Shirley Corriher’s Magically Moist Yellow Cake

By Addie

My Favorite Cake of all! Perfect in Every Way!

Due to an empty box of cake flour, the yellow cake experiments were delayed until this morning. Don’t worry. They’re back!

For those of you just catching up, I’ve been baking and comparing yellow cakes all week. The first three, adapted from Magnolia, Carole Walter and Paula Deen recipes, were variations on 1-2-3-4 cake and were all very good.

This second round, adapted from Cook’s Illustrated, Shirley Corriher and a blog called Egg Beater, are more like true yellow cakes rather than butter cakes, as they contain more egg yolks and are so less crumbly.

Up until now, my favorite of all cakes tested was CI’s recipe, but we have a new winner. Shirley C.’s Magnificent Moist Yellow Cake has moved to the top of the heap.

The recipe I used is adapted from Shirley Corriher’s book, Bakewise, which I accidentally packed away in storage until we move to our new house. Given the situation, I had to use an adapted version off Pink Antler Cakes, which I then “adapted” some more — and by that I mean streamlined. You could argue that because I didn’t do things exactly the same as Shirley, it’s a different recipe. However, given the excellent results I think I just used different means to reach the same end and you’ll be safe using this recipe if you don’t have the book yet.

Ingredients

• 1 3/4 cups cake flour
• 1 3/4 teaspoon baking powder
• 1/2 teaspoon salt
• 1 1/2 cup sugar
• 1/3 cup water
• 4 Tablespoon unsalted butter
• 2 teaspoon vanilla extract
• 1/3 cup vegetable oil
• 3 large egg yolks
• 2 large eggs
• 1/2 cup heavy cream

Preparation

Step 1

Preheat oven to 350 degrees F. Spray 2 9-inch round pans with flour-added baking spray and line bottoms with rounds of parchment or use 8 inch round pans for a higher cake.

Put a stand mixer bowl and whisk attachment (or regular bowl and beaters) in the freezer to chill for about 5 minutes.

Thoroughly mix flour and baking powder in a bowl and set side.

Take out the chilled mixing bowl and whip the cream just a little beyond soft peak stage. Scrape it out of the bowl and set it aside.

Put the mixing bowl back onto the stand mixer (no need to rinse) and add the sugar. Heat the water to in the microwave. Add it to the sugar and beat a few seconds to dissolve the sugar, then add the butter, vanilla, and salt. Add the oil mix on medium speed to blend. Sprinkle about 1/3 of the flour mixture over the sugar mixture. Stir by hand — I do this with a heavy duty scraper. Continue adding the flour until all is incorporated. By hand stir in the egg yolks one at a time, and then stir in the whole eggs one at a time.

Fold a little of the whipped cream into the batter to lighten, then fold in the rest.

Pour the batter into pans. Drop the pans onto the counter a few times to get out any bubbles. Bake for about 20-23 minutes, checking at 15 minutes.

Frost with your choice of frosting.