Marianna46, what kind of strawberry flavoring did you use? Did it give it an artificial strawberry flavor? I need to make a strawberry cake and am going to try your proportions (I think mine has too much strawberry puree) but I think it needs a little something to boost the strawberry flavor. Thanks!

Hey there, confectionsofahousewife (I've always loved that name!). I substituted strawberry puree for the milk. I forget how much the recipe called for, and I don't have the recipe on hand right now, but it was the same amount of strawberry puree as there was milk in the original recipe. I also substituted strawberry flavoring for the vanilla or almond extract. I was afraid it might taste a little bit artificial with the extract, but it didn't. It actually brought out the natural strawberry flavor. I used Demian's creamy strawberry, which I'm not sure is sold in the US. It has a little bit of red food coloring in it, which gave the cake a very nice pastel pink color. HTH and good luck!

I can't wait to try this. I had trouble with the WASC recipe sinking and having that dense almost gummy texture in the middle every time I tried to make it. I have a cake for friends next weekend, but we haven't decided on strawberry with ganache or choc. with hazelnut buttercream. Either way I now have a recipe to try.

One question though... can you use instant coffee for the choc. cake? I don't drink coffee often enough to keep it around and don't want to buy a whole lot for one cake every now and then. TIA

I just finished making the chocolate cake, but I made two substitutions. I used whole milk in place of buttermilk and 1/4 cup whiskey in place of 1 cup coffee. All my other recipes use whole milk and my choc ones use whiskey, so I didn't want to buy any additional ingredients. I have no idea what the original was like, but with these modifications, it rose nicely with a flat top, was very fluffy, and has a nice taste and texture. Definitely a keeper. One note though, it only made 4 1/2 cups batter so if you want it to rise 2 inches high, use a 6 inch square pan. Not sure about round ones. I used 7 inch square ML pans and it was 1 1/2 inches tall. I baked at 320F for 30 min.

You know, Odyssey, I've always thought that a cake that has a whole bunch of sour cream plus a whole bunch of butter has too much fat in it and couldn't possibly rise. All my problems faded away when I started using low-fat or fat-free yogurt in this cake (and bought some fresh baking powder, which is a problem that should never be overlooked!). Now I'm a happy camper and have a whole range of flavors in this delicious, resistant and carvable cake.

By the way, anybody given any thought to the butter pecan version of this cake? I'm trying to come up with something, too, but so far no luck.

DrTina, your post came in while I was writing. That chocolate cake sounds great. I'm definitely going to add it to my WASC collection!

By the way, about the instant coffee, I've used it in several desserts combined with chocolate and it tastes just fine. I use Folger's crystals or another of those freeze-dried coffees because I like the way they taste.

I've been stalking this post since it first came out and I absolutely love this scratch WASC!

As for the butter pecan WASC, I would love to have a version of that as well. Keep in mind, I haven't tried it yet, but what if you decreased the amount of milk, added in 1/2c REAL maple syrup (not pancake syrup), stirred in 1 1/2-2 cups diced/chopped pecans, and maybe some butter flavoring along with the vanilla (or maple flavoring). You might have to decrease the amount of sugar too because of how much is in the syrup.

I guess that would be more of a maple pecan cake though, huh? lol. I'll have to give this a shot sometime soon.

I am definately going to be trying the orange version. I have some leftover chocolate icing that I could use for the filling- Orange Valencia here I come!

I think there's a butter pecan coffee creamer you could use or LorAnn has a fountain flavor that is butter pecan you could substitute for the liquid.

Did I seriously just read 19 pages? lol I love this site =) Ya'll have convinced me to try this recipe, but I don't know if I want to use butter or shortening. I am also going to be trying that choc cake! Butter vs shortening people, where are you? *snickers* Let's have a comparison, shall we? I would love you forever! Pretty pleeease? =)

I recently tried it with the shortening and liked it better. It was a little lighter.

I just went back and noticed how much baking powder is in the recipe. Seven teaspoons to five cups of flour...there's no aftertaste?

Did anybody make a chocolate version of it? How do you make it into a chocolate cake?

