Sweet Potato Chocolate Marble Bundt Cake (Gluten Free, Grain Free)

This was my birthday cake I made a couple weeks ago, but it would be perfect for your Thanksgiving desserts or Christmas, or any holiday or any occasion or just because you want cake—it’s practically healthy!  Get this—the cake is not only gluten free, but it’s grain free and it’s made with much healthier coconut sugar and raw honey for the sweetener.  Hello, it also has a vegetable in it.  The sweet potato acts like pumpkin.  I love the flavor.  With sweet spices added, sweet potato and and chocolate go together perfectly!  If you’re trying to find healthier desserts or have diet restrictions, this pretty bundt cake would be just right for you. 
It was certainly just right for my birthday, which just happens to fall on National Bundt Day, November 15.  I’ve enjoyed making a bundt cake for my birthday for a number of years now, ever since Mary at The Food Librarian started in with her love of bundts.  She has hundreds of bundt cakes posted on her blog.  She would even do 30 days of bundts leading up to my birthday National Bundt Day, and post a bundt a day before that.  She did that for a couple years.  She has some great round ups of all the cakes she’s made as well as some round ups of the bundts everyone makes to join in the fun and send her their links. 

I can’t wait to make this cake again.  I recently bought two sweet potatoes that were huge—one was over three pounds!  I baked it and used it to make a puree.  It was well enough for this cake and a lot more.  Some of it even went in the freezer since I went out of town and couldn’t eat it all up before it would have spoiled.  I still have the second big one and some smaller ones to use up.  I thought the big one wouldn’t be good (over grown) or as sweet or something, but it was great and perfect for this cake!
Sweet Potato Chocolate Marble Bundt Cake, by Katrina, Baking and Boys!
4 ounces good chocolate, melted and cooled (I used Enjoy Life mini chocolate chips)
1/2 cup arrowroot powder
1/4 cup coconut flour
1 cup almond meal/flour
1 teaspoon baking soda
1/2 teaspoon sea salt
1 teaspoon ground cinnamon
1/2 teaspoon ground ginger
1/4 teaspoon ground cloves
1/4 teaspoon freshly ground nutmeg
1/2 cup coconut sugar
1/2 cup (168 grams) raw honey
1/2 cup (224 grams) coconut oil
1 cup (250 grams) sweet potato puree (Make sure it’s cool if you’re baking it right before using it. I baked mine the night before I made the cake, then cooled it and stored it in the refrigerator, then pureed it right before using.)
4 large eggs (I actually used 5 sm-med. farm fresh eggs, for a total of 202 grams out of shell)
2 teaspoon vanilla extract
1/3 cup Enjoy Life mini chocolate chips
Ganache Drizzle:
2 1/2 ounces chocolate (I used mini chocolate chips)
4 tablespoons heavy cream
Preheat oven to 350 degrees F.  Spread coconut oil evenly over the surface of the bundt pan.  (You’ll want at least a 6 cup bundt pan, but bigger will work, too, it’s not a super high cake that totally fills the pan.)  You can also dust it with cocoa powder or almond flour or coconut flour, but I didn’t, just oil.  (The cake stuck in one little place and usually doesn’t at all when I add some kind of flour after oiling the pan.)  Set aside.  Melt the 4 ounces of chocolate in a medium sized microwave-safe bowl.  Stir after 20-30 second intervals until all melted and smooth and let cool while preparing the rest of the ingredients.
In a medium-sized bowl, combine the arrowroot, coconut flour, almond flour, baking soda, salt and all the spices.  Whisk together, set aside.  In a large bowl, combine the coconut sugar, honey and coconut oil.  Whisk (or use mixer) until well combined.  Add the sweet potato puree and beat until combined.  Add the eggs and vanilla and beat well.  Slowly add the dry ingredients and mix together until well combined.  Remove about 1/3 of the cake batter from the bowl into another pan and add the 4 ounces of melted chocolate to it, then combine well. 
Working in spoonsful or scoops at a time, put the batter in the pan, first the sweet potato cake batter, then in opposite places around the bundt the chocolate batter in spoonsful.  Continue in layers of both cake batters until you’ve used it all.  Take a butter knife and swirl the batter to make the marble effect (not too much swirling or it will not look marbled).  Bake in the preheated oven for 30-35 minutes, until a toothpick inserted in the center comes out mostly clean.  Set the pan on a wire rack to cool for about 10 minutes.  Turn the cake over and let it sit for a couple minutes, then tap the sides and bottom of the pan to release the cake.  It should come out nicely!  Heat the cream in a microwave safe bowl until slightly bubbly (careful it doesn’t boil over, it can come to that stage pretty quickly, especially since it’s such a small amount.)  Pour the heated cream over the 2 1/2 ounces of chocolate, let sit for a minute.  Then slowly stir it together until the chocolate is all melted and you have a nice smooth ganache.  You can do this while the cake is cooling as it sets up a bit after it’s all melted.  Drizzle the ganache over the cake (I put it in a plastic zip top bag and snipped the corner off to drizzle it over the cake, you can also do it by the spoonsful.) 

