Saturday, March 8, 2014 – I’m taking a cake baking and decorating class at Sizzleworks. So the time I would use for cooking, I now use for baking.
Before we get started, I’d like to show off my new toy:
I have a KitchenAid Artisan stand mixer, and the paddle attachment that comes with it leaves a lot to be desired. I recently discovered the New Metro Beater Blade (courtesy of the folks at Sizzleworks), and it is amazing. This blade has single-handedly cut mixing time in half, and reduces the amount of scraping I have to do. If you’ve already shelled out the money for a KitchenAid stand mixer, you might as well shell out the extra money for a good set of blades.
Just make sure you get the right blade. For Artisans, you’ll want the KA-TH (KitchenAid Tilt-Head), or as I like to call it, “Kathy”.
In any case, the first baking class was learning the basics. Namely, the creaming method. Except I already know the creaming method, so it was really just applying their recipe for Double Vanilla Pound Cake. (Except I didn’t want to deal with infusing a vanilla bean into milk, so I just used vanilla paste.) It went well, except I think my eggs were too cold. But I’ll let you decide. Here are some super close-ups so you can see the crumb:
It’s more crumbly than spongy. And here’s the same piece from another angle:
Also, I’ve decided the best way to break an egg is inside one bowl, then pour it into the other bowl. Because breaking it on a table is a very good way to make an egg go splat on the table and entirely lose the egg. And breaking it in a bowl full of eggs is kinda difficult. (And breaking it on the side of the bowl, though common, is what they teach you not to do in pretty much every cooking class.)
Also, apparently to fill out a loaf pan, you need a whole pound of ingredients. The recipe called for a half pound of each ingredient, and as you can see, the pound cake is kinda short. (But it’s enough to fill out a 9 inch round cake pan though. Cakes are weird.)
We also learned how to make a free spreads in class. I guess to add a little variety. So I decided to make lemon curd. It’s really easy. Lemon zest, lemon juice, sugar, salt, egg, butter, and microwave.
Yes, you need a big cup, because it boils over quickly. Also, when it finally cooled, I used it as a spread on a slice of pound cake. (But let’s be honest, it didn’t need it.)
And lastly, before we go, a taste of things to come:
