Monday, December 17, 2007

Happy (Belated by 3 Months...) Birthday!

No real intro to this recipe today, folks... as you can tell by the time that I'm posting this, it's late, I'm exhausted, and I'm still not done yet!!! How do we still manage to gain weight over the holidays when we're on our feet 24/7?? Everyone knows what you eat while standing has no calories....

This is going to be part of the birthday and Christmas gift package that I’ll be giving to one of my best friends, Heather, this year. It is a take on one of our first tandem baking experiences, which was a lemon (box) cake with cherry – vanilla (box) icing. I’ve taken the flavours, flipped them around and “gourmetized” the memories by making both the cake and frosting from scratch, adding lightness to the cake with rice flour and cornstarch, and the extra flavour layer of honey to the frosting. It's a gorgeous-looking cake, and hopefully she enjoys this as much as we did the original!

Heather’s Birth – Mas Cake
Serves 8
1/3 cup shortening
2/3 cup white sugar
1 egg
1 tablespoon vanilla extract
½ cup maraschino cherry puree (about 1 ¼ cups stemmed whole cherries)
1 tsp red food colouring (optional)
1 cup flour
1/3 cup white rice flour
2 tablespoons cornstarch
2 teaspoons baking powder
½ teaspoon salt
2/3 cup whole milk
¼ cup shortening
¼ cup stick margarine, softened
1 ½ teaspoons lemon extract
½ teaspoon grated lemon zest
1 cup powdered sugar (sifted)
1 tablespoon honey
1 teaspoon yellow food colouring (optional)
  1. Preheat oven to 350F, grease and flour a large loaf pan.
  2. Cream shortening and sugar until fluffy.
  3. Add egg, vanilla and maraschino puree, along with food colouring if using, and blend well.
  4. Mix flours, cornstarch, baking powder and salt into a large bowl.
  5. Add flour alternately with milk to the creamed mixture.
  6. Bake 65-70 minutes or until a toothpick inserted into the cake comes out clean.
  7. Cool 30 minutes in pan, unmould onto wire rack and cool completely.
  8. Beat together shortening, margarine, lemon extract and lemon zest at medium speed for about 30 seconds or until well blended.
  9. Add 1 cup of the powdered sugar, a bit at a time, while beating.
  10. Beat in the honey.
  11. With a sharp, serrated knife or unflavoured dental floss, cut cake horizontally into two layers.
  12. Fill and frost the cake with the frosting, decorate if and as desired, and enjoy!
Amount Per Serving
Calories: 527.3
Total Fat: 22.3 g
Cholesterol: 37.1 mg
Sodium: 86.0 mg
Total Carbs: 79.2 g
Dietary Fiber: 2.0 g
Protein: 3.7 g

1 comment :

  1. what a gorgeous cake! It makes up for the lateness I think!

    ReplyDelete

Thanks for the feedback!