She Wore Red Velvet

I'm not much of a cake baker. I tend to stick to chocolate desserts for my baking, but when your significant other loves cake and it's her birthday, what are you going to do? In fact, nearly all my cake baking has taken place around one of her birthdays over the past 15 years. I've fumbled a few, though I've had a few triumphs as well, including a nice tres leches that I made from an Alton Brown recipe.

One of her favorite cakes is red velvet, so this year I took it on. After searching high and low, I found this Chowhound post. All I can say is, use it. The recipe is near-flawless. The secret ingredient is a bit of vinegar and baking soda, which adds that fizzy CO2 to the batter. I followed the recipe pretty much to the letter with the exception of substituting butter for the Crisco, since I have a deep-seated fear of Crisco.

And the frosting is wonderful, though be warned it is a buttercream, and some folks prefer cream cheese frosting on their red velvet cake. As for me, you could frost dog shit with a good buttercream and I'd happily lap it up.

Enjoy!