is chocolate not called brown cake?
Lots of nonchocolate cakes are brown: spice, carrot, applesauce, gingerbread.
White cake and yellow cake are both, technically, vanilla. But yeah it’s a whole thing here. Yellow cake uses whole eggs and butter and white cake just egg whites and usually oil. So yellow cake tastes more custard-y. It also usually has more vanilla because white cake doesn’t want the tinge of color from the extract so recipes call for less or for artificial clear vanilla flavoring.
Also, I hate almond flavoring, but adding a smidge to scratch cakes gives them that nostalgic boxed flavor. Especially good for making homemade funfetti.
Thank you for the “I need to wait until later to worry about that” plan. I really need it.
Worry triaging is a brilliant way to describe this. I can’t fix our retirement fund, which, whoops! And just when we were going to need it. But I can be frantic that THE NEW YORK TIMES CROSSWORD PUZZLE SITE IS DOWN. It might be fixed soon, during this worry session.
NOOO, not the puzzles!! I haven’t gone on today… just as well! Nice to have something comparatively inconsequential to worry about.
Triaging worrying – it’s a good skill to have. It is hard with so many unknowns, yet somehow I feel slightly better knowing that we’re all in the same boat WRT events being cancelled, etc. With the cancellation of Wimbledon which is a late-June-into-July event, I feel less and less secure about big events we have planned. However my son’s graduation party is minuscule in scope, cost, lead-time planning, and attendance compared to Wimbledon. I can’t waste any brain power worrying about it. If it gets cancelled, I’ll figure out something else (for later in the year) and everyone will understand. There won’t even be a need for an explanation because everyone knows the reason.
And yellow cake – yum!
Worry triage – brilliant!
How old is the cat, now? And are there photos? The cat, I am assuming, does not eat the cake – does it get its own special treat?
The cat is now 7. She shared some deluxe wet cat food (said “bisque” on the label, which, what) with her brothers. (Not actually her brothers. Just cats.)
Our 12 year old cat will now only eat the “bisque” stuff and dry cat food. She’s picky. The bisque just looks gross.
Bisque?!?!
Thank you for the details. If I weren’t allergic we would have gotten a pandemic kitten weeks ago so I am hungry for all cat content.
I have found King Arthur Flour recipes to be really reliable! I use their fudgy brownie recipe all the time because it uses cocoa powder, which I always have on hand, vs unsweetened bar chocolate which I might or might not have on hand.
My therapist taught me a trick for triaging: if it’s something I would like to worry about later (like, it’s a valid worry but not right now, like the fire plan thing), visualize putting it in a box, taping up and labeling the box, and putting it away safely for later. If it’s actually not something I want to worry about at all (like going over and over angry conversations in my head), then blow the worry into a helium balloon, tie a string to the balloon, and let it float away into the stratosphere.
This may sound goofy but it has worked many times very well for me.
I need to know which way you went regarding band instrument choices.
We ended up letting each kid decide what to do, but with us encouraging (possibly verging into pushing) the idea of trying it to see. We put more pressure on the first two kids about it, less on the younger three. They all went different ways: one played the same instrument for five years and still noodles around sometimes on that or on the recorder; one tried four different instruments and still plays one of them, and also sings; one tried a year each of two instruments and now plays nothing; one tried one instrument and hated it right away; one never tried an instrument but is currently taking a songwriting class.
There IS a scratch recipe that recreates the “Yellow” flavor and it is completely delicious: https://smittenkitchen.com/2009/07/best-birthday-cake/
It is slightly a pain because I think the cake flour is necessary for getting the right flavor/texture, but I don’t use actual buttermilk (I do the milk/vinegar trick – 1 T vinegar per cup of milk, mix it together and let it sit for a few minutes until it’s weird looking). It is SO yummy and to me has the cake mix taste/texture without the slight chemical taste.
I am in the middle of interviewing for a new teaching job which I am not positive I want, nor do I know if schools (my current one or the new one) will even be open in August. Also I have a 2-week-baby and I don’t know what going back to work even looks like right now. So I am having to remind myself firmly and frequently that I can worry about a lot of things later, and these questions do not have answers right now, nor do they need answering today. It is a helpful mantra but one that’s hard to stick to!
Thank you! I’ve decided that “the baby is still only three weeks old” is going to be my new self-mantra during this time. That really is a very useful re -frame for me. I can feel my anxiety lessening literally as I type this.
I’m not familiar with “yellow” cake, but I have a great vegan vanilla cake recipe that, of course, doesn’t use any eggs! Let me know if you want me to share it…
I love that you celebrate the cat’s birthday! I saw the tweet this morning and was moved to make a yellow cake and homemade icing. It turned out “okay.” I’m thinking the recipe I used probably needs to up the eggs and butter.
I find myself getting annoyed with people saying “I can’t believe people are surprised this is going on longer” (even though I shouldn’t because I am really trying to give everyone grace) because it’s not that I’m surprised. I just can’t think too far ahead right now or I bottom out completely. It doesn’t change what I’m doing now, so I don’t need someone saying “wise up, people, this is going on for MONTHS”. I’m going day by day and week by week because that’s what keeps me relatively calm. Oh, and happy birthday to the cat.
I want to just comment and say your blog posting during this time is such a bright spot in my life. I look forward to your posts so much. And love and savour reading them! Thank you!
Oh I’m so glad it worked for you. I make it with boiled chocolate frosting (that sounds terrible, I know, but it’s really lovely and simple, the water dissolves the sugar so the texture is really nice) and it’s my go-to for yellow cake. I love sharing recipes with people almost as much as I love baking for them—a couple weeks ago I made that cake and delivered slices to quarantined friends and family, and everyone was so delighted by having a little surprise on their doorstep, and it made me feel more connected to them when I got pictures of everyone eating the cake I’d just baked!