Two days ago my sister was out in Seattle having dinner with a friend.  Simple enough, right?  

She was approached my a friendly faced woman and asked “Are you Joy the Baker’s sister?”  My  sister burst into confused laughter.  They carried on a short, smile filled conversation and went on with their meals… my sister still slightly confounded.  

Lauren is Joy the Baker’s sister… that’s not the confusing part.  The confusing part is that you all might recognize my sister in the world.   Awesome.  Odd.  Strange.  And awesome again.  

Have I told you how awesome you are?  How glad I am that you’re here?  How glad I am that you would say hi to my sister if you saw her in Seattle?  Well…. you are awesome.  I’m so stoked that you’re here and thanks for being nice to my sister.  For.  Reals.  Cause if you weren’t nice to her… we’d have to fight.  That would be weird.  

In other news… I can’t find my tweezers and I made you a cake.  Let’s discuss. 

I’m a sucker for an easy bundt cake… especially when it happens to be covered in blue glaze.  This cake is all sorts of straight forward.  It comes together in two bowls and bakes up in 45 minutes.  I love the teeny tiny crunch of poppy seeds.  To make this more of a breakfast cake, you might add fresh blueberries into the poppy seed batter.  To make this more of a simple and fancy cake, leave the blueberries only for the glaze.  It’s pretty and tasty either way.  

Poppy Seed Cake with Blueberry Glaze

     inspired by Jun and Arlene

     makes one 10-inch bundt cake

     Print this Recipe!

2 1/2 cups all-purpose flour

1 1/2 cup sugar

1 teaspoon baking soda

1 teaspoon salt

1 1/3 cup canola oil

1 cup buttermilk

2 large egg

1 teaspoon white vinegar

1 teaspoon vanilla extract

2 Tablespoons poppy seeds

Blueberry Glaze

1/4 cup frozen blueberries, thawed but not drained

1 1/2 cup powdered sugar

1/4 teaspoon vanilla extract

1/2 teaspoon fresh lemon juice

2 teaspoons buttermilk (or regular milk is fine too) 

Preheat oven to 325 degrees F.  Place a rack in the center of the oven.  Grease and flour a 10-inch bundt pan and set aside.  

In a medium bowl, whisk together the flour, sugar, baking soda and salt.  In another medium bowl, whisk together canola oil, buttermilk, egg, vinegar, and vanilla extract.  Add the wet ingredients to the dry ingredients all at once.  Whisk together until just combined and no lumps remain.  Stir in the poppy seeds.  Pour the batter into the prepared baking pan and bake for 35-45 minutes, or until a cake tester inserted in the center of the cake comes out clean.

Allow the cake to cook in the pan for 20 minutes.  Carefully run a butter knife along the edges of the cake to assure that it is well loosed before inverting the cake onto a wire rack to cool.

To make the blueberry glaze:

Mash the thawed blueberries in a medium sized bowl releasing lots of dark blue juice.  Remove most of the blueberry skins from the juice and discard.  Add the vanilla extract, buttermilk and lemon.  Add the powdered sugar and whisk to combine.  If the mixture is too thick, add more milk to reach the desired consistency.  If the mixture is too thin, add just a bit more powdered sugar.

Drizzle the glaze over the completely cooled bundt cake and allow to set for 20 minutes before serving. 

Before I made this cake on Sunday afternoon, I sat down with a nice, tall root beer float.  Sure, it was 10:30 in the morning.  I suppose that technically that means I had a root beer float for breakfast.  That’s one of the great thing about being an adult, you can have a float for breakfast with no resistance.

Something about a root beet float puts me on a conveyor belt back to some really random childhood memories.  The taste, the bubbles, the increasingly creamy soda… it take me back to constantly skinned knees, playing in a beat-up old red wagon with my sister, and sitting in front of an old black and white television watching baseball with my grandfather.  Funny what a little ice cream and soda can do in your brain, right?

But cake!?  Root Beet Float Cake?  I have so many questions.  Will it have the same memory inducing effects as the real deal?  Is that asking too much?  Wait, is this cake chocolate or root beer?  Can I eat it for breakfast?  Will it change my life for the better?

Answers and cake, just a click away.

Here’s what you should know about the Root Beer Float Cake.  It’s a wonderfully moist, super chocolate Bundt Cake.  It’s the kind of cake that’s great to take to a outdoor summer party because it has the “hmmm” factor.  People will wonder what’s in it besides the chocolate.

The cake doesn’t have the same memory inducing effects as a real root beer float.  I blame that on all the chocolate.  The root beer flavor does intensify in the cake the next day.  I suggest making the cake a day ahead, wrapping it well, then frosting it and serving the next day.  And yes… cake for breakfast is always encouraged around these parts.  Cake for breakfast usually makes my life better.

