Caramel Cake

Well, here’s new recipe #1 for January. I have a feeling it’s not what "Eating Well" had in mind for healthier eating. I run between carrying an ongoing mental list of things I want to make, and finding something in a magazine and on impulse, wanting to make it right away. The latter is what I made today. It’s the Caramel Cake from the January 2008 issue of Gourmet. I had some buttermilk, cream, and cake flour to use up, and this incorporated all three. This issue of Gourmet, by the way, is dedicated to Southern food. For someone like me, it’s a whole new world of dishes.

The magazine’s description of the cake was that it was simple but the glaze really makes the cake, and people in the test kitchen were going back for seconds and thirds. In some ways, it’s just a yellow cake, but it’s sooo much better than anything you’d get out of a box. It has a rich, pound cake taste, and a fluffy creamed cake texture. The caramel is good in that it doesn’t overpower the subtle flavor of the cake. I think coconut pecan or even chocolate frosting would be good too.

I briefly mentioned lists. I'm big on lists. I currently have several to-do lists, one for higher priority stuff and the other for less important but still need to be done things. I even have one item on an ongoing "things I'll probably procrastinate but need to do someday" list, about updating another list.