Cooking Confidential

I don’t know about you, gentle reader, but whenever I am offered a “goodie” with an enthusiastic, “Oh, I never follow a recipe! I just throw everything together” I have come to assume that I am in for a penitential experience.
Yes, you may not need to open a book, get out a clipping, or consult a food website, but you do need to have a consistent sense of relative proportions for a successful venture into the world of cooking improv.

I had a bowl of do-it-yourself (mostly whipping cream with enough sour cream added to give it tartness and body) whipped and sweetened creme fraiche I’d made for a pear tart we’d eaten mostly without it– for some reason, most everyone in my house had decided to eat it unadorned for breakfast. Judging from the pretty generous amount left, I figured it would, if collapsed, come to about the same amount of liquid called for in your standard bundt/tube cake. I just couldn’t bear to waste it, and since we were a little pie/tart/crisp-ed out, it occurred to me that it would do nicely in said cake.

Having made scores of bundt/tube cakes– my default cake for serving the ravening hoardes– in both the recent and distant past, I had a pretty decent sense of that dessert’s general proportions which a reflected in the following formula:
So….

I greased and floured my favorite bundt pan.
Set the oven to 325 degrees.
I rewhisked the rather fallen and somewhat separated whipped cream mixture and set it aside — it will be added alternately with the flour

In a large mixing bowl beat :
3/4 cup butter
When pretty soft (my kitchen is freezing this winter), added
1 1/2 cups sugar ( I knew that there was about 1/4 cup of sugar in the whipped cream mixture) otherwise I would have made it 1 3/4 cup)
1 T vanilla
1/2 tsp almond flavoring
(There was vanilla and a bit of brandy in the whipped cream mixture as well, so you can think about 1 T brandy for this as well)
Add 4 egg yolks, one at a time, dropping the whites into a separate bowl– you will beat these and fold in at the end.

Sifting first, measure out 3 cups of all purpose flour to which you’ve added
1/2 tsp baking soda
1 teaspoon baking powder
1/4 teaspoon salt

Add 1/4 tsp salt to reserved egg whites and beat/whisk until firm but not stiff

In three installments and using low mixer speed, add flour mixture alternately with the whipped cream mixture, stopping to scrape batter up from bottom and sides.
When batter is just smooth, start stirring in the beaten egg whites– it is fine to do this in the mixer on low speed.You will need to stop and gently but firmly scrape sides and bottom to expedite the process, since the rather heavy batter will seem to resist the process. Don’t worry and just do your best until the whites are pretty well amalgamated.

Fill baking pan– it’s easier to spoon it out with a large curved rubber/silicon scraper, since the batter is relatively stiff, dropping the glops evenly around the botttom of the pan, then scraping whatever’s still clinging to the interior of the mixing bowl. Smooth top and even the batter by running a knife around through the batter a couple time.

Bake until nice and golden brown, probably about an hour, but I had to take the dog out for a walk and then I forgot exactly what time I’d put it in!

It was GORGEOUS! with a soft interior contrasting delightfully with a crisp crust!
And to think, it’s all about proportions!

Most tube type cakes call for approximately 3/4 cup butter, 1 3/4 cup sugar