Note: I brought three cakes to a party so a wide group of individuals could help with the taste test. The cakes were: 1) Sylvia's New Classic Yellow Cake; 2) Downy Yellow Cake; and 3) Magnolia's Vanilla Cake (not officially part of the test group)
Below are the opinions from 14 testers (ranging in age from 15-75).
Sylvia's NEW Classic Yellow Cake
Flavor: Exceptional flavor. Everyone at the party loved the taste, even the people who didn't like the texture though it tasted great. A few people said it wasn't sweet enough, but most said it was perfect.
Texture: Dense, heavy and very, very moist. Very tight crumb, almost cheesecake like. About half of the testers loved the texture of the cake and thought it was perfectly moist, but the other half of the group thought it was too wet. They either loved it or hated it.
Ease of Preparation - Average to difficult
Cost: Average
Ability to convert into cupcakes: Did not try, but don't think it would work.
Other Comments: As written I don't think the "NEW" Sylvia is a good, general purpose cake. Too many people were turned off by the extra moist texture. Next time I'll try it with 1/4 cup of added milk rather than the full cup and see how the group likes the modified "New" version.
Overall I would give this cake 6 out of 10. I would give it higher marks if it wasn't so moist.
Downy Yellow Cake
Flavor - Nice flavor, subtle vanilla and butter overtones. Just the right amount of sweetness. This cake has a lot of baking powder (4 teaspoons) and salt (3/4 teaspoon) which, to me, gave the cake a slight off taste. None of the other tasters mentioned saltiness, so it might have been my imagination.
Texture - Light and airy. Large, coarse crumb. Everyone loved the texture.
Moistness- Most of the testers mentioned that the cake was dry, a few said that it was fine. The cake was a little over baked, so that may have caused the excessive dryness.
Ease of Preparation - very, very easy. No creaming or whipping of egg whites. Flour and dry ingredients are whisked together, butter is cut into the flour, wet ingredients added last. Almost as easy as a box mix!
Cost of Recipe - Used a lot of eggs yolks but not the whites
Ability to convert into cupcakes -- yes
Other Comments: The cake domed a little during baking and had to be trimmed. The top and sides started to brown before the top set, but this may be because I forgot to use my insulating baking strips.
Overall I would give it 7 out of 10. I loved how easy it was to mix, but a lot of the testers thought it was on the dry side. I'm going to try it again with a little less salt and some sour cream for added moisture.
In the end it looked like the group was equally divided between those who preferred the super moist Sylvia cake and those who preferred the dryer, airier cakes (Downy & Magnolia's).
Sylvia - 6 selected this cake as their favorite, none selected it as their second favorite
Downy - 4 selected this as their favorite, 4 selected it as their second favorite
Magnolia - 4 selected this cake as their favorite, 11 selected it as their second favorite
Magnolia's Vanilla Cake (not officially part of the test group)
moreCakePlz, did you use the amended version of the recipe with the extra 1/4 cup of milk and a package of pudding or the original one? This is one of the cakes I wanted to try as well but just did not get to it yet. Your review makes me wonder if I even want to now, but I wanted to do the amended one.
Thanks, P
I wonder if using butter Crisco would give Serious Cakes' recipe a better flavor?
I think in the recipe i was given they said they tried half and half and it was too greasy??? I think butter would maybe make it better though??
Downy Yellow Cake
Flavor - Nice flavor, subtle vanilla and butter overtones. Just the right amount of sweetness. This cake has a lot of baking powder (4 teaspoons) and salt (3/4 teaspoon) which, to me, gave the cake a slight off taste. None of the other tasters mentioned saltiness, so it might have been my imagination.
Texture - Light and airy. Large, coarse crumb. Everyone loved the texture.
Moistness- Most of the testers mentioned that the cake was dry, a few said that it was fine. The cake was a little over baked, so that may have caused the excessive dryness.
Ease of Preparation - very, very easy. No creaming or whipping of egg whites. Flour and dry ingredients are whisked together, butter is cut into the flour, wet ingredients added last. Almost as easy as a box mix!
Cost of Recipe - Used a lot of eggs yolks but not the whites
Ability to convert into cupcakes -- yes
Other Comments: The cake domed a little during baking and had to be trimmed. The top and sides started to brown before the top set, but this may be because I forgot to use my insulating baking strips.
