~ Valentines Day Cooking ~

Mr. Podunk and I tend to keep any of the holidays pretty simple and predictable.  He always gives me roses and I usually fix him something special for dinner.  This years special  was Red Velvet Cake, his favorite that I've never made.   Red Velvet cake is nothing more than chocolate cake and cream cheese icing.  So it shouldn't be that hard to make.   I found many different traditional recipes on the internet requiring buttermilk that I didn't have.  I could have made sour milk with plain old milk and white vinegar to replace the buttermilk but I stumbled across this recipe without buttermilk and decided to give it a try.  Can you tell this was a spur of the moment decision to make cake?   Even though it was a last minute plan, my cake turned out pretty good.  I'm not one to get real fancy with decorating cakes so my cake is your basic looking cake.

Most of you already know that we live in a rural area and we stock up on the kitchen basics.  Making a run into town for a gallon of milk or loaf of bread doesn't happen.  I have a pantry bigger than my bathroom, stocked full of just about everything we need.  Well how often do you need food coloring?  Almost never.  The only reason I had this small box of food coloring is because I thought we might need it someday to color Easter Eggs.  Unfortunately it was not enough red food coloring.  The recipe called for 1 ounce, I have .25 of an ounce.   Oh well that's what I have so that's what I'll use.  Hopefully the acid in the rest of the recipe will help turn the cocoa powder red. Did you know that's the secret of Red Velvet cake?  I didn't until today.  That is the reason for the Buttermilk and vinegar in the traditional recipes.  But my recipe doesn't call for buttermilk or vinegar.

So here's how the batter looked with the little bit of food coloring.  It's red but more of a brick red.   Well, men are all about more earthy colors, right?  If that were true, he wouldn't love RED VELVET CAKE.  I mean seriously, what's more earthy than plain ole brown chocolate?  Red is not natural!

So I altered this recipe.  It did not call for added vinegar but I added it anyway in hopes it would work it's magic on the chocolate. 

While the cake baked I started on the icing.  It is your basic icing with butter, powder sugar, vanilla and milk.  Guess what?  I don't have powder sugar.  But I never buy powdered sugar because I rarely use it and when I do need it, I make it!  Did you know you can make your own powdered sugar?  It's quite simple but can be a little messy.  Some people add corn starch to the sugar but I don't unless I need it as a thickening agent.  My icing may be a little runny but that's okay, I'm not adding corn starch.  If you're interested in making powder sugar click here for a blogger with a video.  I make mine a cup of refined sugar at a time.  This will make about 1 1/4 cup of powdered sugar.

A little tip no one will tell you.  If your blender doesn't seal well you may get clouds of powdered sugar poofing out from under the lid.  I usually put a wet paper towel or tea towel over the top to help reduce the clouds.

And a few minutes later I have enough powder sugar to make my icing.

Another baking ingredient I never buy is vanilla.  This is super easy to make but takes at least 6 months.  This batch was started about 2 years ago in a quart jar.  It's nothing more than vodka and vanilla beans. How many vanilla beans.  A LOT!  There's about 8 in this little jar. When I find vanilla beans on sale I add another one to the jar.  Before adding the bean to the jar it must first be split longways.  Every time I get in my spice cabinet I give this bottle a little shake for about 15 seconds.  And that's all there is to making vanilla.   It makes a great homemade Christmas or birthday gift for the bakers in your family.  I gave all my children a bottle of this for Christmas last year.  The girls loved it and said they would continue to make it now that they had a start.

 The icing is a beautiful creamy white but a little to thin because my butter was a too soft from softening it in the microwave.  OOPS!  A few minutes in the freezer while cleaning up the mess should make it perfect.

Well my cake did not turn out as red as I had hoped.  The flavor is lacking also.  Not as rich as I would prefer.  But I'm sure that won't stop Mr. Podunk from plowing through it in few short days.

If (and that's a big IF) I ever make this cake again I'll do a little more research to find a better recipe and maybe have all the ingredients on hand.  

Happy Valentines Day to each of you!  I hope you find time today to spend a little extra time enjoying friends and family that are near and dear to you.

My Valentines day gift to my followers  I'm having a 24 hour FLASH SALE  of 30% off all PDF quilt patterns.  Hurry!  It ends tomorrow!

#redvelvetcake 

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