As I wrote down the recipe, it seemed a little involved, but I have found if you get everything out and in place (Mise en place, I’m all for it!), it’s not bad at all.  Prep everything ahead of time, bake your potato, melt the chocolate, etc.—it’s really not too bad.  And fun.  And worth it for this cake!  Not only does it taste great—it looks great, too.  I think it’s a real show stopper.  If you had this on your dessert table and didn’t tell anyone it was grain free, I don’t think anyone would even know.  Only Kevin and my son, Scott, even tasted the cake.  But after that I hid the rest for the next couple days so they didn’t eat more, because it was all for me on National Bundt Day—MY BIRTHDAY!  I thought it tasted better the next day and the next.  Maybe because I’m kind of cake-deprived, but try it and tell me what you think!
I’m home for Thanksgiving in Idaho with my parents while my awesome husband is home with the four boys.  He’s amazing and I am so blessed and grateful for all the wonderful blessings I have been given.  He even spent the last two days repainting our bedroom—5 1/2 years in our home and we’ve never really liked the paint in our room.  Love it now!  Happy Holidays to all!

Homemade Nut Butters—Honey Peanut Butter, Almond Butter and Sunflower Seed Butter

Homemade Honey Peanut Butter, July 2013

I’ve been making homemade nut butters and promised a few people I’d post about them.  There is something about making nut butters homemade that is fun and in my opinion taste better.  I love knowing exactly what is in them and controlling how much salt goes in as well.  It is also more economical than buying them.  I’m sure I’ll still buy my favorite ones from time to time, but I’ve really enjoyed the ones I’ve done so far.

Besides for health reasons, I started  making these after ordering five pounds each of raw sunflower seeds, raw almonds and raw pecans.  I love eating raw nuts and seeds.  I actually prefer sunflower seeds raw rather than roasted and salted.  For the nut butter, I did roast and salt them.

I just made the Honey Peanut Butter yesterday.  I might be my favorite one so far!  I had some raw peanuts and roasted them on a baking sheet.  When they came out of the oven, I sprinkled just a little salt on them.  After they had completely cooled, I put them in the food processor and pulse them until they were chopped finely.  Then I turned the food processor on and let them go until they became a paste.  I would stop and scrape the sides of the bowl from time to time.  It only took about five minutes until they became a great peanut butter.  I sprinkled in a little bit more salt.  Then for kicks, I decided to add some raw honey.  I added a tablespoon.  The peanut butter thickened up quite a bit after I added the honey.  I wasn’t sure if it would smooth back out if I just kept the food processor running, so I decided to add some organic coconut oil to it.  That smoothed it right out and the peanut butter tastes fantastic!  I love just the ever-so-slight hint of coconut flavor and the perfect amount of honey.  This might be my favorite nut butter I’ve made so far, but every time I make one, I think that.  They each taste so different, it’s really hard to say.

Homemade Honey Peanut Butter, by Katrina, Baking and Boys!

2 cups raw peanuts

1/8 teaspoon salt (or to taste)

1 tablespoons raw honey

1 tablespoon organic coconut oil

Preheat oven to 350 degrees.  Spread peanuts on baking sheet in an even layer.  Roast for about 10 minutes.  After removing them from the oven, sprinkle a little salt over them.  Let cool completely.  Put the peanuts in the bowl of a food processor and pulse until they are chopped finely.  Turn the food processor on and let them go until they begin to form a paste.  Scrape the sides of the bowl and process until it becomes a smooth peanut butter ( about 5 minutes total).  Sprinkle with a little more salt.  Add some raw honey (you don’t have to use raw honey).  After it combines, add coconut oil until it is all smooth.  Let the peanut butter cool, then store in a jar.  If it lasts more than a week, store it in the refrigerator.

