The Food Maven Diary
[Archives]

[Previous Entry] [Diary Home] [Next Entry]

04/02/2003 Archived Entry: "Homemade Cake Mix"

I was thrilled and flattered to get an on-air call from Bucharest, Romania last week, from a listener who is now assigned to the American embassy there. Her problem is that she took The Cake Mix Doctor and Chocolate from the Cake Mix Doctor cookbooks by Anne Byrn with her, books that give recipes using cake mixes as a starting point. There are no cake mixes in Romania.

So my listener in Bucharest wondered if she couldn’t put together, from scratch, a facsimile of a cake mix with which she could build her Cake Doctor extravaganzas.

I thought I could find such a recipe easily and I did. There’s a formula for homemade cake mix in the ninth printing (May 1993) of Gloria Pitzer’s The Copycat Cookbook, a thickish, staple-bound booklet from the woman who calls herself “The Recipe Detective.”

I don’t know what’s become of Gloria. Her self-published booklets of facsimile recipes were hugely successful. She was as a guest on “Food Talk” several times. I always learned something from Gloria. Preceding her retirement – she planned to travel around the country with her husband in a Winabago, if I remember correctly -- she made a farewell media tour. But then, like Frank Sinatra, she didn’t really retire. She returned with another booklet and newsletter.

Neither of these recipes, the Yellow Cake or the Chocolate Cake, taste like a cake mix. They taste better. There is nothing in these mixes that you wouldn’t use in a conventional cake. This is why they don’t keep very long – after three months in the refrigerator, the fats could become rancid or may have an “off” flavor.

Yellow Cake Mix
Makes 5 cups, equal to 1 18-ounce package of cake mix

2 cups flour
1 1/2 cups sugar
4 teaspoons baking powder
1 teaspoon salt
1/4 pound (1 stick) butter or margarine, at room temperature, cut into 1/2-inch cubes
3 tablespoons oil

Place all the dry ingredients in a large mixing bowl. Combine thoroughly with a fork.

Add the butter or margarine and the oil. Blend with an electric mixer on the lowest speed until the fats are evenly distributed and the mix has the consistency of fine gravel.

Keep refrigerated in a covered container. To be used within 3 months.

Yellow Cake
(from homemade “Yellow Cake Mix”)
Makes 1 2-layer, 9-inch round cake

5 cups homemade yellow cake mix
1 cup milk
1 1/2 teaspoons vanilla extract
3 large eggs

Preheat the oven to 350 degrees and grease and flour 2 9-inch round baking pans.

Place all ingredients on a bowl and mix with an electric mixer on medium speed for 5 to 6 minutes. Scrape down the sides of the bowl with a rubber spatula 2 to 3 times during mixing.

Pour into the prepared pans and bake for 30 to 40 minutes or until the cake pulls away from the sides of the pan and a cake tester inserted into the cake comes out clean.

Let cool in the pans on a wire rack for 30 minutes, then frost and serve as desired.

Chocolate Cake Mix
Makes 5 cups, equal to 1 18-ounce package of cake mix

2 cups unbleached, all-purpose flour
1 2/3 cups sugar
1/2 cup unsweetened cocoa powder
1 tablespoon baking powder
1/4 teaspoon baking soda
1/4 pound (1 stick) butter or margarine, at room temperature, cut into 1/2-inch cubes
3 tablespoons oil

Place all the dry ingredients in a large mixing bowl. Combine thoroughly with a fork.

Add the butter or margarine and the oil. Blend with an electric mixer on the lowest speed until the fats are evenly distributed and the mix has the consistency of fine gravel.

Keep refrigerated in a covered container. To be used within 3 months.

Chocolate Cake
(from homemade “Chocolate Cake Mix”)
Makes 1 2-layer, 9-inch round cake

5 cups homemade chocolate cake mix
1 cup whole milk
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
1 teaspoon white vinegar
3 large eggs

Preheat the oven to 350 degrees and grease and flour two 9-inch round baking pans.

Place the homemade cake mix in a large mixing bowl and form a well in the center.

Pour all remaining ingredients into a liquid measuring cup, but do not mix.

Pour the wet ingredients into the well and mix with an electric mixer for 5 to 6 minutes. Scrape down the sides of the bowl with a rubber spatula 2 to 3 times during mixing.

Pour into the prepared pans and bake for 35 to 45 minutes or until the cake pulls away from the sides of the pan and a cake tester inserted into the cake comes out clean.

Let cool in the pans on a wire rack for 30 minutes, then frost and serve as desired.