Try this cake.  Maybe for Memorial Day.  Maybe put it on your summer baking list.  I’d love to hear what you think!

Root Beer Float Cake

Baked: New Frontiers in Baking

Print this recipe!

2 cups root beer (don’t use diet)

1 cup dark unsweetened cocoa powder

1/2 cup unsalted butter, cut into 1/2 inch cubes

1 1/4 cup granulated sugar

1/2 cup dark brown sugar

2 cups all-purpose flour

1 1/4 teaspoons baking soda

1 teaspoon salt

2 large eggs

Preheat even to 325 degrees F.  Spray the inside of a 10-inch Bundt pan with nonstick cooking spray, or butter generously and dust with flour, knocking out the excess.

In a small saucepan, heat the root beer, cocoa powder and butter over medium heat until butter is melted.  Add sugars and whisk until dissolved.  Remove from heat and let cool.

In a large bowl, whisk together the flour, baking soda and salt.

In a small bowl whisk the eggs until just beaten.  Then whisk into the cocoa mixture until combined.  Gently fold the flour mixture into the cocoa mixture.  The batter will be slightly lumpy.  You can give it a quick whisk if you like, but don’t over beat the batter or it could cause the cake to be tough.  Don’t worry, the batter is very loose.

Pour the batter into prepared pan and cook for 35-45 minutes, rotating the pan halfway through baking until a sharp knife inserted in the center comes out clean.  Transfer to a wire rack to cool completely then loosen edges with a butter knife and turn out onto a cake plate.

Chocolate Root Beer Frosting

2 ounces 60% cocoa, melted

1 stick unsalted butter, softened

1 teaspoon salt (you may want to use less… maybe just 1/2 teaspoon)

1/4 cup root beer

2/3 cup unsweetened cocoa powder

2 1/2  cups powdered sugar

In the bowl of a stand mixer, or using an electric hand mixer, beat softened butter and cocoa powder.  Once combined add the melted chocolate, salt, powdered sugar and root beer.  Beat together until smooth.  Spread on top of cooled cake.  Slice and serve with  vanilla ice cream.

So sneaky!  This cake is nothing but sneaky.   It may not have the looks of a world class chocolate cake, but please don’t underestimate me when I tell you that this is one of the best chocolate cakes I’ve ever experiences.

If this chocolate cake were your blind date, you might think to yourself, well…. he’s not as tall as guys I usually date, and he’s a little dorky.  But by the end of the night, you’re both laughing hysterically, he’s taken off his glasses to reveal quite a handsome man, and you’re already thinking about the cute pair of flats you’re going to buy so you’re not taller than him.

This is that cake.  It’ll surprise you.  It might seem a little short, and a little dorky, but trust me when I say it’s worth the leap of faith.

With the flavors of chocolate, coffee and rum, this cake tastes like it’s loaded with all the good things in the world.  I topped mine with a simple rum glaze, but if served slightly warm, I think lightly sweetened whipped cream would be divine.

This Mocha Rum Cake is impossibly moist, and dense without being heavy.  Let yourself be surprised by this little gem.

Mocha Rum Cake

adapted from Gourmet, January 1994

Print this recipe!

cocoa powder for dusting
3 cups all-purpose flour
1 1/2 teaspoons baking soda
3/4 teaspoon salt
3/4 pound fine-quality bittersweet chocolate (not unsweetened), chopped
3 sticks (1 1/2 cups) unsalted butter, cut into pieces
1 cup dark rum
1 1/3 cups strong brewed coffee
2 1/4 cups granulated sugar
3 large eggs, beaten lightly
1 1/2 teaspoons vanilla
confectioners’ sugar for dusting

lightly sweetened whipped cream

Preheat oven to 300°F. Butter a 4 1/2-inch-deep (12-cup) Kugelhupf or bundt pan and dust with cocoa powder, knocking out excess.

In a bowl whisk together flour, baking soda, and salt. In a large metal bowl set over a saucepan of barely simmering water melt chocolate and butter, stirring until smooth. Remove chocolate from heat and stir in rum, coffee, and granulated sugar. With an electric mixer beat in flour, 1/2 cup at a time, scraping down side, and beat in eggs and vanilla until batter is combined well.  The batter may seem very loose.  That’s perfect!  Pour batter into prepared pan.

Bake cake in middle of oven until a tester comes out clean, about 1 hour and 50 minutes. Let cake cool completely in pan on a rack and turn it out onto rack. Cake may be made 3 days in advance and kept wrapped well and chilled.

Dust cake with confectioners’ sugar and serve with whipped cream.

I made a simple rum glaze with 2 cups powdered sugar and 2-3 Tablespoons of rum.