Overall I would give it 7 out of 10. I loved how easy it was to mix, but a lot of the testers thought it was on the dry side. I'm going to try it again with a little less salt and some sour cream for added moisture.
In the end it looked like the group was equally divided between those who preferred the super moist Sylvia cake and those who preferred the dryer, airier cakes (Downy & Magnolia's).
Im going to have to give this one a try sounds alot like the recipe I use dry, cut butter add wet... Love how mine comes out everytime maybe altille tweak for more moistness though...
Magnolia's Vanilla Cake (not officially part of the test group)
moreCakePlz, did you use the amended version of the recipe with the extra 1/4 cup of milk and a package of pudding or the original one? This is one of the cakes I wanted to try as well but just did not get to it yet. Your review makes me wonder if I even want to now, but I wanted to do the amended one.
Thanks, P
Hi Pebbles,
I used Ceshell's Not So Lemon Lemon Cake from Magnolia Bakery recipe but subbed 1/4 cup milk for the 1/4 cup lemon juice and subbed 1 tsp vanilla for the zest. (Don't like lemon.)
1 cup (2 sticks) butter, softened
2 cups sugar
4 large eggs
3 cups cake flour (self-raising)
3/4 cup milk
1/4 cup lemon juice
2 tsp grated lemon zest
With the subs of the lemon stuff it becomes just plain old Magnolia's Vanilla Cake
http://www.recipezaar.com/Magnolia-Bakerys-Vanilla-Birthday-Cake-and-Frosting-139518
It was really very good. I think I gave it a 9 out of 10. The review is way back on page 11.
Thanks moreCakePlz, I must have been thinking about some other cake though. With all these cakes, I'm starting to get confused. Adding that one to my to try list too. Did you use cake flour or self rising? Or is it self-rising cake flour? Never seen that one before though.
Thanks, P
Some supermarkets carry self-rising flour. If you can't find it...you can make it. Per ~Donna~V, for each cup of self-rising cake flour, sift togather 1 cup of regular cake flour with 2 tsp of baking powder and 1/4 tsp of salt. Sift the combo 2-3 times.
I used it when I made the Magnolia recipe and it turned out good.
HTH
Well SW part deux came out of the oven looking beautiful. High and golden. Toothpick had just a crumb clinging to it. I was very happy. THEN...as soon as I set the pan down the cake started to shrink...a lot! It shrank almost 3/4" in height and pulled away from the sides more than 1/4". I didn't cut it because it was late. I just froze it for now. For all I know it's fine, but it's so short and heavy that I fear I have another flop.
It drove me nuts because I must can't even imagine how many thousands of cakes I've made in my life without any flops at all. If everyone was getting flops, I wouldn't mind. But a few folks are getting great success. And I had perfect results with the original recipe, so I can't imagine my technique is wrong or my original would have failed as well.
The only difference is all that milk. 1/4 seems to work for folks, but the full extra cup somehow crosses a line from success to flop for most folks but not all. What could make that difference between theirs and ours if it's not technique?
Then it hit me...The flour. That extra cup of milk is crossing the line where there is enough flour to support all that extra milk. The amount of flour did seem small to me to begin with. So my question to those who have had success with this recipe is how are you measuring your cake flour? How does SW recommend measuring flour? Are you scooping, spooning, weighing?
If you're weighing, how much weight are you assigning one cup of cake flour (which has a different weight than all purpose flour)? I've seen listings that show as low as 3 1/2 oz per cup of cake flour. I use the box info (7 cups at 32 oz) to come up with 4 2/3 oz per cup.
I normally use 5 oz for all purpose, and 4 2/3 oz for cake flour, as recommended by Cooks Illustrated.
artscallion, it will definitely shrink back on you so don't despair yet, I think it will still be OK.
Ya know I usually weigh my ingredients but this is one of the only cakes that I measure (scooping into cup) level off. The other is the Hershey's perfectly choc cake. Sorry I didn't mention that earlier.
I think your cake will be fine though. Mine rises above the pan but ends up shrinking back to level or sometimes just below level with the top of the pan.
I took the SW part deux out of the freezer this morning to thaw. I just cut into it...FAIL!!
Same problem as before. Top half was fine, but there was an inch thick layer of inedible gum at the bottom. I tasted it so I know it wasn't just really moist, it was inedible and clearly a fail.
