So Let Them Eat Cake...

As you have probably figured out by now, I like to take whatever has happened in my week and somehow connect it to the books I review. The past week involved my monthly get together at the library with my Cookbook Club. 



Two of my Cookbook Club pals Crystal and Amy!

Each month when the Cookbook Club gets together, we have a theme. April's theme was spaghetti sauce. Now it is true that I love to cook from scratch, but spaghetti sauce isn't one of the items I attempt. My idea of spaghetti is to open a jar of Ragu, add ground beef, and pour it over cooked angel hair pasta. That being the case, I chose to bring a dessert that I thought would go wonderfully with the various versions of spaghetti, an Italian Cream Cake.

Not having made many cakes from scratch in the past, I boldly went where I had not gone before... my mother's house. Okay, so I have been to my mother's house before, but that just sounded so dramatic that I couldn't resist. The reason I had to go to my  mother's house was to borrow two nine inch cake pans. I had two eight inch pans, I had a ten inch pan, I had assorted sizes of spring form pans, but not a single nine inch pan did I posses.

I then went home and set about to bake my cake. The only problem I ran into was that the recipe called for the batter to be put into three pans. But, being the creative soul that I am, I simply split the batter between two cake pans, and put the remaining batter in a bowl. Once the first two cakes were done, I washed the pan and baked the third. Problem solved. It smelled great when I was baking it, looked delicious when I was frosting it, and tasted fabulous when I was eating it! Everyone else must have thought it tasted fabulous as well, because all I came home with was one small slice.

Italian Cream Cake

Since I had also attended a volunteer brunch that same morning (I am a library volunteer), I squeezed my book choosing session in-between the two feasts. Because I had so lovingly baked a cake to share with friends, I thought it would be fun to review a book involving  cake. The book I found was Splat The Cat Takes The Cake an I Can Read Level One book.



Splat the cat wants to enter a cake contest, but his first attempt is a disaster. A very tired Splat goes to bed and dreams of a solution. He bakes a super cake and takes the super cake prize. His cake wasn't the tallest, wasn't the prettiest, and it wasn't the widest, so how did he win? To find out, you will have to be sure to read this book for yourself. And if you want to try your hand at an Italian Cream Cake, my recipe is as follows:

 Cake 
 

1 cup buttermilk 
1 tsp baking soda
1 cup butter softened
2 cups sugar
5 eggs
1 tsp vanilla
1 cup shredded coconut
1 tsp baking powder
2 cups flour

Icing

8 ounces cream cheese softened
1/2 cup butter softened
1 tsp vanilla
4 cups powdered sugar
2 TBS milk
1/2 cup chopped pecans                                                               

Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Grease three nine inch pans and flour them. Set aside. In a small bowl dissolve baking soda in buttermilk. Set aside.

In a large bowl cream butter and sugar until smooth. Add eggs, buttermilk, and vanilla beating until well mixed. Add coconut, flour, and baking powder. Pour into pans and bake for thirty minutes or until toothpick comes out of center cleanly. Allow to cool.

To make frosting, combine cream cheese, butter, vanilla, and sugar. Mix well. Add milk a little at a time until desired consistency is reached. Spread between layers and then frost tops and sides. Sprinkle top with chopped pecans. (My picture doesn't show nuts because we have a member with nut allergies).

Well, that about wraps it up for this week. Join me next week for another exciting episode, same crazy time, same crazy channel. And feel free to drop by my personal website, Fun With Aileen, any day of the week for even more on reading, writing, my very own early grade chapter book, Fern Valley, and my soon to be released sequel, Return To Fern Valley, coming summer of 2014! I'm also on twitter @AileenWStewart if you want an extremely brief glimpse into my days.