I think that pretty much all cake is good, but I prefer frosting to whipped cream, and am very anti-fruit fillings. My favourite kind of cake in the whole world is coconut cake, and if you want to get right down to it, Van de Camp's coconut cake. What's yours?

-- Kymm Zuckert (hedgehog@hedgehog.net), August 22, 2000

Answers

My mother-in-law makes a red velvet cake with cream cheese icing. It is fabulous. It may be a southern thing, cuz I never had it as a kid growing up. It is very popular as a grooms' cake here, shaped as the mascot of the groom's alma mater.

-- Van (cascade79@ivillage.com), August 22, 2000.

German chocolate. Mmmm.

I really don't like plain old frosting, unless it's real homemade butter based frosting. Otherwise, if it's that lardy stuff, I'd rather have whipped cream, thanks.

-- Beth (beth@xeney.com), August 22, 2000.

Chocolate fudge cake with walnuts, or pound cake. When I was a little kid, my aunts used to bake the old-family-recipe Fudge cake for birthday parties, and they'd bake a few pennies into it. Whoever got the penny got to keep it, woo hoo!

It's a wonder nobody died or lost a tooth.

-- Colin (ethilrist@prodigy.net), August 22, 2000.

Here's mine (I hope this works formatwise...) 2 C flour
1 C sugar
3/4 C brown sugar
3/4 C unsweetened cocoa
1 1/2 tsp. baking powder
1/2 tsp. baking soda
1/2 tsp. salt
1 1/2 C milk
2 eggs
1/2 C butter, softened
2 1/2 tsp. vanilla
Preheat oven to 3500 F and grease and flour two 8" - 9" round cake pans. Mix all dry ingredients together in a large bowl. Make a well in center of dry ingredients, add remaining ingredients and mix at low speed until completely moistened. Increase speed and beat at high speed for about 3 minutes. Divide batter between the pans and bake for about 30 minutes or until a cake tester comes out clean. Cool in pans on wire racks for about 5 minutes, before inverting onto wire racks to cool completely. For the buttercream 1 cup sugar
2 large eggs
3 sticks (1 1/2 cups) unsalted butter, softened
3 tablespoons instant espresso powder dissolved in 1 tablespoon hot water
In a small heavy saucepan dissolve the sugar in 1/3 cup water over moderate heat, stirring, bring the mixture to a boil, and boil it until it registers 2400F. on a candy thermometer. In a large bowl with an electric mixer beat the eggs until they are frothy, add the sugar syrup in a thin stream, beating, and beat the mixture until it is cool. Beat in the butter, 1 tablespoon at a time, the espresso mixture, and a pinch of salt and beat the buttercream until it is combined well. If necessary, chill the buttercream, covered, until it is firm enough to spread. Enough coffee and sugar to keep you awake for days.

-- Laura (windmills@diaryland.com), August 22, 2000.

Van, that reminds me of STEEL MAGNOLIAS (I think), where the cake is shaped like an armadillo and Shirley McLean's character says it looks like it's bleeding. (I think it was McLean's character, it's been a long time since I've seen the movie).

I love pretty much all kinds of cake, except German Chocolate. But I'm not much of a frosting fan. Though I once loved whipped cream or homemade cream cheese frostings. Unfortunately, I can't have most cakes these days and angel food cake is completely verboten (don't even know how to make a vegan version of that). *sigh*

-- Carol (webgal@ordinarygoddess.com), August 22, 2000.

My mom makes a chocolate cake with a whipped frosting that's made of Crisco and sugar and very little else. Sounds revolting, I know, but it's about 55% air, and it's light and fattening and has crunchy granules of sugar throughout. The most delicious cake, ever.

I used to be timid about asking for it for my birthday, because it's such fluffy frosting that you can't write "Happy Birthday" on it in icing. Then I grew up and realized that people would pretty much figure out why the cake was there, even without the writing on it.

Chocolate cake w/that frosting and a freezing-cold glass of milk....Mmmmm!

-- Patrick (xingcat@yahoo.com), August 22, 2000.

If I were making a cake for Kymm, I would make this cake - Kitty Litter Cake.

Actually, I am dying to make this cake for someone - it cracks me up so much.

-- Kristin Thomas (kristin@sperare.com), August 22, 2000.

A warm, flourless chocolate cake made entirely from eggs, butter, and whipped cream and served with vanilla ice cream. Depending on the taste of the recipient (this is my version of a birthday cake) I sometimes spread glazed raspberries over the top.

