Red Velvet

This summer there has been several new TV shows and specials on bakeries, cakes, cupcakes and all of them talk about their Red Velvet Cake. Admittedly I did not know a lot about this type of cake, and not sure I had ever eaten it, much less made it. I had heard some people say they just add a bottle of red food coloring to chocolate cake. Which did not make a whole lot of sense to me – what was the point?

So I set out to experiment with some authentic Red Velvet Cake. I found a recipe that looked good and I went to town. I also did some research on what exactly Red Velvet was. According to my good friend Wiki….

A Red velvet cake is a cake with a dark red, bright red or red-brown color. It is usually prepared as a layer cake somewhere between chocolate and vanilla in flavor, topped with a creamy white icing. Common ingredients are buttermilk, butter, flour, cocoa, and red food coloring or beetroot; although beetroot is traditionally used, many prefer food coloring since it is seen as more appealing.

A red velvet cake was a signature dessert at the Waldorf-Astoria Hotel in New York City during the 1920s. According to a common urban legend of the 1960s a woman once asked for the recipe for the cake, and was billed a large amount. Indignant, she spread the recipe in a chain letter.

In Canada the cake was a well-known dessert in the restaurants and bakeries of the Eaton's department store chain in the 1940s and 1950s. Promoted as an exclusive Eaton's recipe, with employees who knew the recipe sworn to silence, many mistakenly believed the cake to be the invention of the department store matriarch, Lady Eaton.

I decided to make the recipe into cup cakes and over all pleased with how it turned out. I do think they baked for a minute too long and could be a bit more moist, so I will continue to play around with the recipe.

The cake recipe I found was paired with a meringue frosting. I decided to try that as well. That turned out wonderful and it a for sure winner.

Here is the result.

I realized when taking the picture that it was hard to see the shiny frosting against my white counter tops, so here it is on a better background.

I also think I achieved another baker’s right of passage with this experiment. On several of the shows, especially the challenge ones, people often get burned while melting sugar. In a recent episode one of the people needed medical attention due to the burn. I didn’t bet why this was such a big deal, until I experienced it. I got splattered with some melting sugar and it hurt a bit, but I did not think it was that big of deal. But then it I noticed it blistered almost immediately – crazy – that means it is a 2nd degree burn. Thankfully it was only a small splatter on my finger, but I can see how a large area would not be a good thing.