American Baker in Germany

This week, a friend I'm making a cake for made a request: could I possibly use her favorite box cake mix? I will admit that it caught me by surprise. I agreed since it was what she wanted, but only for one tier of the two tiered cake because her favorite box mix was full of milk and my lactose intolerant daughter would also be at the party. This was the first time I've made a box mix in easily 10 years. My impressions: I didn't really feel like it saved that much time. I mean, I still had to bust out my mixer, bake the cake in two layers, wash up afterwards... The cake itself was significantly lighter than mine. Lighter in color, lighter in weight. And it dried out faster as well. I don't prefer the taste. And it easily cost me 4 times what I would normally spend on ingredients for even my vegan chocolate cake. Basically, I'm not the biggest fan. Box mixes are great for those who never bake and don't have the ingredients at home, but I would never willingly ...

So lately I've only been making vegan cake because, believe it or not, it actually tastes better than the regular cake recipes. That, and my 4-year-old can have some, too, without taking lactase pills first. But just for information sake, I'll include both vegan and regular cake recipes. These recipes are quite versatile, but the vegan versions are quite soft, so keep that in mind if you want to stack them, they may need some extra support. Let's start with the regular recipes. I got both my regular recipes from the Better Homes and Gardens Cookbook. Vanilla Cake (adapted from White Cake recipe) 2 cups flour 1 tsp baking powder 1/2 tsp baking soda Pinch of salt 1/2 cup butter or margarine 1 tsp vanilla (or 1 packet vanilla sugar) 4 egg white (or 3 whole eggs if the white color isn't so important) 1 1/3 cups buttermilk (this makes the cake. Don't be tempted to substitute regular milk.) In large mixing bowl, beat butter, sugar and vanilla. Add eggs one at...