 

Today I had some of the peanut butter spread on some Grain Free Sandwich Bread I made.  I found the recipe at Unrefined Kitchen.  It is my first try of a grain free bread.  It’s okay.  It’s my first bite of anything bread-like in about a month.  In the recipe, it gives the option of butter or coconut oil.  I used coconut oil.  It also suggested two tablespoons of honey, but more if you want a really sweet bread.  So I only used one tablespoon of raw honey.  I’ll eat the loaf slowly, I’m sure.  It will be fun to try different recipes until I find one that I really like.  It was certainly good with the honey peanut butter on it!

I enjoyed it with some apple slices yesterday not long after I made it.  It’s good enough that I could just dig my finger in the jar as well.  The peanut butter is a light color.  I think it is because the raw peanuts I used did not have skins.  I am assuming a lot of peanut butters are made with the skins on and/or they are roasted to a darker color.  This is perfect to me. ;)

I made sunflower seed butter about three weeks ago.  Loved it.  I need to make some more.  There isn’t really a recipe for that.  I roasted raw sunflower seeds (about 3 cups) on a baking sheet at 350 degrees F. for about 10 minutes.  I lightly salted them when they came out of the oven.  I let them cool completely.  I put them in the food processor and let it go, scraping the sides every couple of minutes until it formed a nice smooth butter.  This took probably closer to a total of 10 minutes until it was the consistency I wanted.  You can decide how smooth or crunchy you’d like any of these butters.

Here’s a couple pictures of the sunflower butter in process.

After a few pulses in the food processor.

After 2 minutes in the food processor.

 

After 4 minutes in the food processor.

After 6 minutes in the food processor.

 

After 8 minutes in the food processor.

My favorite thing to do with the sunflower butter, besides dipping carrot sticks in it, is make one of my breakfast smoothies.  I always put a tablespoon of peanut butter in it, but tried it with sunflower seed butter and it was really good.  I’ve always tried my smoothies with almond butter.  They are all good, but this particular one is really good with the sunflower seed butter.  This smoothie has a secret ingredient that one wouldn’t think of for smoothies, but I love it!

I kept forgetting exactly what I was putting in the smoothie, so I finally remember to take a picture of the ingredients once recently.  Funny thing is, I forgot to add the Greek yogurt in the photo. ;)

The secret ingredient is sweet potato!  So really this smoothie just has banana, sweet potato, nonfat Greek yogurt, sunflower seed butter and my vitamin powder and some almond milk.

Breakfast Banana Sunflower Smoothie, by Katrina, Baking and Boys!

1/2 a banana, frozen

1/4 of a sweet potato, cooked and cooled, skin removed before adding to smoothie

1 tablespoon sunflower seed butter (or other nut butter)

1/2 cup nonfat Greek yogurt

1/2-3/4 cup almond milk (or any other milk)

1/2-3/4 cup crushed ice

vitamin powder (mine has a light orange flavor), optional

Combine all ingredients in a blender.  Pulse and puree until smooth, about 1 minute.

Although I often have green smoothies or put other fruit in them as well, this banana one is my favorite.  You can’t really taste the sweet potato, but it sure makes the smoothie creamy and adds a lot of nutrition!

Finally, I have made almond butter at least three times.  Super easy and great for so many things.  I just made another batch two days ago.

  Here’s one of my lunches recently with almond butter.

Homemade Almond Butter, by Katrina, Baking and Boys!

4 cups raw almonds

Preheat oven to 350 degrees.  Put the almonds in a single layer on a baking sheet.  Roast for 10 minutes.  Remove from oven and cool completely.  Put the almonds in the bowl of a food processor.  Process (it’s pretty loud at first as they start to chop up!) the almonds until they become a smooth butter.  This takes a good 10 minutes.  Let cool (the food processor warms up a bit) before store in a glass jar.  This amount of almonds made 16 ounces of almond butter.

Almond Butter

Can’t wait to try all kinds of different things with all these nut/seed butters I’ve been making homemade!  I know that there are a lot of grain-free/gluten free recipes that use almond butter and have been enjoying looking at all the possibilities. 

Warm Raspberry Chocolate Pudding Cake and Sweet Potato Falafel—Secret Recipe Club

This cake is delicious!  I chose to make this cake I found on my Secret Recipe Club blog for today.  I had Isabelle’s blog, Crumb, which is such a wonderful blog.  SO many great recipes to try and delicious looking pictures!  I love Isabelle’s quick run down about herself—“I'm a 30-something coffee-chugging, booty-shaking, bargain-shopping, cookbook-collecting, photo-snapping, trucker-swearing, farmers-market-loving self-taught cook with a Boy and two cats to feed.”  She lives in Toronto, Canada and works in the telecom industry.  She could totally pull it off as a real chef!  I was lucky enough to fill-in last minute and do a post for Isabelle’s blog back in 2011 when she would have been an orphan.  I made some delicious Granola and Marbled Chocolate Banana Muffins then.  I’ve since found a recipe for granola that I usually turn to and make, but after looking back that I wrote Isabelle’s was one of the best granolas I’ve ever made/tasted, I will be making it again.  I love granola!