I'm giving up on this version. Even if it can come out right, it's clearly way too finicky of a recipe if all these people, including a trained pastry chef can't get it to not fail. Sorry, dkelly. I know you worked hard for us on this. And I might try the original version with an extra 1/4 cup milk, rather the entire extra cup of milk, just to see. But I'm letting the new version go...bu-bye, new version. 0/10
Hi K8,
When I tried the SW version adding the entire eggs at once, I used your directions so I guess it would be SWK8
I did use cake flour though, so that could be the culprit......hmmm, now I want to try it with self rising flour!I know what you mean about the egg white thing. I hate when they're not well incorporated because you can definitely detect that "eggy" taste, or even little hard gooey pieces in the cake. I really have to watch myself so I don't rush that part.
Oh, I spell it Debbie, although everyone calls me Deb....'cept when I'm in trouble then it's DEBRA!!
>>>Ok wait-- I ditch two egg yolks in the SW and add a quarter cup flour--add eggs one at a time.
>>>I use self rising flour in the wasc that for me is actually wvsc due to that poor unfortunate soul hurling it at that one bridal show 'cause of the almond-- oopsy much?
The v is for vanilla.>>>But if I incorporate them (whipped egg whites) well they will deflate--I just can't do it --self defeating --how do you keep them puffy when they're all mixed in???
I would add the beaten egg whites last and just fold them into the batter. It sure makes a difference in the Baker's German Chocolate recipe.
I know. Someday, when I run into you at Michaels, I'll drag you home and force you to bake it so i can watch. There has to be some simple thing that we're missing, like I'll watch you, smack my forehead and say, "Doh! I wasn't doing that step!"
I took the SW part deux out of the freezer this morning to thaw. I just cut into it...FAIL!!
darn it, I'm sorry to hear it. My first try failed too. I finally got to the grocery store this afternoon and got more sour cream to try it again tonight. I cleaned the house and kitchen and only have one more kiddo to get down before I try it again. However, I'm tempted to not try it at all since you didn't have any better success the first time you tried it and my results were almost identical to yours.
ON the flip side, I made paula dean's and Lita's yellow cakes this week. Lita's is definitely a winner and I think it's a very easy recipe that can get reliable results every time.
WOW...from what I've been reading about the new SW recipe I'm afraid to try it. If its failing with a trained pastry chef I don't think I'd get better results. Hmmm...I have to think about it. I really don't want to waste ingredients (times are hard in my neck of the woods).
I'm happy you liked my yellow cake recipe, notapro 
. Its been pretty good to me....it hasn't failed me yet. Its cuppie friendly, also. I make them all the time.
Wow just found this thread,I'll definitely be trying some of these recipes.Thanks to everybody that contributed.
FWIW, When we were working through recipes for Suagrland, we baked over 40 different white/off-white/yellow cakes, Including's Rose's Downy Butter, Sylvia's, Toba's Mermaid bakery's etc...The cake we ended up using as the base for our French Vanilla Buttermilk is Rebecca Rather's cake. If you scale it up ( Our base recipe starts with 80 oz of butter) I find that the cake bakes out more predictably after a night in the fridge . It bakes up perfectly flat which is a dream on busy weekends, cause I can stack and ice about 10 cakes in a hour when I don't have to fool around trimming them. I think hydrating the flour molecules develops a little more gluten, and thus a more stable cake.
JMO YMMV ETC TIA.
I know. Someday, when I run into you at Michaels, I'll drag you home and force you to bake it so i can watch. There has to be some simple thing that we're missing, like I'll watch you, smack my forehead and say, "Doh! I wasn't doing that step!"
LOL OK, I'm in!
The only other things I can think of ...are you using full fat sour cream? I don't use low fat or fat free (whatever the version is) Maybe the type of pan, or the brand of cake flour.
Are you baking at 350 maybe try lowering it and baking longer.
When you taste it does it taste like the egg whites have been incorporated evenly.
OK I just thought of something else when I mentioned the eggs. I always use extra large eggs when I bake.....could the larger size egg give more volume when I'm whipping the whites allowing for a lighter cake?
I'm really stumped. I'm baking this again on Thursday for a stacked cake, I'll post pictures.
Bake the old SW recipe... it rocks.
I am always afraid to leave cake batter overnight... Will it work for anything or just Rebecca Rather's cake? If you did Sylvia's cake and waited to fold in the whites until the next day woudl that work? Just silly questions...
I love Sylvia's cake sans the extra milk... I find it to be nice and moist and it has a great crumb.
