Golden Vanilla Cake

It's been a long while since I last posted.  During my absence, I moved from the Mile High City to America's Finest City (aka my hometown).  I look forward to baking without having to adjust for altitude. Today I'm testing out a yellow cake recipe.

I've been searching for the perfect homemade yellow cake and have tried several recipes over the last few years. I've been disappointed each time.  My last attempt went into the trash.  I'm not looking for a fluffy boxed cake mix cake.  Cakes from mixes are too gummy in texture and artificial tasting for me.

I'm looking for a dense cake but I don't want dry or crumbly and many of the recipes I've tried resulted in a dense, dry, and crumbly.  I want dense but also moist with a fine crumb.  It is the texture found in many bakery cakes.

Bakeries use the high ratio method that utilize special high ratio flours and shortening. The problem with high ratio cakes are they tend to be too sweet and lack flavor.  This is because high ratio cakes are made with a lot of sugar and a special high ratio shortening containing emulsifiers. To top it all off, they are then frosted with shortening "butter"cream. So is there a way to get the results of a high ratio cake without using special flours and shortening? 

I came across this recipe on the King Arthur website.  I think I looked at this recipe a while back but decided to not make it because of the many negative reviews.  But after reading through the several pages of reviews, I found that people were either very happy or very disappointed by the results.  I decided to give it a try.  I've had a lot of luck with King Arthur recipes. 

This recipe from King Arthur utilizes the reverse creaming method used in high ratio cakes but subs butter for the high ratio shortening.  The result is a very flavorful butter cake with a very fine crumb.  The cake is still pretty sweet so I frosted it with a not too sweet chocolate cream cheese frosting.  The only reason I frost cakes is because everyone expects them to be frosted. I don't like frosting and find it a waste of calories.  I would rather eat a larger piece of cake than eat the frosting.

I love the texture and flavor of this cake but it is very sweet and the texture while very good, reminded me of pound cake.  I think I will have to tinker with it a bit.  Perhaps make it with cake flour instead of all purpose and decrease some of the sugar. 

The recipe can be found on the King Arthur website:
http://www.kingarthurflour.com/recipes/golden-vanilla-cake-recipe

The recipe makes:

One 9x13 pan
Two 9" rounds
Three 8" rounds
Twenty four cupcakes


Golden Vanilla Cake

2 cups sugar, preferable baker's sugar (which is a finer than regular granulated sugar)
3 1/4 cups unbleached all purpose flour
2 1/2 teaspoons baking powder

1 teaspoon salt
3/4 cup unsalted butter, cubed and at room temperature
1 1/4 cups milk, at room temperature
2 teaspoons vanilla extract

4 large eggs

1. Bring butter, milk, and eggs to room temperature.

2. Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Line pans with parchment paper.

3. In the bowl of a stand mixer, measure out sugar, flour, baking powder and salt.  Using the paddle attachment, mix until combined.

4. Add the butter and mix on low until mixture looks sandy.  (It should look like bisquick or cake mix.)

5.  Combine the milk and vanilla and add to flour mixture.  Mix on low speed 30 seconds and increase to medium and mix another 30 seconds.

6. Add egg one at a time mixing on medium for 30 seconds after each addition.

7. After the last egg, scrape down bowl and mix another 30 seconds.

8. Transfer batter into baking pans.  Drop pans on counter a few times to release air bubbles.  Bake until golden and toothpick inserted comes out clean.  (I didn't read the instructions carefully and baked the batter in two 8" pans instead of three.)

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Pad See Ew -- Thai Soy Sauce Noodles

I usually order drunken noodles at Thai restaurants but every once in a while I will crave a good pad see ew.  Pad see ew is no nonsense noodle goodness. While pad thai and pad kee mao (drunken noodles) are more complex in flavor, pad see ew is simple.  The key ingredient is the dark sweet soy sauce. 

I must have about 15 different soy sauces in my pantry.  I believe every bottle serves a different purpose.  For this recipe, I bought a different brand of sweet soy sauce to try out.  I've been using the Healthy Boy brand but wanted to try the Dragonfly brand.  I remember seeing a bottle of this stuff in mom's pantry. I give it a thumbs up.

In San Diego, fresh rice noodles can be found in almost all Asian grocery stores.  The noodle factories deliver warm noodles daily.  In Denver, we get the noodles from California and instead of warm and soft, they are refrigerated and hard. Refrigerated noodles do not stand up well when fried but the only other option is making your own noodles.  My aunts are expert noodle makers.  They helped my grandmother run a noodle soup stand when they were teenagers. They still make noodles from time to time.  I should attempt making fresh noodles one day.

My mom doesn't like factory made noodles.  She says the oil used to coat the noodles cycles through the machine continuously.  She prefers to buy the dried noodles and soak the noodles in warmish-hot water.  I used refrigerated fresh noodles and blanched them in boiling water.  The noodles do fall apart a bit but I think they are still pretty yummy.