Looking through all her recipes and once again, I had a hard time deciding what to make.  And as usual, I couldn’t decide on just one.  So I made two.  It’s only fitting for me to start out with dessert first though.  I made her Warm Raspberry Chocolate Pudding Cake.  Just as I started out this post, let me say it again—this was delicious!  I don’t know if you’ve had chocolate pudding cake before, but it’s super easy to make.  You think it’s strange as you follow the recipe with a thick, brownie-like batter put in the bottom of the pan, then a boiling hot liquid with cocoa and sugar in it poured over the top.  You wonder if it will really bake into a cake—but darn it all, it does, and ends up with a warm, gooey pudding on the bottom. 

I LOVE the combination of chocolate and raspberries, it’s one of my favorite combinations.  When I saw Isabelle had a version of this cake that included raspberries, I knew I needed to make it.  Luckily I had some frozen raspberries in the freezer.  I WISH raspberries were in season right now because some fresh ones on the plate with this dessert would have been perfect.  It was still worth it without the little fresh berries on the side.  I made the cake and was really happy with how it looked as it came out of the oven.

Almost couldn’t wait to dig in to it until after dinner!  To make this a chocolate-raspberry dessert, a simple raspberry coulis is made and poured over the thick brownie-cake layer, before the hot liquid is added.  So you can’t see it, but there is great raspberry flavor hiding in there!  Since I didn’t have any fresh raspberries, this definitely needed something on top and I’m not sure I’ve ever had chocolate pudding cake without ice cream, so naturally this got some vanilla ice cream on top.

I was still sad about  not having any fresh raspberries and then I thought some more raspberry coulis drizzled over the ice cream would be really good.  But I didn’t have any more coulis already made—so I got some raspberry jam out of the fridge and heated it up a bit, then drizzled that over the top.  Delicious!  (Go drool over the first photo in this post again!)

Here’s the link for Isabelle’s recipe again—I didn’t change a thing!  Warm Raspberry Chocolate Pudding Cake

While fishing through all her recipes, I ran across her Homemade Sweet Potato Falafel and realized I had everything to make them for dinner.  We love falafel.  Kevin has even been to Israel where he still says they make the “real” thing and he’s never had any quite like the authentic ones in Israel.  I keep trying different recipes.  I’m not really trying to make some JUST like he remembers.  I just like trying different kinds.  I LOVE sweet potatoes, so when I saw Isabelle’s recipe for falafel with sweet potato added, I was set on trying it.  Go check out her recipe.  She filled her falafel wraps with a tahini sauce, hummus, a tabbouleh salad AND the falafel.  I really want to make all those components sometime.  For this meal, I went simple and just made the tahini sauce and falafel patties.  Easy and delicious!  Kevin knew when he saw the falafel there was something different about them, they looked more orange.  But he didn’t say anything and I didn’t tell him until after dinner that they had sweet potato in them.  He liked them okay.  I loved them.  The boys ate them, too.  Okay, Sam wouldn’t even try them.  I knew he wouldn’t.  He’s still my picky youngest.  ;)

I changed a few simple things in Isabelle’s recipe, but go check out hers with the tabbouleh salad recipes and hummus!  (Link above.)

Sweet Potato Falafel with Yogurt Sauce, by Katrina, Baking and Boys!, adapted from Crumb (www.crumbblog.com)

Yogurt Sauce--

1/4 cup nonfat Greek yogurt

1 tablespoon tahini oil

1 tablespoon lemon juice

1/2 teaspoon garlic powder

Whisk together all four ingredients in a small bowl.  Refrigerate until ready to use.

Sweet Potato Falafel--

1/4 cup chopped cilantro

1/4 cup chopped parsley

2 cloves garlic

15.5 ounce can of chickpeas (garbanzo bean), drained and rinsed

1 cup sweet potato, cooked and mashed (about 1 large sweet potato)

3-4 tablespoons all purpose flour

1 teaspoon ground cumin

1/2 teaspoon red pepper flakes

1/4 teaspoon salt

Canola oil, for frying falafel

Put the cilantro, parsley and garlic in the bowl of a food processor and pulse until nicely chopped.  Add the chickpeas and pulse until coarsely ground.  Add the already cooked, mashed sweet potato and pulse to combine, just don’t pulse it too much in the food processor.  You can also remove the mixture from the food processor to a bowl and stir in the sweet potato.  Then add the flour, cumin, red pepper flakes, and salt.  Once it is all combined, heat some oil in a large skillet (enough to cover the bottom of the whole pan).  Form patties using about 2 tablespoons of the mixture for each.  You should get 12-14 patties.  Fry the patties over medium-high heat for about 3 minutes on each side, until they are golden and crisp.  Transfer them to a baking sheet lined with paper towel.

