Week 135:
RECIPE OF THE WEEK FROM HIGHFIELD HALL & GARDENS STAFF, LISA WALKER
I am lucky enough to walk my dogs with a wonderful group of women. We connected through our dogs but, during the walks, we find so much more to talk about and share. One woman in this group is PJ Hamel.
PJ is a baking legend, she worked developing recipes for King Arthur Baking Company (formerly King Arthur Flour), she is a food blogger, won a James Beard award for the King Arthur cookbook, she is a dog lover, and extremely patient with all my baking and food questions!
Recently she told me about the King Arthur Original Cake Pan Cake recipe, she said it was the 225 th Anniversary Recipe of the Centuries and beyond being absolutely delicious and easy to make it is also vegan – no dairy, no butter, and best of all no eggs (and with the price of eggs these days that means something)!
My go-to chocolate cake has always been Ina Garten’s “Beatty’s chocolate cake,” but step aside Ina and Beatty, this is THE cake to keep in your back pocket at all times! This recipe makes a 8” or 9” square or round but it can easily be doubled for a 9×12 or two rounds. I hope you’ll try it and like it as much as I did!
King Arthur Original Cake Pan Cake
Ingredients
- 1 1/2 cups (180g) King Arthur Unbleached All-Purpose Flour
- 1 cup (198g) granulated sugar
- 1/4 cup (21g) unsweetened cocoa, Dutch-process or natural*
- 1/2 teaspoon salt
- 1/2 teaspoon espresso powder (optional but I would recommend using it)
- 1 teaspoon baking soda
- 1 teaspoon King Arthur Pure Vanilla Extract
- 1 tablespoon (14g) cider vinegar or white vinegar
- 1/3 cup (67g) vegetable oil
- 1 cup (227g) water, cold
Instructions
- Preheat your oven to 350°F. Lightly grease an 8-inch square or 9-inch round pan that's at least 2 inches deep.
- Whisk the dry ingredients together in a medium-sized bowl. Whisk the vanilla, vinegar, vegetable oil, and water in a separate bowl. Pour the wet ingredients into the bowl of dry ingredients, stirring until thoroughly combined. Pour the batter into the prepared pan.
- Bake the cake for 25 to 35 minutes, until a toothpick inserted into the center comes out clean, or with a few moist crumbs clinging to it.
- Serve the cake right from the pan; warm from the oven. I made a vegan chocolate ganache with dark chocolate chips, oat milk, and confectioner’s sugar but feel free to top it however you like!