Pad See Ew
adapted from Serious Eats
yield: one generous serving 

For the meat:
4 ounces chicken breast, pork, or beef; thinly sliced
1 teaspoon baking soda
2 teaspoons thin soy sauce (sometimes called white soy sauce)

For the sauce:
2 tablespoons oyster sauce
2 teaspoons thin soy sauce
2 teaspoons sugar
2 teaspoons rice vinegar
1 clove garlic; minced

For the stir fry:
4 tablespoons oil
1 large egg
8 ounces fresh wide flat rice noodles; separated or noodle sheets; separated and cut
2 tablespoons sweet soy sauce
3 stalks gai lan (Chinese broccoli)
2 ounces fried tofu


1. Marinate meat with baking soda and thin soy sauce.  Set aside.
2. Combine ingredients for the sauce.  Set aside.
3. Bring a large pot of water to a boil. Place noodles in a strainer and dip noodles into boiling water for a few seconds until soft.  Set aside.  Place chicken in strainer and dip in boiling water until cooked.  Set aside.
4. Heat a wok on high.  Add oil and when oil starts to smoke, add egg.  Allow eggs to set then scramble.  When eggs are cooked, add noodles.  Stir noodles to coat with oil and then allow to cook a minute.  Drizzle in 2 tablespoons of sweet soy sauce.  Toss well.  Cook until slightly charred.
5.  Add gai lan, meat, and tofu.  Toss until all ingredients are heated through.  Add the sauce mixture.  Stir fry a few more minutes.
6. Serve immediately.

To substitute dried noodles: Soak noodles in warm/hot water for about 30 minutes and drain.  Skip the blanching in hot water.

The sauces (from left to right): rice vinegar (either mizkan or marukan brand), Mae Krua brand oyster sauce, Healthy Boy thin soy sauce, Kwong Hung Seng or Dragonfly brand sweet soy sauce (blue cap), and Healthy Boy sweet soy sauce.  Behind the Healthy Boy sweet soy is a bottle of Healthy Boy dark soy sauce.  I used Kwong Hung Seng for the sweet soy but some people prefer Healthy Boy sweet or dark soy.

gai lan, noodles, eggs, marinated meat, sauce mixture, fried tofu.

Add egg to hot oil

Scramble the eggs

Add the noodles

Add sweet soy sauce

Add gai lan

Add meat, tofu, and sauce mixture

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Som Moo (Naem or Sour Pork Sausage)

I called my mom on Christmas Day.  I was on my way to the Asian grocery store.  She's coming to Denver in a few days and usually brings me goodies.  She was just in town over the Thanksgiving weekend and brought rambutans, guavas, seaweed, mangosteen, and other goodies.  When J* was in San Diego a few weeks ago she sent him back with a large bag of guavas for me and a bag of snickers for his plane ride.  While we were talking, my mom said that our Lao sausage guy passed away a few days ago.

He's the guy that we always got our sai krok and som moo from.  I didn't eat beef or pork for a long time.  I started eating pork but only in certain forms (when the flavor is hidden enough that it no longer tastes like pork).  I always brought back a few packages of sai krok and som moo.  The sai krok is the best I've ever had.  It's sour, garlicky, and lemongrass-y.  (Maybe I'll attempt making sai krok and lap cheong when I feel like dealing with the casings.) I never eat som moo by itself but I keep it around for nam khao.

One of my favorite Laotian dishes is nam khao.  A few years ago I was looking for a recipe on the net and I couldn't find one so I came up with something based solely on my memory of eating it. I've been told that my recipe is missing the red curry paste.  I think it tastes fine without.  One of the key ingredients for nam khao is som moo.  Now that my sausage guy has passed away, I must come up with a way to make my own or else settle for American ham doused with lime juice.

I looked at a few recipes.  I love the directions on the Lao Cook website so I followed the instructions but went with the seasoning recipe from Thai Food Master because he included sugar and MSG.  I made two batches -- one using just sticky rice and another using the nam powder I thought I used nam powder but I guess I threw away the actual sodium nitrite packet mistaking it for one of those oxygen absorber packets.

Please visit the Lao Cook and Thai Food Master websites for a recipe.

I started off with some pork. I bought these from the Asian store.  In hindsight I should I have bought a leaner pork loin and the frozen pork skin instead.

I trimmed the meat, saving the ski.  I boiled the skin and sliced them up.

I ground the meat user the grinder attachment on my Kitchenaid.  While I don't feel that it's the best meat grinder, it works for occasional meat grinding.  I had to cut the meat into small pieces to get it to fit the chute.  I bought my mom a stand alone meat grinder and took it with me to San Diego. It was surprisingly difficult to find a meat grinder in San Diego but almost every store in Denver carries it.  (Excuse the mess.  I was working on a few different cooking projects.)

I kneaded the meat using the dough hook of my Kitchenaid.  This can be done by hand but it takes a long time.

After kneading, I divided the meat into two batches.  The one below has the sticky rice.  (I didn't think I had enough pork skin but it was perfectly fine.  I should have trimmed off more of the fat.) I finished the kneading by hand after I mixed in the ingredients and the pork skin.

I wrapped the batches differently.  The one without the rice were wrapped smaller and has the chili on the outside.  The one with the rice were wrapped larger (I was a little tired by this time) and had chili in the middle (like how Lao Cook does it).

I ate the sausages (even the batch without the rice or the sodium nitrite) and I survived.

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