Don't-Throw-Out-The-Egg-Whites Almond Cake
Plus: Baked Salmon Over Dill Basmati Rice, Spicy Peanut Noodles, and Fried Tofu.
Hey everyone,
I’ve been making the same almond cake for thousands of years… you know: it’s this recipe from Amanda Hesser’s Cooking for Mr. Latte. I know it so well, I can recite it: beat butter and sugar, work in almond paste, add four egg yolks, add sour cream mixed with baking soda, add the flour mixture, put in buttered pan.
But wait a second: four egg yolks… but about the egg whites?
For as long as I’ve been making this recipe, I’ve used the yolks (see left bowl) and discarded the whites (see right bowl) and always felt a little guilty. Sure, if I had more time I’d make meringues or an egg white omelette but who wants an egg white omelette besides Jenny Craig?
This time I made a bold decision: I would whip the egg whites until stiff peaks formed and fold them into the finished batter.
It seems obvious now, but so many cake recipes have you do this to get more air into the cake. The added benefit here is that the almond cake always sinks in the middle… maybe the egg whites would give it more stability? And make it a little lighter?
Only one way to find out: I baked it for an hour at 350, like I usually do, and after 15 minutes of cooling I took the sides off the springform pan.
Behold! A much more stable cake with hardly any sinking in the middle. I solved the sinking in the middle problem.
But how did it actually taste? Was it better than the almond cake that launched a thousand forks?
Sad to say: it was not.
Don’t get me wrong… this is still a most excellent almond cake, a dazzling dessert that perfectly ends any dinner party. It just didn’t have the density that the yolk-only cake has. That cake is more compact (hence the sinking in the middle) and is almost fudgier in texture, whereas this is spongier.
So in the future, save your egg whites for the Jenny Craig omelette. This almond cake recipe is perfect as-is.
I made this cake for our visiting friends Jimmy and Raef who followed us from New York to L.A. but refuse to follow us back! Our mutual friend Chris, with whom we used to have a Bad Movie Club (that I ruined with Nothing But Trouble), was also in attendance.
For dinner, I made this Baked Salmon and Dill Rice from NYT Cooking.
It’s a really nice recipe in that you cook the rice in the baking pan, then put the salmon on top, and brush it with a mixture of mayo and honey and a few other things.
A few technical difficulties: I doubled the rice, so when I added the boiling water, it came up really high and when I put the foil on and placed it in the oven, a little sloshed over the side. Still: the rice came out perfect.
The other issue: maybe because I couldn’t fully seal the salmon in there with so much rice, the fish didn’t get cooked all the way when I served it to my guests, and I had to place all of the filets back on to a cookie sheet to cook longer in a 425 oven for another 5 minutes. This was a more forgivable offense than Nothing But Trouble.
The finished dish was delish… I also served it with a cherry tomato, Persian cucumber, and red onion salad.
Finally, I tried to scrounge up some ingredients last night to make dinner and landed on this old recipe for noodles with spicy peanut sauce.
I used spaghetti, peanut butter, soy sauce, fish sauce, grated ginger and garlic, scallions, cilantro, and toasted chopped cashews (b/c I couldn’t find peanuts).
I also fried up some firm tofu which was as easy as patting it dry, heating oil in a non-stick skillet, and frying the cubes up in batches.
The key was sprinkling them with salt after to give them an extra pop of flavor.
Tossed with the peanut noodles, this was an excellent, vegetarian dinner. Dare I say vegan? Oh, wait, there was spicy honey in the mix too.
Let’s look at some links!
Gordon Ramsay and Fox Launch New Food Entertainment Platform “Bite” (Deadline);
Perfect Blueberry Muffin Loaf (Smitten Kitchen).
That’s all for today, folks!
See you back here on Thursday….
Your pal,
Adam
I have a couple of recipes that use yolks only. I freeze my egg whites in small ziploc bags for future uses. They work perfectly for meringues or other baked goodies.
Hi there! So, I made this cake again last month for a funeral (the last time I made it, it sank lower than it had ever sunk before). I remembered, far back in the mists of time, that the NYT version had different baking instructions. I ended up baking it in 2 round pans at 325 for a long time - probably 55 mins. It still sank, but it sank *less*. I think the lower temp makes for a more stable cake. I'll do it at the lower temp from now on, I think, and I'll take it out probably at 50-51 minutes. That's my report from the field. Thank you! Love your work!