[quote="dkelly"][quote="artscallion"]
OK I just thought of something else when I mentioned the eggs. I always use extra large eggs when I bake.....could the larger size egg give more volume when I'm whipping the whites allowing for a lighter cake?
I was going to ask about this tonight since I mistakenly bought extra large eggs instead of large eggs this afternoon. I was wondering the same thing.
Bake the old SW recipe... it rocks.
I am always afraid to leave cake batter overnight... Will it work for anything or just Rebecca Rather's cake? If you did Sylvia's cake and waited to fold in the whites until the next day woudl that work? Just silly questions...
I love Sylvia's cake sans the extra milk... I find it to be nice and moist and it has a great crumb.
Sylvias cake is a nice recipe, but it's fiddliness get demerits in my book. We made about 94 cakes - ALL FROM SCRATCH- from cutting the fruit for fillings to mixing the batters last Thursday and Friday. Fussy Foldy cakes aren't in my time perameters.
are you using full fat sour cream? I don't use low fat or fat free (whatever the version is) Maybe the type of pan, or the brand of cake flour.
I used full fat sour cream. I used two 8x2" Fat Daddio pans. I know it calls for 8x3". But only the dome rises above my pans. The sides never reach to top to need a taller pan to climb up. The cake flour was Pillsbury Softasilk.
Are you baking at 350 maybe try lowering it and baking longer.
I did bake at 350°
When you taste it does it taste like the egg whites have been incorporated evenly.
Yes. The top half tastes like a well mixed, nicely baked, perfect cake. The bottom half however...
I always use extra large eggs when I bake..... could the larger size egg give more volume when I'm whipping the whites allowing for a lighter cake?
I also always use extra large eggs.
I did try again tonight using just 1/4 cup of additional milk under all of the above circumstances except I spooned and leveled my flour instead of weighing it. After I did that, I weighed what I had scooped. It was 3.5 oz per cup, rather than the 4.5oz I'd been using. Maybe this is the key. Though I do trust Cooks Illustrated and the 32 oz box of flour itself tells me that it contains 7 cups, which makes 4.6 oz per cup.
I suppose knowing the reality of what cake flour weighs is only helpful if the person who wrote recipe uses that same information. There can be such a difference between weighing and scooping, and you don't often know what method the author uses.
In any event, tonight's version came out perfectly. It's such a sublime cake that I really yearn to see what I'm missing with this wretched new version. Ah the agony of the unattainable!
Well, I'm glad tonight's came out better for you.
That's interesting that the scooped method yielded less weight per cup. Do you sift your cake flour? I use the same brand as you.
I do use bake even strips on the outside of my pans....bake about 340 degrees.
I just checked my 8" pans are fat daddio too.
Someone else earlier in this thread re-made the new version with 1/4 cup of milk and it worked out well for her too.
Everyone's ovens are so different, that could be it too.
That's interesting that the scooped method yielded less weight per cup. Do you sift your cake flour? I use the same brand as you.
I did sift my cake flour for this recipe, especially because it specifically called for "2 1/4 cups of sifted cake flour" meaning that you should sift it prior to measuring, as opposed to "2 1/4 cups cake flour, sifted"
Bake the old SW recipe... it rocks.
I am always afraid to leave cake batter overnight... Will it work for anything or just Rebecca Rather's cake? If you did Sylvia's cake and waited to fold in the whites until the next day woudl that work? Just silly questions...
I love Sylvia's cake sans the extra milk... I find it to be nice and moist and it has a great crumb.
Sylvias cake is a nice recipe, but it's fiddliness get demerits in my book. We made about 94 cakes - ALL FROM SCRATCH- from cutting the fruit for fillings to mixing the batters last Thursday and Friday. Fussy Foldy cakes aren't in my time perameters.
I tried RR's White on White cake once and I thought it shrunk up too much and didn't have enough structure. It tasted good, but I prefered the SW cake. I'm still looking for that perfect yellow cake. I like a recipe with egg yolks... I don't necessarily want a "white" cake. I'll have to try it again.
I add 1/3 of the whites right in the KA and then fold in the rest... makes it much easier for me.
The cake we ended up using as the base for our French Vanilla Buttermilk is Rebecca Rather's cake. If you scale it up ( Our base recipe starts with 80 oz of butter) I find that the cake bakes out more predictably after a night in the fridge .
