I’m a simple kind of girl, once I’ve found something I like I’ll stick with it, especially if it works well over and over again. That’s how I feel about these recipes, the only time they’ve failed is when I did something I knew I shouldn’t, or….when my oven started baking everything 100 degrees hotter than it was supposed to.
This recipe is not mine, I found it on the internet nearly 5 years ago and have been using it exclusively since. I know I say, ‘Here’s my yellow cake recipe’, but I’ve made a couple changes to the recipe and because I’ve been using it so long I tend to feel like it’s really mine.
A few things before we get underway, I need to say that baking IS science. These recipes work the way they do because of how the ingredients work together. If you start swapping out items you cannot expect them to still work properly. It’s like putting square wheels on a bike and wondering why it’s much harder to pedal. There are variations and additions that do work though and I’ll list them as well.
Starting with the yellow cake, one thing I’ve noticed is that it bothers people that this recipe is called yellow cake but it turns out very pale. What makes a yellow cake yellow? It is not, as some people think, because butter is used, but rather the egg yolks. This is not my definition folks, it’s a fact! But then if you look at a box yellow cake mix, it lists yellow food dye as one of the ingredients. The question is, how important is it that the cake is pale and not a good deep yellow? I personally don’t care, and I can honestly say I’ve never had someone hand their slice of cake back to me and tell me it wasn’t yellow enough for them.
Another thing that kind of freaks people out is that this recipe calls for shortening. I’ll admit it bothered me at first too, but considering all the processed food nearly EVERYONE eats, including me, I just let it go. Granted, my diet has actually gotten better since I started baking but I still refuse to feel bad. And no, you cannot exchange the shortening for butter in this recipe, I’ve tried, it doesn’t work. Butter has a much lower melting point than shortening, it throws the whole thing off.
When I was searching for yellow cake recipes there were a few criteria that were necessary; everything listed in the recipe needed to be what I already had in the house, no hard to find ingredients, no crazy directions that involve only part of the egg be used, no making me use 10 different bowls to keep things separated. This recipe won because if done correctly I only needed 2 mixing bowls and a measuring cup, and bonus points that I could use all purpose flour. Over time I added sifting to it but it’s really not that difficult to wash a strainer
Ok, enough yapping, here’s the recipe, blow by blow: