FROM-SCRATCH CAKE RECIPES
BY BAKER AND SPICE
Review by Barb & Ron Kroll
Vintage Cakes
(Ten Speed Press) ISBN 978-1607741022 1607741024
Baking cakes is rewarding with Julie Richardson's modernized vintage recipes. The owner of Baker & Spice, a Portland Oregon bakery, provides 50 lip-smacking recipes for homemade cakes, ranging from quick cake recipes to party cakes, with cake fillings, frostings and glazes.
Organized by type of cake, from everyday to special occasion, each recipe includes the number of servings, baking time and size of baking pan required. Detailed instructions specify whether the pan should be greased, spritzed with baking spray or lined with parchment paper.
Historic cake recipes
Inside Vintage Cakes you'll find recipes for cupcakes (malted milk chocolate), layer cakes (banana cake with coffee walnut buttercream), bundt cakes (Kentucky bourbon cake), slab cakes (Texas sheet cake), light cakes (angel cake with chocolate and orange freckles), upside-down cakes (chocolate apricot), chiffon cakes (maple pecan with brown butter icing), chocolate cakes (peppermint patty flourless chocolate cake), party cakes (champagne cake), fast cakes (blueberry cornmeal skillet cake) and old-fashioned cakes (shoo-fly cake and skinny or Lane cake with a bourbon, dried fruit and nut filling).
Some are boozy adult cake recipes, such as the Harvey Wallbanger, not-for-children gingerbread bundt cake and coffee crunch spiral (a Kahlua cake recipe). Others are trendy, like the wacky cake and Watergate cake with impeachment icing, made with pistachio pudding.
You will even find from-scratch cakes for breakfast, e.g., lazy daisy oatmeal cake, made from a family recipe.
Baking tips
Julie Richardson introduces each heirloom recipe with information about its history and suggestions for ingredient substitution, e.g., use full-fat plain yogurt instead of sour cream in the rhubarb pudding cake recipe. Many recipes include variations, such as using hazelnuts, pecans, walnuts or pine nuts to make different versions of honey bee cake.
Boxed sidebars offer cake baking tips. One tells you how to save an overbaked or dry cake by soaking it with a sugar syrup flavored with Kahlua or Grand Marnier.
The 167-page cookbook includes shortcuts, such as using store-bought vanilla wafers instead of her recipe for wafers in the blackberry chocolate cream icebox cake recipe.
Cake ingredients
You will find more information about making cakes from scratch in the introduction, including cake-baking equipment and techniques, e.g., how to tell if a cake is done baking. Ingredients are listed in both metric and American measurements.
The cake cookbook also includes easy ways to decorate cakes, such as using chocolate shavings, icing sugar, piped frosting decorations, fresh berries and flowers.
Frostings, fillings and glazes
Vintage Cakes includes delicious recipes for frostings (maple cream cheese icing, caramel chocolate ganache, malted milk chocolate frosting, peanut butter and marshmallow frostings). All make great fillings too.
Cake glazes, such as the tequila lime glaze in the daffodil cake recipe, are easy and fast to make.
Color photos by Erin Kunkel depict several delicious recipes in Vintage Cakes. Her step-by-step photos show you how to assemble the butterscotch cream roll-up cake.
Contents
IntroductionThe Cake Baker's Battery
The Cake Baker's Cupboard
Tips and Techniques
- Hasty Cakes
- Everyday Cakes
- Little Cakes and Light Cakes
- Flips & Rolls
- Layer Cakes
- Party Cakes
- Fillings, Frostings and Icings
Author
Julie Richardson is the owner of Baker & Spice in Portland OR (address: 6330 SW Capital Hwy) and SweetWares, a bakeware shop.