Mar. 21: Red Velvet Cake. Why?

Maybe some of you foodie types can answer this question for me. What is so special about Red Velvet Cake? California Pizza Kitchen has it on their dessert menu now, and I’ve tried to order it a few times but they’re always out. Yesterday I ordered a slice to go after a yummy pasta lunch, and when I got around to eating it yesterday afternoon, it was underwhelming. Nothing bad about it, just nothing spectacular. With the raves I’ve read about in several places, I expected a little more.

Moist? Yes, very. Pretty? Soooo pretty, especially with the vanilla bean cream cheese frosting and white chocolate curls. Edible? Definitely, but please don’t ask me to identify a specific flavor. Because was it out of this world? Not so much.

I’m embarrassed to admit that I had never even heard of Red Velvet Cake until just before Katie’s second birthday. I was looking for fun cake ideas and ran across a recipe for Red Velvet Cake—sounded perfect to go with the hearts party theme. I had half the ingredients in my shopping cart at Albertsons when I got to the baking aisle and found a Red Velvet Cake mix. Just add oil, eggs and water? Much easier than all that buttermilk and shortening and beets.

The cupcakes turned out cute, sure, but they weren’t anything special; I blamed my use of a cake mix shortcut. But after eating that so-so cake from CPK yesterday, I think maybe I just don’t get it. Here, let me Google some recipes for you (not to be a smartass; it’s my excuse to use LMGTFY): Red Velvet Cake Recipes.

I read on Wikipedia that Red Velvet Cake is a favorite in the southern US and that’s it’s known for being rich and sweet. The CPK cake had rich and sweet frosting, but the cake itself was blah in comparison. I call shenanigans.