Best-Ever (Bakewise) Pound Cake & The Science of Baking

I taught a 4-week, 40-hour course in January called The Art & Science of Baking.  We used Shirley Corriher's book Bakewise for a textbook.  Shirley is a frequent guest on Alton Brown's show Good Eats.  She's a chemist, and explains the science behind the baking. If you want to develop your own recipes, this is a must-read book.  She explains how to check the math of a given recipe and the important differences between baking powder and baking soda, natural cocoa powder and Dutch-process cocoa powder, and so much more.  One of the most surprising things I learned - so many cake recipes are way over-leavened!!

Shirley examines pound cake early on in her book, and takes you through her process of developing the perfect recipe.  Make this cake immediately, and as you taste the moist buttery cake with just a slight hint of almond (perhaps unidentifiable to some, but you'll taste something a little different), with a dense (but not heavy) crumb, you'll see how successful she was.  The whipped cream is not a typical ingredient in pound cake, but after you make this cake, it might become a regular in all your cake recipes.  It adds moisture, and of course enriches the flavor of the cake; whipping air into the cream lightens the texture of the cake.  Replacing some of the fat (i.e. butter) with oil also adds moisture to the cake; oil is better at greasing the flour proteins than are butter or shortening, so less gluten forms.

Full-disclosure, I did adapt Shirley's recipe slightly.  Potato starch isn't readily available at my grocery store, so I stuck with flour; Shirley says the potato starch adds moisture to the cake, and that the large granules make the texture a little less tight than the average pound cake. I believe her, but my version of the cake is still extremely moist, and the texture is not as dense and tight as your everyday pound cake.  I also didn't add her optional cream glaze or pound cake icing. I didn't miss them. 

Other things to note:  don't make this cake in a loaf pan, it won't work.  The abundance of butter and sugar in this cake make the cake perfectly moist and sweet, but don't contribute enough protein structure for the cake to dome in a loaf pan.  Using a tube pan or Bundt pan insures that the cake remains fully in the pan; in a loaf pan, we would want the cake to dome nicely above the pan, but without the sides of the pan to climb, the cake needs sufficient protein structure to reach that high.  Also, if the cake sinks slightly on top, it's not noticeable with these pans, since you invert the cake before serving anyway.

Oh, and I'm not sure she mentions this, but this cake improves after baking, so try not to eat it all the first, or even second day.  It's still moist on day 3, and the butter flavor is even more pronounced (I haven't figured out why yet!).

The Best Yellow Cake Ever! And the Best Mousse.

Does yellow cake seem a little boring to you?  I actually loved yellow cake with chocolate frosting and rainbow sprinkles when I was younger (hell, who am I kidding, it still sounds pretty great!), but I don't make a lot of yellow cakes these days.  Until now perhaps.  This cake is anything but boring.  My cakes domed, and I leveled the tops, and those bites of cake scraps were one of my most memorable cake-eating experiences.  So simple, so plain even, and yet so perfect... you really can stop looking for a perfect yellow cake recipe now.  I think I have.  It uses both butter and oil so you get the moistness that the oil gives (oil coats flour proteins better than butter, resulting in less gluten formation) and the flavor that makes butter so popular.  The cake flour adds tenderness, and helps keep the layers level (mine still domed, but I baked it in the bakeshop oven, not my own).  And there's whipped cream!  To add more moisture, flavor, and great texture.  Can't wait to go try whipped cream in my other favorite cakes... but that's for another day.

This Nutella mousse is also unforgettable.  It's tempting not to give out the recipe because then you'll see how easy it is to make, and the end result might not seem so impressive.  But it's too good not to share, so here it is. I use it over and over again; I was actually quite surprised to see it's not on my blog yet in fact.  It more than holds its own as a pie or tart filling; it's delightful between cake layers; it's delicious with nothing but a spoon.

So is this my new favorite cake?  Surprisingly, no.  I love each component separately, but they didn't quite become more than the sum of their parts when joined.  Maybe the yellow cake just doesn't have as much of a shelf life as some cakes, I admit I did not serve it on the day it was made.  I'll give it another try, serving immediately.  Now, don't let me dissuade you from making this cake; it is wonderful.  It's just not quite as amazing as I had expected, given the brilliance of the individual components.

Tomorrow, in baking class, we graduate from cakes.  You'll be seeing meringue, cream puffs, eclairs (oh how good this Nutella mousse would taste inside a fluffy crisp cream puff), pies, and tarts.  Happy baking!