For finished falafel pitas--

Whole wheat pitas

Shredded lettuce

Thinly sliced tomatoes

Thinly sliced cucumber

Sliced dill pickles

When all the patties are finished and the lettuce, tomatoes, cucumber and pickles are prepared, assemble the pitas starting with some of the yogurt sauce.  Let each person decide what vegetables to put in theirs.  Put two falafel in each half-pita.

The falafel are a little fragile as the sweet potato makes them softer.  You can add a little more flour to make them really hold together.  I loved the tender crunch on the outside and the soft inside!

Sweet potato falafel frying action shot. ;)

 

Sweet Potato Spice Cake with Cinnamon Honey Glaze—Secret Recipe Club

I made this delicious cake after pouring through my assigned blog for March for the Secret Recipe Club.  The decision on what to make wasn’t easy—I could not decide.  Check out Kate’s blog, Food Babbles.  She is truly a gal I can relate to with a love of baking, sharing and writing.  I loved reading through her About Me page all about her love of baking, photography and writing and hearing about her family.  She’s married and has two cute little girls.  (Guess that’s where we differ with my husband and I having four boys.) ;)  I love her weekly post called The Weekend Whisk as she does a run down of what has happened during the week.

I also like on Kate’s blog that she and another blogger have a group called First on the First where on the first of every month they bake/make and post a newly challenge recipe/concept/idea.  Look at the cute cake she just made (on the link to First on the First.  You would never see the flaws, but she keeps it real with the challenges she had and learning new things.  This month was all about decorating a cake.  She made a white cake with raspberry lemon filling (yum!) that has some cute little bees on top and is so nice looking with flowered chocolate transfer sheets.  I have never worked with those, but now I want to try.

I seriously couldn’t decide what to make from her blog.  And I actually started with her Lemon Biscotti.  She dipped the bottoms of her in melted white chocolate.  I drizzled mine.  They were good!

I could have just blogged those, but was looking through her blog again another day and found this Cinnamon Crusted Sweet Potato Bundt Cake with Honey Glaze she made and well, there were two reasons I decided to make the cake.  One, she made it on my birthday last year, November 15, which just happens to also be National Bundt Cake Day.  Two, every time I’d gone in my pantry over the last couple weeks, I saw 3-4 sweet potatoes I had that I was neglecting (not sure why, since I love them).  So I was inspired to make her sweet potato cake.  I knew I’d like it and for that reason, I halved the recipe (portion control)!  I changed a few things, but really not too much.  Just to make myself not feel so guilty when I ate some, I used whole wheat flour instead of all purpose flour.  I also added some cinnamon to the cake batter and the honey glaze (as well as the streusel, which she included in her recipe).

After making the batter, I put it in a six inch round cake pan and still had enough batter left to make four cupcakes.  I made the cupcakes with just streusel on top (no glaze)—delicious!

The cake was good, too!  No one here at my house had a clue I used whole wheat flour and I didn’t even tell them it had sweet potato in it, just told them it was a spice cake.  They would have turned their noses at sweet potato in a cake.  (Tricked them!)

Sweet Potato Spice Cake with Cinnamon Streusel and Cinnamon Honey Glaze, by Katrina, Baking and Boys! (adapted from Kate at www.foodbabbles.com)

For the Streusel:

1/3 cup packed brown sugar

6 tablespoons whole wheat flour

3/4 teaspoon ground cinnamon

2 tablespoons unsalted butter, melted and cooled

For the cake batter:

3/4 cup packed brown sugar

3 tablespoons unsalted butter, softened

1 large egg

1/2 cup plus 2 tablespoons cooked and pureed sweet potato (about 1 large)

1/2 teaspoon vanilla extract

1 cup plus 6 tablespoons whole wheat flour (165 grams)

pinch of allspice

1/8 teaspoon ground nutmeg

1/2 teaspoon ground cinnamon

3/8 teaspoon salt

1/2 tablespoon baking powder

6 tablespoons fat free milk

3 tablespoons apple juice (or cider)

For the glaze:

1/4 cup honey

1/4 cup powdered sugar

1 tablespoon fat free milk

1/4 teaspoon ground cinnamon

Preheat oven to 325 degrees F.  Butter then flour a six inch round cake pan a line muffin tin with 4 liners (or you could just make an 8 inch round cake or all cupcakes—which was actually my favorite with the streusel on top).