Snarkybaker,
you are talking about White on White cake in this thread, right? Sorry for ignorance, I'm starting to get confused with all these different names and recipes. That's the recipe that I tried out and absolutely loved it, except for I was worried that it may be a little too fragile for stacking. So, if I keep the batter in the fridge, that should make it more stable? Is there maximum-minimum time frame you normally keep it in the fridge for? Also, do you mind givng me a quick tip on how to scale that recipe up? I do not know if I can just simply double or tripple it for bigger cakes or if I need to adjust things differently.
Thanks in advance, P
Bake the old SW recipe... it rocks.
I am always afraid to leave cake batter overnight... Will it work for anything or just Rebecca Rather's cake? If you did Sylvia's cake and waited to fold in the whites until the next day woudl that work? Just silly questions...
I love Sylvia's cake sans the extra milk... I find it to be nice and moist and it has a great crumb.
Sylvias cake is a nice recipe, but it's fiddliness get demerits in my book. We made about 94 cakes - ALL FROM SCRATCH- from cutting the fruit for fillings to mixing the batters last Thursday and Friday. Fussy Foldy cakes aren't in my time perameters.
I tried RR's White on White cake once and I thought it shrunk up too much and didn't have enough structure. It tasted good, but I prefered the SW cake. I'm still looking for that perfect yellow cake. I like a recipe with egg yolks... I don't necessarily want a "white" cake. I'll have to try it again.
I add 1/3 of the whites right in the KA and then fold in the rest... makes it much easier for me.
That is actually not a bad idea. We do have some recipes ( chiffon cake etc) that we fold etc, but our bulk batters have got to be fast to come together in big batches, and our modified WoW cake ( which isn't white when we're done with it )works great.
Bake the old SW recipe... it rocks.
I am always afraid to leave cake batter overnight... Will it work for anything or just Rebecca Rather's cake? If you did Sylvia's cake and waited to fold in the whites until the next day woudl that work? Just silly questions...
I love Sylvia's cake sans the extra milk... I find it to be nice and moist and it has a great crumb.
Sylvias cake is a nice recipe, but it's fiddliness get demerits in my book. We made about 94 cakes - ALL FROM SCRATCH- from cutting the fruit for fillings to mixing the batters last Thursday and Friday. Fussy Foldy cakes aren't in my time perameters.
I tried RR's White on White cake once and I thought it shrunk up too much and didn't have enough structure. It tasted good, but I prefered the SW cake. I'm still looking for that perfect yellow cake. I like a recipe with egg yolks... I don't necessarily want a "white" cake. I'll have to try it again.
I add 1/3 of the whites right in the KA and then fold in the rest... makes it much easier for me.
That is actually not a bad idea. We do have some recipes ( chiffon cake etc) that we fold etc, but our bulk batters have got to be fast to come together in big batches, and our modified WoW cake ( which isn't white when we're done with it )works great.
I completely understand from your standpoint... making that much volume you need something that comes together easily without having those extra steps. I'll have to play around with some recipes when I have a free moment. I just love everything about the SW cake... it sliced clean and is moist without being fragile. The WoW cake seemed fragile to me as is... though I didn't frost it... I just ate is plain because I was comparing.
The cake we ended up using as the base for our French Vanilla Buttermilk is Rebecca Rather's cake. If you scale it up ( Our base recipe starts with 80 oz of butter) I find that the cake bakes out more predictably after a night in the fridge .
Snarkybaker,
you are talking about White on White cake in this thread, right? Sorry for ignorance, I'm starting to get confused with all these different names and recipes. That's the recipe that I tried out and absolutely loved it, except for I was worried that it may be a little too fragile for stacking. So, if I keep the batter in the fridge, that should make it more stable? Is there maximum-minimum time frame you normally keep it in the fridge for? Also, do you mind givng me a quick tip on how to scale that recipe up? I do not know if I can just simply double or tripple it for bigger cakes or if I need to adjust things differently.
Thanks in advance, P
We stack that sucker to the moon. We carve it and generally abuse the heck out of it. We usually mix batters on Wednesday and bake on Thursday for the weekends, so I'd mix it the day ahead. You can probably get a couple of days out of it. When you go to bake it, pan it up and let the batter come back to room temperature so you don't mess up your baking times.
The cake is still quite soft when you pull it from the oven. Pull it by internal temperature ( 200), not finger touch. If you wait for it to spring back, it'll be over done ( and thus shrink up a lot)
We convert everything to weight for scaling, and add a scraped vanilla bean... yumm.
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