Simple

Yesterday, when I was sick of watching TV, but didn't feel up to tackling the out of control mess that is my bedroom, I decided to bake. But when I looked in my cupboards I realized that the combination of baking up a storm this last month, and not having a car to make regular trips to the grocery store had left my baking ingredients pretty depleted. I had butter, sugar, 2 eggs, some milk, but not much else. I was out of vanilla, and most recipes call for more eggs, or other things like buttermilk, powdered sugar, in short, things I didn't have. Justin had also said that if I was going to be doing this much baking, then he would have to assign me a monthly budget and he hadn't done that yet. So I decided to turn to the most simple recipe I knew, Yellow Cake with Chocolate frosting.

Yellow Cake

• 1 cup all-purpose flour
• 3/4 cup white sugar
• 1/4 cup shortening
• 1/2 cup milk
• 2 teaspoons baking powder
• 1/2 teaspoon salt
• 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
• 2 whole eggs

1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees F. Prepare cupcake pan with paper liners. Sift together the flour, baking powder and salt; set aside.
2. In a large bowl, cream sugar and shortening until light and fluffy. Add eggs one at a time, beating thoroughly after each addition. Add flour mixture alternately with milk, beating just to combine. Finally, stir in vanilla. Pour batter into the prepared pan.
3. Bake at 350 degrees F for 17 to 24 minutes, or until a toothpick inserted into a cake comes out clean.

Chocolate Ganache

• 8 ounces Heavy Cream/Whipping Cream
• 8 ounces of semi-sweet chocolate (chips, or chopped)
• 2 tablespoons butter

Heat heavy cream in the microwave for up to 4 minutes. Cream should simmer but don't let it boil over. Pour the hot cream over the chocolate and whisk together until creamy. If the chocolate isn't incorporating fully reheat mixture for up to 30 seconds at a time stirring in between microwaving until chocolate, butter and cream have fully combined. Cover mixture in saran (to avoid a crusty layer forming press saran down so that it lays directly on the ganache).

After two hours the ganache should have the consistency of a heavy frosting. Alternatively, dip the cupcakes in the mixture at room temperature and refrigerate cakes to set up the ganache. This will create a thin, but very smooth frosting that can either be a crumb coating for chilled ganache or for those who prefer less frosting eaten as is.

Yellow cake and chocolate frosting is one of my favorite cake/frosting combination, and this super easy ganache is rich in flavor and heavy in texture which is so nice with the light fluffy yellow cake. The yellow cake recipe is easy as it gets for a cake-from-scratch recipe as long as you stick to the directions. The order in which the ingredients are added is important and it's when people deviate from the instructions that cakes come out hard, flat, or otherwise go awry. When you cream butter and sugar you're using the sugar to cut tiny holes into the butter, which allow for a light, bubbly texture. Sifting together the dry ingredients both ensures an even distribution of baking powder and salt and this introduces oxygen and lightness into the batter early on. Alternating between the flower and milk prevents the cake from getting too wet, or too heavy. Recipes from scratch are often much thicker in texture than boxed mixes, if this is the case with yours be encouraged.

This recipe is small, I think it reasonably makes 18 cupcakes if you strictly adhere to the "fill liners 3/4 of the way full" rule but I never do. I got 16. Even for a batch that says it will yield 24 cupcakes i usually end up with about 20.

Simple is often best, and this case, simple was delicious. The ganache which is unfortunately underutilized in cupcakes (until I joined the baking world) adds a touch of class to the easy yellow cake.