Back-to-school is upon us 
What’s in your oven?
Unfortunately, it will be too hot here (Los Angeles, CA) to bake for the next week or so.
A couple of days ago I made Cook’s Illustrated’s Cheese Quick Bread.
It’s a favorite in our household. The technique of cutting the cheddar cheese in chunks instead of grating it makes nice pockets of cheese. The technique of grating the Parmesan on the large holes of the grater makes a crunchy layer of toasty cheese.
5 Likes
Paging @sallyt and others who made the Grapefruit White Chocolate Cake from Snacking Cakes!
I’m planning to make it tomorrow as a loaf (instead of my usual orange olive oil cake lol) to take to a friend’s for the weekend — is the white chocolate in it really discernible?
I’ve got the oleosaccharum going from the zest of a big pink grapefruit, and WOW! It’s potent! So I was curious whether the chocolate will actually add much by the time the grapefruit juice goes in too.
As an aside, it’s interesting how this cake follows the same oil cake / yogurt cake proportions, which I love!
2 Likes
I wouldn’t say that it’s discernible but it adds so much to the texture of the cake. Don’t omit it!
3 Likes
Haha this is exactly the scolding I needed 
I’ve got white chocolate chips, will use them!. As I was thinking about it, the white chocolate probably mellows the bite of the grapefruit too.
And I was curious about only 3/4 c sugar (Alexandra calls for 1.5c in her orange cake, which I always cut back to 3/4 to 1c) but of course white chocolate is really sweet so 3/4 makes sense.
ETA: Thank you for the speedy reply!
2 Likes
I love this cake. I made it for friends and one of them said it was one of the best things she’s ever eaten. Enjoy!
Buttermilk sandwich bread. Recipe from an old Bernard Clayton book. Had just the right amount of buttermilk needing to be used. Nice bread for sandwiches and toast.
18 Likes
Berry tart three ways…blackberry, golden raspberries, red raspberries. Pâte Sablée and crème pâtissère were the underpinnings for the berries. Would be nice with crème fraîche or a little whipped cream.
19 Likes
Lookin’ bodacious!
1 Like
Alrighty, finished up.
This is the Grapefruit and White Chocolate Cake from Snacking Cakes, which lots of folks here have baked before, I am very late to the party.
It’s an oil and yogurt citrus cake with grapefruit as the citrus and white chocolate to offset the bitterness. The yogurt gives it a softer texture than the orange olive oil cakes I often bake.
One thing I haven’t encountered in a while - the cake sank as it cooled. Not concave, but from nicely domed to flat. It last happened the first time I baked an orange olive oil cake, and my fix was to drop the temperature to 325 (vs the 375 of that recipe) - never happened again. So I’m wondering why it happened today. So far my theories are that the batter is very rich because of the whole milk yogurt plus oil plus chocolate chips.
One day I’ll learn to make a glaze look pretty
The tester I made is delicious (even though the chocolate chips sank in that tiny portion)! I hope my friend’s parents, for whom the loaf is intended, will enjoy it!
.
13 Likes
I’ve never made it In a loaf pan but my theory would be that it’s too thick a structure for that kind of cake. I’ve actually only made it with chopped white chocolate - I never use chips unless explicitly called for - and the chopped white chocolate melted into the cake. Glad that you liked it!!
3 Likes
Technically I baked this in August, but had to wait until now to try it. This is a whisky raisin pound cake because I was out of rum. The raisins are left to soak at least a week then after the cake is baked it’s left to soak up boozy syrup and mellow out a little. It’s delicious, but previously I made a test version of this which I didn’t brush with syrup and ate immediately and I think I might have liked it even more.
11 Likes
The book had adjustments for a loaf pan, so I’d figured it was tested?
Re sinking, I’ll experiment again. I’ve made yogurt and oil cakes that didn’t sink in a loaf pan, so it may be managing the temperature, or it may be cutting back the yogurt, let’s see.
I’m hoping the chips didn’t sink in the loaf, but we’ll see when it’s cut.
Lovely crumb on the little tester - so tender from the yogurt!
1 Like
I have made that cake twice in a 5 cup Lotus Bundt pan (Nordic ware) with no sinking. It’s taller than a loaf pan but gets some structural support from the shape, baked at 335*.
I was thinking about using my small bundt one of these times.
I think the sinking was just a freak thing.
I agree, especially since she offers it as an alternative.
Yup. When I made the orange olive oil cake from Alexandra bakes, it both overflowed and sank later — and the recipe actually said that was “normal.”
But of course, when I cut the baking soda by half and reduced the temp drastically (375 to 325) in subsequent attempts, that never happened again! (She amended the recipe last year with the temp change and an extra egg probably for structure, but I find that unnecessary because it’s already so rich.)
Goes without saying that if it hadn’t tasted great the first time, I would never have bothered figuring out how to fix it! I’ll make this one again too, noodling on what might have caused it is helpful with everyone’s input!
(My sister asked if I left the cake in the oven after turning it off because I did that ONCE in her presence and the eggless banana bread I was baking for mom sank similarly… but that time I had winged the measure of leavening and added yogurt to convert my usual recipe, so I was pretty sure it was that messing around that did it.)
Just maybe