The two other cakes I look forward to making are holiday cakes. At Easter, I make Lane cake, which is an eight-layer angel cake with 7-yolk coconut-bourbon-pecan filling between the layers and vanilla buttercream frosting. On Christmas Eve I make a buche de Noel with chocolate frosting and coffee/cognac buttercream filling.

X had a professor once whose wife had promised him when they married that she would bake him a chocolate cake every single week. Regrettably, they turned out to be Type II diabetics in their old age.

Catriona

-- Catriona Richardson (catri696@purpleturtle.com), August 22, 2000.

Carrot cake, which absolutely must have cream cheese frosting. And the more ingredients, the better. Nuts, raisins, actual carrot, the whole enchilada. Well, not the whole enchi... Anyway, I order carrot cake wherever I can find it, and twice, once at a restaurant and once right in front of me at a general store, the person cutting my piece dropped the entire (and only) cake to the floor. I'm still recovering from it, I think.

I did once find a wonderful example at a farmers' market, except, and this is a big except, it had vanilla icing. I'm still trying to fathom the thinking behind that fatal flaw. They didn't just run out of cream cheese, either. I went back to make sure -- still vanilla.

As for making it myself, I simply don't have the patience for baking anymore. And other cakes are generally OK, except for angel food, most German chocolate, and anything with dark or bright blue frosting (It's a personal thing, and yes, I'm still mad about the M&M!)

-- Charlie (jovi775@yahoo.com), August 23, 2000.

Carol: Just for the record, it was M'Lynn (Sallie Field's character) who talked about the armadllo groom's cake looking like it was bleeding "ta death". Mizz Weeza (Shirley MacLaine) did have a few things to say about it later to the groom's aunt who had made the cake ("You're responsible for this?") My daughter made Steel Magnolias her favorite movie from approximately age 6 through 10, at which time Fried Green Tomatoes replaced it. I have a lot of the dialog from both movies memorized from seeing them 300 times each. We also play Name the Movie around our house (You have to name the movie from a snippet of dialog, such as "Fasten your seatbelts - its going to be a bumpy night")

Favorite cake (since that's the actual topic) is chocolate with white icing - as close to the taste of a Devil Dog as possible.

-- Jon Arthur (zanne1504@aol.com), August 23, 2000.

Sorry, that should have been "Sally" Field. I guess I was confusing her with Sallie Mae, the student loan organization. Anyone can see how I could make that mistake.

-- Jon Arthur (zanne1504@aol.com), August 23, 2000.

Why hasn't anyone said 'Ice Cream Cake' yet?????

I LOVE ice cream cake. Especially the kind from Carvel with the 'dirt' in the middle. Those chocolate crunchies make it the best.

Just recently I had ice cream cake from Baskin Robbins where it was chocolate cake on the bottom and mint chocolate chip ice cream on top. It was SOOOOOO good.

But I'd be just as happy with a dunkin hines cake with jar frosting on it. Like Kymm said, it's the fact that someone makes it for you that makes it good. And if it looks like crap because the frosting was put on too soon and it messed up the cake top it's even better.

Colleen

-- Colleen (triggirl@yahoo.com), August 23, 2000.

A victoria sponge made with wholemeal flour. Buttercream and strawberry jam filling, dusted with icing sugar.

-- smallkat (smallkat@hotmail.com), August 24, 2000.

its a pie but very good and unbelievably easy, take a tub of whipped topping, an equal amount of your favorite fruit flavored yogurt and a handfull of gummy bears and mix them together. put them in a graham cracker crust and put seran wrap over it and let it freeze overnight. totally awesome

-- Ray Watkins (rayadj67@hotmail.com), January 16, 2002.

wow.......... dont you peoiple have something better to do? like really.... goget a job or read a book or something... this is sad

-- Jesse Crackhead (crazyjman@hotmail.com), May 18, 2002.

no kidding... YOU SLACKERS!!!!! you slow down our countries capatilist ways.... i have 7 jobs and i am raeding this over my 1 hour sleep per night and you know what? IM MAKING MONEY you cake freaks!

-- Taka Takiem (takatakiem@hotmail.com), May 18, 2002.

My favorite kind of cake in the world is: Pepperidge Farm,--- from the freezer section. The coconut and devil's food flavours are tied. You people that think talking about cake is stupid, please get over it, it's just cake. You don't have to eat it a lot to enjoy it. In fact, I enjoy cake ALOT more if I get it about once a month or less.:) Cake is good.

-- N.L. (tropicalchick14@aol.com), July 12, 2002.

I looooooove duncin hines cackes and buy from them all the time and i think they should say some tips on how to bake it and funky designs to mold it with.

-- aliza tova gaon (alcool@sbc globel.net), November 14, 2003.