This is a story about a Candy Cane Swirl Cake that tasted better than it looked…

I don’t really share my craft/cooking fails with you guys and I don’t want you to think that I never have any…cause believe me…I do. Not everything turns out like I had imagined it in my head. Can anyone relate? I wanted to share this delicious Cake we made over the Christmas holidays but it was just not pretty enough to make the cut. Even though it tasted really great. 

{See? I told you!}

I originally saw the Candy Cane Swirl Cake at Betty Crocker. But instead of using a box cake, I decided to make my favorite white cake recipe from scratch.

White Cake Recipe

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

Directions:

1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees.
2. Grease and flour pans lightly. I used three 8 inch round pans.
3. Cream together butter & vanilla extract.
4. Add sugar slowly until all is added and it is mixed well.
5. Add eggs, one at a time, mixing well after each addition.
6. In a separate bowl sift flour, baking powder and salt together twice.
7. Now add flour mixture, alternating between the milk and flour. Mixing well after each again.
8. ______________________________

1/2 teaspoon red food color (see Directions #1 below)

1/2 teaspoon peppermint extract (see Directions #1 below)

Directions:

1. Heat oven to 350°F (325°F for dark or nonstick pan). Generously grease and flour 12-cup fluted tube cake pan. Make cake Batter as directed above. Pour about 2 cups batter into pan. In small bowl, pour about 3/4 cup batter; stir in food color and peppermint extract. Carefully pour pink batter over white batter in pan. Carefully pour remaining white batter over pink batter.

2. Bake cake at 350°F and cool completely.

3. In small bowl, mix white icing ingredients. If necessary, stir in additional milk, 1 teaspoon at a time, until smooth and spreadable. Spread over cake. Sprinkle crushed candy on top. Store loosely covered.

White Icing:

1 cup powdered sugar

1 tablespoon milk or water

1/2 teaspoon vanilla, if desired

I am not quite sure why my cake fell apart. Maybe the box cake would have been better to use in the bundt pan. But it sure did taste good. And there were several salvageable pieces of cake that I was able to serve up that looked halfway decent. Hehe. And with some creative photography I was almost able to make it look…well…somewhat presentable.

I have decided to share more of these creativity failures with you as part of trying to keep it real. What do you think? Are you looking forward to seeing some of my creative catastrophes??

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