Wacky Cake #2

I decided to try Mary's (Sweet Little Bluebird) Lemon Crazy Cake recipe for dessert yesterday.  I am happy to say it turned out even better (SOOO moist) than the Coffee & Kahlua one!

Because good food is meant to be shared, I had to call our friend, John, with his dog, Brandy, to come over.  I was a little nervous that it would be okay, as I'd had to make a fairly major change to the recipe.  However, we had bought some organic vanilla ice cream at Publix, (just excellent! no preservatives and so creamy) so we had that as both a complement to the cake as well as a back-up if the cake wasn't edible.  I needn't have worried.

I iced it with vanilla icing, whipping about 2 tablespoons of cream cheese into the icing.  To die for.

You can find Mary's recipe here.  I had to make a fairly major change:  I had no lemons, so I used orange zest to increase flavour, and I had no lemon extract, so I used 1/2 cup of lemon juice and 1/2 cup of water instead of the 1 cup of water.  It turned out just super.  Lemony, with a hint of orange.

As always, we had a wonderful visit, both humans and canines!

I've written before about the importance I place on my friends, but it's never too many times to repeat that sentiment.  We had a wonderful day away this past Friday, at our dear friends, next-door neighbours, from Kingsville, who also winter in Florida.  The time spent, whether in deep conversation, sharing of a beautiful garden 

and music played by the carilloneur at Bok Tower,

or again, sharing good food (Jude made a fantastic fruit salad which I will make and share the recipe on here with her permission) and good belly laughter, ..... where was I going?!  LOL   Oh yes, no matter the activity, the time spent is always so much more pleasurable when shared with good friends.

We need to remember to tell our friends how much they mean to us, and how much we value the time spent with them.  Funnily enough, Jude has done that very thing with me in the past.  On Friday, she also told me how much her husband enjoys and values Joe as a friend.  It takes courage to do this, as you open yourself to another person, yet it truly is rewarding for both! 

We need and we thrive on this belly-nourishing and heart-nourishing - - veritable soul-nourishing we get from good friends. :-)

Wacky Coffee Kahlua Chocolate Cake

Phew!  That's a mouthful!  Mmmm!  And a good one!  Geez I crack me up sometimes.  Pun not originally intended until half way through the sentence!

That looks like a teeny piece of cake, but really, the Plant City, FL strawberries are BIG!  It turned out DIVINE!

I've made Wacky Cake for decades.  Four of them, egad (decades, not cakes).  First got the recipe in Home Ec class wa-a-ay back in about 1973.  It's wacky, because it has no eggs, no milk and no baking powder in it, yet it makes a super-moist richly dark, chocolate cake.  Or cupcakes.  It's GREAT for those with egg allergies, like my grandson, and my niece and nephew. Or maybe just my niece...help me out, Linda.

I read, from time to time, Sweet Little Bluebird, one of the first blogs I found when I discovered blogging, a little over a year ago.  A couple of days ago, I got notification of a new post, so went to read it, and on the sidebar I found this recipe, altered ever so slightly to mine, for this delectable dessert.

Here is what she did:
Instead of 1 cup water, add 3/4 cup of coffee and 1/4 cup Kahlua!  Mmm.  Mix everything right in the 8X8 pan:

Her amounts of oil and vinegar differ slightly from mine, so I tried her version and it worked out just fine.  I usually use 1 tablespoon of white vinegar (she uses 1 tsp) and 1/4 oil, (she uses 3 Tbsp).  Everything else is the same.

You can find her recipe here.  I iced mine with a butter and brown sugar, milk, 1 Tbsp of Kahlua (more is merrier, just sayin') and confectioners' sugar icing, SOOOO good.

Nothing goes better with chocolate cake than strawberries and a nice cuppa Typhoo tea!  And a quilt magazine, and a book!  I am almost halfway through The Redbreast, and can't stop thinking about it.  It's one of those crime novels where there is a backstory, so you go back and forth from 1940s to 2000.  More pleasure: chocolate cake, strong tea, good reading material.  :-)