Anne spends almost as much time in the kitchen as I do. She loves to watch me and help in whatever ways she can. Almost every time I go into the kitchen to start cooking or baking I can pretty much count on her joining me with her chair in tow within about 2 minutes.
I was baking yesterday and Anne had been watching me for quite a while. The idea entered my head to let her make her own cake, just for fun. I asked her if she wanted to and told her that I wasn't really going to help her. She got the biggest grin on her face and immediately set to work. She was positively giddy. She came up with the entire recipe on her own and it's pretty creative. The only thing I had to set her straight on was the very first ingredient, flour, she said, "Hmm, I think I should start with 7 cups of flour." After I told her she probably should start with one, she pretty much did all the measuring herself. On a few of the ingredients, she sought my opinion sneakily by stating what she was going to do with a bit of a question mark at the end. She didn't want to appear to be new at this! Well, here is her recipe.
Anne's Chocolate Cake
"We always use a bowl for all the flour and sugar and dry kind of things, don't we."
In a large bowl, combine:
1 Cup Flour (no, not 7)
1 Cup Sugar
3/4 Teaspoon Baking Soda
"A little salt" (about 1/4 Teaspoon)
1/2 Cup Cocoa
In another bowl combine:
1 Stick Butter (softened)
1 Egg
1/2 Cup Buttermilk ("We like to put buttermilk in our cakes and things because it's gooood.")
"Some Vanilla. Vanilla doesn't taste good when we drink it plain but in a cake it's so gooood!"
Add to dry ingredients with mixer.
Then add, (because "It needs something to make it creamy." Off to the fridge!)
4 Ounces Cream Cheese (softened)
"It's kind of chunky and thick. Yeah, it's too thick. Sometimes it's ok to add water isn't it."
Add 2 Tablespoons water
Mix until smooth. In fact, I don't know that you can over-mix this cake. Anne likes using the mixer. Pour into a greased 8x8 pan. (Anne used a small rectangular one I had but it's probably about the size of an 8x8.) Bake at 350 about 20 minutes or until a toothpick inserted in middle comes out clean.
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| From Bakery |
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| From Bakery |
6 comments:
Well- was it any good?
It was actually really good! I'm going to let her make it to serve for dessert some time.
that is really cool that she is starting young - she's lucky that she'll get your fabulous cooking tips!
That's awesome that she is starting young - she's lucky that you'll be able to pass on all of your fabulous cooking tips!
I've been thinking about making that cake for Grandpa
I'm thinking about making Annie's cake for Grandpa.
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