Cakes Galore

I'm back from France, done with my externship (woohoo!) and beginning my career. (sort of)
I'll probably touch more on that later.

But for now, I got an itch to bake some cakes yesterday. One for my brothers belated birthday celebration and the second because my mom found her angel food cake pan in the garage recently and I couldn't not make an angel food cake knowing this information.

I LOVE angel food cake.

I made one in my Baking and Pastry class back in culinary school and it turned out absolutely perfect. I even received praise from my picky Chef for its delightful texture and crispy crust. I dream about that cake. My second attempt was a failure that I quickly blamed on my Dad's faulty oven, but something tells me I wasn't fully present during the production. Yesterday was my third attempt and though not completely disappointing, I didn't beam with joy when I saw the results. Too flat, the edges weren't crunchy enough and the flavor wasn't up to par. I need help. Maybe it's the lack of measuring (I didn't use a scale, forgive me) or the non-convection oven I used. Whatever it is I want it fixed because I don't think I can handle seeing another imperfect angel food cake. If you have advice I could use it. (Lisa, I'm talking to you...) Could it have been the recipe I used?

sad right?

On to less depressing things. My chocolate cake I made turned out fabulously and Jared, my brother, complimented me on it, which rarely happens. He described it as a truffle chocolate cake because of its rich taste and fudge-like frosting (literally the cake wouldn't come to "room-temp" since it's so cold here and the frosting stayed fudge-like...like a piece of fudge).



You can find the recipe here ('Fudgy Chocolate Layer Cake' from Epicurious). I halved it and made a half moon cake. At first I thought it would look silly but I quickly fell in love with the funky shaped cake and think I'll do it again real soon. Who needs twelve servings of cake anyway?

Beware, this cake is RICH...like grab a tall glass of milk and sit down rich. It has espresso in it too so take heed. I subbed espresso from an espresso machine for the instant stuff called for in the recipe since I hate buying instant espresso. It bothers me to see it in my cupboard being unused in between 'Fudgy Chocolate Layer Cake' endeavors.
If you have a chocolate lover in your life you should make this cake and watch them swoon when they take the first bite. Oh and believe me, they will swoon.