Me, Bobby Flay, and the Great Red Velvet Cake Adventure

Occasionally I like to bake. However, I'm not always that in to baking and cooking shows. They usually just make me hungry! I sometimes make an exception from this rule for some of the more entertaining food network shows. Recently I was watching the Bobby Flay Throwdown! In this show Bobby Flay finds people who are especially known for one certain dish and then he tries to out do them. This particular episode was about Red Velvet Cake. Bobby Flay won, but me, and everyone else in the room, were wondering if they made the right decision. Both cakes looked delicious, but how could we really know unless we tried them ourselves? So I decided to go for it and recreate the competition at home.

Here are the two recipes I used: Bobby Flay's and Cake Man Raven's. I added a little extra cocoa to Cake Man Raven's based on the reviewers on the food network website. I also let both cakes sit in the fridge overnight before the first taste test on the advice of reviewers.

As I am not a master chef, some mishaps occurred during baking. Like a piece of cake falling off as I flipped one of the layers onto the cooling rack. Luckily this only happened on one of the four layers I made and it's easily disguised by massive amounts of frosting!

Here are the main differences between the cakes. Cake Man Raven's was definitely more red (2x the amount of food coloring)! His was also paired with cream cheese frosting and called for pecans on top of the frosting. Bobby Flay's had more Cocoa and was topped with a butter cream frosting.

Cake in process. Each cake had two layers, although Bobby Flays came out taller for some reason.

After making the cakes, I had everyone I could sample them (including myself of course). I brought them to our neighbors, coworkers and family members. Everyone was extremely cooperative (Generally no one ever says no to the question: "Can you help me taste test these cakes?")Then we tallied up the votes.

Many people liked the flavor of Bobby Flay's cake more. However several people preferred the cream cheese frosting that Cake Man put with his cake. Cake Man's cake was also moister. Most people viewed the Cake Man's as more traditional, and saw Bobby Flay's as a new spin on things (I have no idea if this is true). It was a very close race. One of my favorite parts was hearing every one's detailed analysis of the cakes (Cake tasting is serious business!) So what's my verdict? I say the winner is the Cake Man! The moistness of the cake combined with the overall presentation won me over. Not that the other cake wasn't delicious. In fact I felt a little bad because I think it was a bit more competetive on the first day; I don't think Bobby Flay's did as well in the fridge.

The Winner!

That's it! It was a fun experiment! I'd love to do it again, although not with red velvet for awhile (trust me that much cake with only three people in the house was never ending!).

The two finished cakes side by side!

Currently watching: Community Reruns and SYTYCD

Signs of the Times

I really loved all the old signs, storefronts, and architecture in Richmond, so I put this little photo essay together. However instead of trying to put a written essay with it, I'm just going to put titles or little stories from my trip.

Our hotel was actually an old department store, Miller and Rhoads, that they renovated and restored. They kept the original sign on the building. When the hotel was finished they had an old employee who had written the history of the hotel come stay in one of their suites, which happened to be his old office.

Coca-Cola

The American Wholesale Barber-Beauty Supply.

Wise words from Jim.

Amazing pancakes. And biscuits.

This saying was on a small plaque that was sort of hidden on the wall of a doorway of a small fabric shop. The shop was closed when we walked by, but we peeked in the window and it looked like they still lived by their motto of quality.

Currently: sightseeing. I visited the Jefferson Memorial today.

Richmond

I recently took a weekend trip to Richmond, Virginia. We managed to pack a lot into that weekend. We ate good fun, found some great shopping, and I got to take a lot of pictures. Oh and the art museum was amazing!!! I highly recommend it. I don't have time to talk about everything we did on our trip right now, so I'll just highlight one of my favorite things for now.

This is possibly my favorite shop that we found, Halcyon Vintage Clothing. Even though I didn't buy anything, everything in there was really nice and carefully selected so it was fun just to window shop (although I was extremely tempted by an adorable yellow dress!).

The owner's dog, Olive, stayed in the shop window the whole time.

Another thing I loved about Richmond was all the old architecture and building signs we saw. Some of it was quite run down, but it was still interesting and beautiful. I'm going to try and throw together a short photo essay of my favorite buildings and signs.

Currently eating: red velvet cake
Currently watching: Closer and Glee