Recipe Royalty

OKAY, OKAY, OKAY!  I know what you might be thinking, but I promise that I’ll be bringing more health-conscious recipes to you in the near future.  But for today, I couldn’t pass up passing along a recipe for a totally delectable delight (unless you don’t like or can’t eat strawberries).  And if that’s the case, then this Homemade Strawberry Cake Recipe from Tastes of Lizzy T is not for you; because, this recipe is all about the strawberry.

The inspiration for making a strawberry cake was derived from my son, Junior, by request the other day; but, it doesn’t take much for me to jump right on the strawberry train.  WE LOVE STRAWBERRIES in this household!  Any dessert (strawberries and cream, banana split with strawberries, strawberry sundae, strawberry shake, strawberry shortcake, and on and on), requiring the use of this mouth-watering fruit, is a welcomed treat.  You can say that we (my family) are unofficial strawberry connoisseurs.  And if a strawberry dessert gets a rave review from multiple members of my family, especially those of the male persuasion, then you can bank on the fact that you’ve struck some dessert gold.  DESSERT GOLD = Tastes of Lizzy T’s Homemade Strawberry Cake Recipe.  My family absolutely loved it.

Now, I’m not necessarily one who has mastered the creative flare for developing my own tantalizing recipes.  Not just yet anyway.  But, I do know how to share someone else’s great recipe when I come across one.  I’m all about enlightening the culinary masses, giving credit where credit is due.  In this case, hats off to the ladies of Tastes of Lizzy T.  I pretty much followed their cake and buttercream list of ingredients to a “T” with the exception of the following:

• I used organic all-purpose flour instead of the cake flour, which was highly recommended by the creators.  (I was kind of worried about the substitution of this ingredient, but my family doesn’t use cake flour so I decided to take my chances and see what would happen.  I’m sure the cake might have been a little lighter/fluffier, if I had used the cake flour, but the consistency wasn’t too dense and was actually on point enough for my crew.  Furthermore, the taste wasn’t affected in the slightest).
• I used olive oil instead of canola oil.  (I was also worried a little about this substitution as well; but since only 2 tablespoons was involved, I decided to do the switch-a-roo and observe the result.  We also don’t use canola oil, so my go-to for most things, requiring canola oil, is olive oil.  Again, the risky attempt didn’t negatively impact the result.  We’re two for three so far).
• I used vanilla extract in place of the strawberry extract.  The recipe calls for 1 tsp. of strawberry extract and 1 tsp. of vanilla extract, which I didn’t have a problem with.  More strawberry, right?  But after looking at two different stores that I frequent and finding no strawberry extract, I gave up and took the “I’ll use what I have in the cupboard route”.  So, I just doubled the vanilla and used 2 tsp. of it instead of worrying about the strawberry extract.  (I’ll have to do more research on where I can find it locally).  Anyway, I wasn’t concerned about using the additional vanilla at all.  Usually, adding vanilla to anything is a good thing.

All in all, the dessert was a SUCCESS!  And, I just decided to establish a new rating category of “Recipe Royalty” that describes recipes that are the bomb.  By my taste-testing observation, this strawberry cake recipe fits the bill.

Half the cake gone!  This is real life, people.