In a small bowl, combine the brown sugar, flour and cinnamon for the streusel.  Drizzle with the melted butter and mix well with a fork.  Set asides or refrigerate until needed.

For the cake batter, in the bowl of a mixer, cream together the butter, brown sugar, egg and vanilla until light and fluffy.  Add the pureed sweet potato (previously cooked in the microwave with fork piercings for 3-4 minutes until soft all the way through, then cooled enough to remove skin and puree’ in a food processor until smooth).  In a medium sized bowl, combine the flour, spices, baking powder and salt and whisk together.  In a cup, combine the milk and apple juice.  Add the dry ingredients alternately with the milk/juice beginning with some of the dry ingredients, then half the milk mixture, ending with the dry ingredients.  Beat into the batter until well combined.  Pour half the batter into the prepared cake pan and/or lined muffin tin.  Add a good amount of the streusel to the top of the cake batter, then top it with more batter.  Scoop the rest of the batter into the muffin tins and top with the remaining streusel.

Bake the cake for 35-40 minutes, until a toothpick inserted in the center of the cake comes out clean. (The cupcakes baked for 21 minutes and the six inch cake baked for 37 minutes.)  Cool on a wire rack for 10 minutes, then remove the cake from the pan and let cool completely on a wire rack. 

For the glaze—In a small bowl, combine the honey, powdered sugar, milk and cinnamon and stir until smooth and no lumps of sugar remain.  Drizzle over the cooled cake. 

Check out Kate’s blog, Food Babbles if you haven’t already!

National Bundt Cake Day—Cinnamon Ripple Sweet Potato Bundt Cake, Red Velvet Bundt Cake and Banana Bundt Cake

It’s all been building up and building up to this—the actual day.  My birthday National Bundt Cake Day is finally here.  Mary, The Food Librarian has been rockin’ out bundt cakes for 30 days leading up to today.  She loves bundts, big bundts.  It has been such a yummy experience to see what bundt she’ll post next.  I’m not as cool as Mary, so I have only made four bundt cakes during the last month, but does it count for more that I made three of those in the last 24 hours?

I’m not sure if you got that today is also my birthday. (Ha, that’s just for you Megan---it’s. my. birthday.  Should I spell it out?  hehe kidding, I’m kidding.)  Anyway, just for fun, I made two bundt cakes yesterday as we had people over to eat cake and sort of celebrate then since Kevin had to work until late tonight.

I often have the Food Network on in the background of whatever I’m doing in the kitchen.  On Saturday, Paula Deen’s show was on and she was making a Cinnamon Ripple Sweet Potato Cake.  It looks great.  I decided that I wanted to make that bundt.

  

There are supposed to be pecans in the cinnamon ripple of the cake.  I toasted them.  Finished the cake, put the batter in the pan, added the ripple, then more batter, stuck the bundt in the oven, turned around and saw the pecans still sitting on the sheet pan I roasted them on.  Ugh.  The only other change I made to the cake was Paula’s cake had a white rum glaze on it and I decided to do a chocolate glaze.  Since I forgot the pecans inside, I sprinkled a bunch on the top.  Also just for kicks, I did add some mini chocolate chips to the ripple and the top of the cake.  The only other change I made was Paula’s recipe called for sour cream and I used Greek yogurt instead.

We liked the cake okay, but it didn’t have enough sweet potato flavor.  There were also some spices in it, but not enough.  It almost just tasted like a yellow cake with the cinnamon ripple and chocolate glaze.

I very much preferred this Marbled Chocolate Sweet Potato Cake I made a few weeks ago.

Then I also decided to finally make a Red Velvet Bundt Cake.  I have never made any kind of red velvet cake before.  This recipe I used is from the LA Times, which was a recipe they posted from Kiss My Bundt Bakery.

The cake is sure pretty and love the red color.  All of us that ate some of the cake weren’t super thrilled with it.  It tasted like the main flavor was oil.  (The recipes uses oil instead of butter.)  It didn’t really taste like the red velvet cake I’ve had before.  It does make me want to try some other recipes sometime.

 

The best part of the red velvet cake was the cream cheese frosting, which I changed a bit from the Kiss My Bundt recipe.  I added more powdered sugar than the recipe called for.