So i tried this recipe and it came out dense and gummy- any suggestions on where I went wrong. I sub'd butter for shortening and used 5 whole eggs vs the whites as I was not looking for a pure white cake. Any insight? I mixed exactly as stated. With all these raving posts I know I must have gone off the mark somewhere

I found the only time I like the texture is when I use the shortening and egg whites. Otherwise it comes out too dense and heavy.

...ditto, momg9

So excited that I came across this post! And I am thrilled that some things can be substituted....

thanks for the feedback. sweetiesbykim- I just bought Cake Bible and I don't know how I will have time to try all the recipes that look so fantastic in that book. I will give the scratch wasc another try keeping closer to the original recipe

So who has tried what and what were the results??

Hello everyone-
I just remembered and checked back to this post and after reading for an hour to catch up, all I can say is WHEW! You guys and gals have been busy, lol. In response to the recent questions about the dense, gummy texture: I find this happens when I use all real butter. After experimenting with it A LOT, I really do prefer the shortening for this recipe. As a previous poster said, I find it makes the texture much lighter and more what I'm looking for. If I want a butter flavored cake I have done 1/2 butter and 1/2 shortening before with this recipe and added a little butter extract for flavor.

Another recent variation I tried and loved: I substituted 1c of the milk for 1c of white chocolate raspberry liquid creamer instead. I kept all of the rest of the ingredients the same and ADDED 1c of raspberry preserves to the batter (stirred in by hand after the batter was totally mixed). My oh my.......

~Skye

Ok, results in. I just made it EXACTLY as the recipe states, including mixing method. Ok, ok, I had to use the standard alterations for high altitude, reducing baking powder and SLIGHTLY increasing liquid. The result is something I don't know what to do with!
The top rose perfectly level, but then cracked when it was almost done. The cake is too light I think, to use for my layer cake. I haven't taken it out of it's pan yet, that will be the determining factor. WIsh me luck, I cannot believe I killed the unkillable recipe. LOL

Wow that all I have to say

Update: The layer I spoke of was a complete disaster, unusable for my order however, I added more flour when faced with A. Throw it all away, B. Add flour, throw it away after it doesn't work or C. Add flour, save it from being wasted and I chose C. lol. Adding about 1.5 cups of flour helped it to be able to set up. I have no clue what went wrong, it lost it's level crust, and had huge uneven domes which I remedied with silicone strips. So, all in all I was able to use the rest of the batter. Hallelujah!! The bad news, I am afraid to try this again. If anyone has any insight as to what I did wrong, I am all ears. The instructions had such strange mixing instructions, I wonder if that had something to do with it. Hmm, might never know. Either way, I genuinely thank you for the adventure! Never a lost learning opportunity =)

After reading all the posts about the pros and cons of shortening vs. butter, I wanted to see for myself. So I baked it up using the shortening (sweetex). The only changes to the original recipe (from the book) was subbing cake flour instead of AP, adding 1/4 t baking soda, reducing milk to 1/2 cup, and adding the 8 oz sour cream (I used 5 egg whites). Note.. that recipe yielded two 8" rounds (or equivilant).
It baked up well in the layer cake and in cupcakes. It is dense yet light in texture. I like the one bowl method as opposed to having to cream the butter and sugar as it's faster. But I like the butter flavor better. So...... I loved them both.

Can someone help?

I tried this recipe and loved it. I used butter, sour cream and whole milk. Loved it and nothing but rave reviews.

Well, last week I went to make lemon and it was weird. The crumb was weird, almost cornbreadish. It was soft, and the lemon flavor was there but the texture was really rough. I didn't even want to serve it.

The only thing I changed was added lemon zest and did half vanilla flavor and half lemon extract. I don't understand what happened at all. I have done this with other recipes no problems. I have a wedding in two weeks and they want lemon and I'm nervous now.

Does anyone have any insight? I do prefer this recipe but the variations aren't working so good thus far.

Thanks for any help on this.

So i took the advice from OP warmed my all ingredients to room temp and oh my. . . Heaven. Delicate soft texture and flavor, mosit with a nice fine crumb perfect for eddings. THanks

k- I used the orignal version with the suggestion of only using 1 C of milk.