My BIG Angel Food Cake

Beautifully tall and stately this BIG Angel Food Cake is served with strawberries for dessert for Sunday Dinner.

Most Angel Food cakes call for 1 1/2 cups of egg whites.  That is just pretty common, old recipes call for 12 egg whites.  To get to the point, I save egg whites and each time I have one I pop it into a small container, whatever is handy, and freeze.  Lately I found several containers with varying amounts.   So I thawed them all and found I had a good 2 cups worth.  I made a BIG cake!

Ingredients for My BIG Angel Food Cake:

2 C. egg whites at room temperature
1 1/2 t. cream of tarter
1/2 t. salt
1 C. sifted cake flour
1 1/2 C. sifted powdered sugar
1 1/2 t. vanilla
1/2 t. almond extract
1 C. granulated sugar

Preheat the oven to 375 degrees F.  Inspect a large angel food tube pan to be sure it is clean and free of any residue.  Set the pan aside.  Sift the flour and the first amount of sugar together on a sheet of waved paper and set aside.

Combine the egg whites, cream of tarter, and salt in a large stand mixer bowl and beat until foamy.  Turn up the mixer.  Begin adding the sugar flour a fourth of a cup at a time quickly but carefully sprinkling it into the mixer as it runs.  After you have added the flour and sugar mixture turn the mixer all the way up and beat until stiff peaks form.

Remove the stiff beaten egg and flour bowl from the mixer stand and fold in by hand the flavorings using a large spoon.  Next fold in 2 T. at a time the last amount of granulated sugar.

Carefully spoon the batter into the tube pan spreading until even.  Take a long table knife or spatula and run it around the batter at the edges of the pan to rid of air bubbles. Then continue until all of the batter is level and without large air pockets.

Bake with the top of the cake in the center of the oven for 30-35 minutes.  The top should be well browned and dry to the touch.  Remove from the oven and hang upside down over a tall thin necked bottle until the cake is cold.  Run a long thin knife blade around the outer edge and the tube to loosen the cake.  Turn out onto a stand and frost as desired.

I frosted this with my "go to" frosting of powdered sugar, soft butter. vanilla and heavy cream.  I use a tablespoon of butter, a 1/2 teaspoon of vanilla and 1-2 tablespoons of cream per cup of powdered sugar.  I add additional cream until it reaches the consistency I want.   This cake is being served with sweetened strawberries I froze last spring and does not need a full recipe of frosting.  Just enough to look luscious!

http://thehiddenpantry.blogspot.com/2010/05/all-things-strawberry.html