The cake was really oily.  Bummer.  But I’m glad I tried a red velvet cake finally and I’m sure I’ll try some other recipes.

After feeling a little disappointed about the two bundt cakes I made for my birthday National Bundt Cake Day, I decided to make another one today.  I also wanted to use the new bundt cake pan Kevin got me. 

So I whipped up half a recipe of one of my favorite cakes---Lots-of-Ways Banana Cake from Dorie Greenspan’s Baking From My Home to Yours.  The half recipe made six perfect individual bundts.  This pan is great—the cake just slid right out and all I did was spray it with cooking spray.

That’s my kind of bundt!

I love banana cake.  I just put a nice dollop of some of the cream cheese frosting left over from the red velvet cake in the center of each one and sprinkled on some pecans. 

That’s my bundt story.  Check out all the big bundt love on Mary’s blog!  (Thanks for the birthday shout out, Mary.   So sweet of you.)

Thanks also to everyone who came and left a nice birthday greeting on my surprise post from Kevin today!  I feel super blessed.  That really made my day!

Marbled Chocolate-Sweet Potato Cake

This cake is SO good.  I almost don’t have much more to say than that.  Except that you might be thinking sweet potato in a cake?  If you like/love sweet potatoes, this cake is fantastic.  If you’re on the fence about them, this cake is a great way to fall in love.  I got the recipe for this Marbled Chocolate-Sweet Potato Cake from one of the classes I took in Kansas from my favorite chef, Paige.  Her classes and food were great!  I sure miss her and her classes and recipes!  Have you ever wanted to just have a few hours every few weeks to just take a break, sit back, relax and eat some yummy food?  That’s Paige’s classes.  You do just that.  Sit back, relax, take a break from all your regular daily cares, learn from an expert about cooking wonderful food, EAT, and enjoy the company of others around you who are just as interested in the same things. 
My wonderful husband made it possible with his busy schedule for me to attend all of Paige’s classes.  We tried to talk Paige in to moving to Utah, but it didn’t work.  Sigh. ;)  Thankfully, I have a huge three-ringed binder full of my collection of Paige Recipes.  And I have made a lot of them.  Every recipe is perfect.  And she has a blog!
 
Look, it’s Paige.  And there’s my friend, Ellen.  Sigh.  I miss Kansas.  (Don’t worry, we’re happy to be in Utah, too.)  I “made” her be in a picture with Ellen and I at the last class we went to back in June before we moved.  Ellen is the reason I started taking Paige’s classes.  She invited me to one (Holiday cookies!  She assumed I’d like that.  Smart girl! ;) back in November of 2008.  I was hooked then.  Thanks, Ellen.  I so miss our “dates” to Paige’s classes together!

The cake was served at a class about winter squash, pumpkins and sweet potatoes.  The cake is supposed to be made in a 10-inch tube pan or 2 8-cup loaf pans.  I don’t have either and last year after having the cake in class, I set out to make it—in my only bundt pan.  Even though Paige said the cake wouldn’t work in a bundt pan, that they usually aren’t big enough, I made it anyway.  That’ll show me.  Here’s a picture of last year’s cake.  It went way over the rim of the pan (but didn’t spill!).  I baked the cake well more than the recipe suggested, and thought it was done, but most of the center was underbaked.
 
The cake tasted great and I ended up make a trifle with it with all the pieces that were not underbaked.  The trifle was really good!  I layered it with whipped cream, pudding (can’t remember what kind) and toffee bits. 
So I wanted to make the cake again, can’t find a tube pan like I want (need to look on Amazon!), and decided to make it again, in my only bundt pan, BUT this time leave out some of the batter.  BINGO.  Perfect bundt AND a perfect six inch round cake!

 
Ok, so my marbling skills aren’t the greatest, but the cake is so good, it almost doesn’t matter.

I think I did a little better marbling job on the bundt cake.  I served this the same night I made the apple pie for TWD and the apple cake coming up for FFWD.  It was a big hit.  Even those who I told that it had sweet potatoes and they wrinkled their noses a little liked it!
I wrote on my notes from Paige’s class that she hadn’t ever tried it, but wondered if toffee bits in the cake would be good.  I didn’t do that, but had fun just playing around with a toffee glaze for the cake.  I didn’t write down what actually worked, but I think I made a really good glaze!  First I tried melting toffee bits, but that wasn’t quite working, so I added a little cream, still not what I wanted.  I added some chocolate chips to the hot, almost melted toffee bits and they melted just from the heat of the toffee.  Now I had kind of a chocolate toffee glop.  I added some powdered sugar and a little milk to that until it was the consistency I wanted and it was actually really good.  I sprinkled the cake with powdered sugar, because it doesn’t REALLY need a glaze, but when serving the cake, I let everyone decided if they wanted a drizzle of the glaze on their piece as well as some whipped cream.  Excellent!
  