Chocolate and orange are like a dream to me.  Although my dream last night had nothing to do with chocolate and orange, and everything to do with watching some bizarre alley cat trying to eat giant hissing grasshoppers, or something.  I woke up wanting a thick slice of this cake for breakfast.  You know, to make everything right in the world again.  It’s that simple.

Another reason I think this cake is dreamy is that it’s one moist cake batter, divided into two, flavored, then dumped in a bundt pan.   It’s great for those last minute, in a pinch desserts.

The cake is loaded with sour cream, and is incredibly moist.  The orange zest adds brightness and chocolate and chocolate chips add richness.  It’s absolutely delicious, and perfect if you wake up from bad dreams.

Chocolate Orange Bundt Cake

adapted from the Gourmet Cookbook

Print this recipe!

3 1/2 cups cake flour

1 Tablespoon baking powder

3/4 teaspoon baking soda

1 teaspoon salt

2 sticks (1/2 pound) unsalted butter at room temprature

2 cups sugar

4 large eggs, left at room temperature for 30 minutes

2 teaspoons vanilla extract

2 cups sour cream

1/2 teaspoon orange extract

zest of 1 large orange

4 tablespoons cocoa powder

1/2 cup chocolate chips

Put rack in the oven and preheat oven to 350 degrees F.  Butter and flour a 12 cup Bundt pan and set aside.

Sift together flour, baking powder, baking soda and salt and set aside.

Beat together butter and sugar in a large bowl with an electric mixer at medium speed until pale and fluffy, about 3 minutes.  Add eggs one at a time, beating well after each addition, then beat in vanilla.  Reduce speed to low, add half of flour mixture, and mix until just blended.  Add sour cream, mixing until just combined, then add remaining flour mixture and mix until smooth.

Divide the batter evenly into two bowls.  In one bowl add the orange zest and orange extract and stir to combine.  In the other  bowl add sifted cocoa powder and chocolate chips and stir to combine.

First pour the orange batter into the buttered Bundt pan, spreading it evenly around the bottom of the pan.  Next, simply add the chocolate batter on top of the orange to cover.  No swirling is necessary, although you can swirl the batters together if you like.

Bake until cake is springy to the touch and a wooden pick inserted in the center comes out clean, 45 minutes to 1 hour.

Remove from oven and cool cake in the pan for 30 minutes.  Invert onto a cooling rack and cool completely.

This is one of the recipes in my collection that invariably makes me raise one eyebrow in suspicion.  It’s a Bundt cake that’s is not only flavored by orange juice, it’s flavored by the whole darn orange- pulp, pith and peel.  I’ve made this cake twice now.  It not exactly the effortless Bundt cake you might expect. But a dozen eggs, and two pounds of butter later, I think I have figured out it’s little quirks.  Once the little hiccups are managed, this turns out to be a delightful cake with loads of  kick-you-in-the-mouth orange flavor.

I first saw this recipe in a podcast by Sweet Melissa, a baker lady in New York.

Whole Orange Poppy Seed Cake

Print this recipe!

2 whole oranges, seedless Navel

12.8 oz melted butter

6 eggs

2 cups sugar

3 cups flour

4 1/2 teaspoons baking powder

1 1/2 teaspoons salt

2 Tablespoons poppy seeds

1. Preheat oven to 350.  Sift together the flour, baking powder and salt.  Set aside.

2.  Slice the two oranges into wedges.  Place wedges in the food processor with the blade attachment.  Process oranges until they are pulverized into orange mush.  Depending on your food processor, this can take 2- 5 minutes.  You may need to stop the food processor half way through to scrape down the sides.

This is what the orange will look like when it comes out of the food processor.

3.  Add eggs to the bowl of an electroc mixer.  Turn on low speed.  Slowly add the sugar to the beating eggs.  Once incorporated, add the cooled melted butter in a steady stream.  Once incorporated, add the orange.

4.  Using a large wooden spoon, fold in the dry ingredients.  Stop mixing once all dry ingredients are no longer visible.

5.  Pour batter into very well greased and floured Bundt pan.  Bake at 350 for 60-70 minutes.

I learned two things the hard way with this cake.

1.  Because of all the orange goodness, this is a very moist, wet cake.  Though a toothpick may come out clean after an hour, indicating that the cake is done, it may still need some time.  I would suggest leaving the cake in a bit longer that your tooth pick tells you.

2.  Let the cake cool in the pan for at least half and hour.  I tried to turn my cake out while it was still warm.  It didn’t work out so well for me.  The top of the Bundt stayed in the pan.  I had to pull the old patch-and-frost maneuver to save it.

Citrus Glaze

Juice of half an orange

Zest of 1 lemon

3 cups powdered sugar.

1. Add juice and zest to powdered sugar.  Wish vigorously until well combined and no lumps are present.  Add more orange juice as necessary to make a thinner glaze.

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