My Baking Adventure...White Forest Cherry Cake

For my Sunday dinner group, I decided to be adventurous and expand my baking capabilities outside of cookies and brownies. After looking through various recipes and successfully baking Martha Stewart's lemon cake last weekend, I decided to try making a White Forest Cherry Cake, which is a spin on Black Forest Cherry Cake. Instead of chocolate cake, you use vanilla cake and vanilla frosting. Thank you Betty Crocker. I made everything from scratch, with my biggest challenged being the cherry filling. The filling consisted of bringing one cup of cherry syrup with sugar and cornstarch to a boil, whiile stirring constantly. After doing that, I added some vanilla extract instead of brandy extract. It tasted delicious. The cake is a yellow whipped cake. It is made using whipping cream. It is delicate. The frosting is made from beating whipping cream with powdered sugar. After making all the elements, I made two cake layers. I spread the filling between the two and then frosted it. I topped the cake off by adding cherries that I also dipped into the cherry filling mixture. Here is the finished product. It is not that spectacular because I am not a cake decorator, I know that and will proudly admit that. I wish Aubree had been here to lend her creative talents to me. I can bake, but not decorate. The cake is delicious and that is what matters. I am really proud of it because I wasnot sure I could do it.

The cake...I put grated sweet chocolate around the sides.
The cherry topping....

The finished product.

After completing this cake, I reflected on where this baking talent came from. It comes from my mom and my aunt Julee and from my Great Grandmother Litchfield (nee Hall). It is our Welsh baking genes that come out. Yeah for the Halls. My ancestors were truly talented cooks and this passes down through our family. We are Welsh bakers/cooks. It is in us, all of us. Renee, Julee, Aubree, me, my mom, and even Nathan (or as I refer to him as Alton Brown Jr). We just love to cook and bake. I think it sometimes bewilders my mom because none of us really wanted to cook/bake growing up, but now we love it. I loved it over Christmas when Eli helped me make Peanut Butter Cup Cookies. He will be good because both of his parents make good food. Laurel makes these amazing rolls that I always look forward too. Whenever I see them, I am like screw the diet and bring on the carbs.

I am proud to have inherited this talent because I love to bake. I learned from the best, I really did. (FYI, for my birthday I really want a cookie scoop and a sifter, how nerdy is that). Thank you!!! No one will ever cook a better meal than my mom. I love her dearly. She is so amazing and wonderful. I am luckily to be her daugther. I cannot wait to see her in a few weeks when my wonderful sister Renee graduates from the U. I am so proud of Renee. She has worked so hard for her degree. I love her. Okay, I am going to stop now before this turns into a big love fest.