I decided to make this cake because I ended up with a bunch of sweet potatoes, that and I’d been thinking about this cake off and on since last year!  Thanks, Paige!  She notes on the recipe that she adapted it from The Victory Garden Cookbook, by Marian Morash.
I planned ahead a little and after making the sweet potato batter and adding chocolate to part of it, I decided to have about six cups (48 ounces) of batter in the bundt pan.  I set the bundt pan on my kitchen scale and kept adding batter until it reached 48 ounces.  The bundt baked for 50 minutes and the six inch round baked for 43 minutes.  You could probably get crazy and make cupcakes with these, too!  This is easily one of my favorite cakes.
Marbled Chocolate-Sweet Potato Cake, by Paige Vandegrift For Love of the Table
3 cups all purpose flour (I measured 360 grams)
2 teaspoons baking powder
2 teaspoons baking soda
2 teaspoons cinnamon
1/2 teaspoon ginger
1/4 teaspoon ground cloves
1/4 teaspoon nutmeg (I used freshly grated)
1 teaspoon salt
1 cup walnuts or pecans, lightly toasted and coarsely chopped (I used walnuts)
2 cups mashed cooked sweet potatoes (about 18 ounces puree—see note)
1 1/2 cups vegetable oil
1 1/2 cups granulated sugar (300 grams)
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
4 large eggs, room temperature
4 ounces semi-sweet chocolate, melted and cooled (I used Ghirardelli 60% cacao chips—my favorite!)
Butter and flour a 10-inch tube pan or 2 8-cup loaf pans.  (I used my 10 cup bundt pan and a six inch round cake pan.)  Set aside.  Whisk the dry ingredients together in a large bowl.  Stir in the toasted, cooled nuts.  Set aside.
In the bowl of a stand mixer, using the whisk attachment, beat the sweet potatoes, sugar, oil and vanilla at medium speed until very smooth and glossy.  (Or whisk by hand in a large bowl.)  Whisk in the eggs one at a time, making sure each egg is fully incorporated before adding the next.  By hand, fold in the dry ingredients and the nuts.  Scoop one third of the batter (about 21 ounces) into a separate bowl and quickly stir in the ,melted and cooled chocolate.
Place the batters in the pan(s), alternating as for a marble cake.  Then, with the end of a wooden spoon or the blade of a table knife, gently dray swirls through the batter to marbleize it.  Don’t over mix or you won’t have a marble affect—two, zig-zag passes through the pan should be sufficient. (Which is what I did! ;)
Bake in a 350 degree oven until the cake springs back and a toothpick inserted in the center comes out clean—about an hour for the loaves and an hour and 10 minutes for the tube cake. (My bundt took 50 minutes and the 6 inch round took 43 minutes.)  Cool in the pan for 10 minutes before transferring to a wire rack to cool completely.  The cake is fine served as is, or you may dust it with powdered sugar or embellish it with a simple powdered sugar glaze, recipe below.  (Or you can mess around like I did and make a funky chocolate toffee glaze.)
Note:  You will need about 2 pounds of sweet potatoes to produce 2 cups of puree.  Roast the sweet potatoes in a 400 degree oven.  Prick the sweet potatoes in several spots with a fork or paring knife and transfer to a baking sheet.  Bake until easily pierced with the tip of a knife, about 40 to 60 minutes.  When cool enough to handle, cut open the sweet potatoes and scoop out the flesh (I just easily peeled mine with my fingers.)  Puree the food processor, or press the flesh through a sieve or mesh strainer.  (I used the food processor).
Powdered Sugar Glaze:  Combine 1 1/2 cups powdered sugar with enough liquid to form a mixture that drizzles slowly from a spoon—about 2 to 3 tablespoons of water, coffee or milk.
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I also made this in honor of Mary, the great! from The Food Librarian, who loves bundt cakes so much that last year and this year (and maybe every year coming?) has made a bundt cake every day for 30 days leading up to National Bundt Cake Day, which just happens to be on my birthday!  Today is day #11, so there’s plenty more bundts to come!  Check out all of Mary’s fun, yummy bundt cakes and her fun “I Like Big Bundts” theme.  I met Mary last year at BlogHer Food in San Francisco.  She’s wonderful.