1st Trial

I did my first trial!! As I expected, this is not the winner recipe. I started by reading blogs of different recipes I had never tried before, because I wanted a different recipe from the one I have been using. This specific one caught my eye because of a couple factors, first, the recipe stated that it stays moist for 4 days, which is a key element in what I am trying to achieve. Secondly, the blog before the recipe talked endlessly about creating the perfect vanilla cake, that doesn't dry out, and has a perfect consistent crumb, which again, is something that is super similar to what I'm doing! And thirdly, the actual process of the recipe was super interesting, and different than anything I've ever tried before. These factors gave me hope that this would be the recipe to base my own around. My first idea was to keep the recipes dry ingredients exactly the same, and only change the type of butter/oil. This is because I have found that recipes with butter, tend to get much more dense and hard in the fridge, just like a stick of butter would, whereas my chocolate cake, which is oil based, always stays moist and light. So I did four different tests. One batch was the normal recipe, made with butter, one batch had vegan butter (which is oil based), one batch had canola oil, and the last batch had extra virgin olive oil. So what did I find? Looking directly at the cakes, there wasn't too much of a difference in color, or appearance. In the picture below, you can see each of the trials cut into, you may notice some big air bubbles, or cracks in the crumb. This is not a good sign, to achieve a wonderful cake, you want the crumb to be as consistent as possible, and big air holes are not ideal. Now for the taste. Overall, I didn't love any of them. The texture of the cake was a bit spongy, which wasn't great, and none of them had a super light fluffy texture to them. For the butter cake, interestingly enough, I could really taste the butter, I've never tasted butter strongly in anything before so this was interesting. In costa rica we have a very yellow, strong and distinct smelling butter, so I am not surprised. For the vegan butter cake, I did not taste much of anything, the cake was fine. For the canola oil batch, the same thing, not much to taste, just kind of bland. And finally for the last test, with the olive oil, I could strongly taste the olive oil, which is what I expected, but not the most enjoyable taste in a cake. What did I learn from these trials? This made me realize I need to incorporate more vanilla flavor, especially when tasting the cake on it's own without frosting. I learned that olive oil in cakes is a no-go. I will most likely not be using this recipe again. Any factors that may have influenced this trial? Yes, there are a couple things that could have altered my results apart from the individual changes I made. I drastically decreased the quantity's in the recipe so I only made small amounts of each, to make sure I didn't waste too much. I also baked them in cupcake tins, so that it was easier to taste test. What will I change for next time? Next week I plan to use the recipe that I know better, and have used many times. I plan to adjust that recipe as I see fit, and go from there.