Last week, my good friend Judi brought the most delicious red velvet cake to my mom's celebration of life service, and she told me she used a hack she'd found about how to make a cake mix taste homemade.
Mom was almost 97 and had an amazing life. She loved sweets, especially chocolate; I know she would have approved heartily! The cake was a huge hit with everyone, and I used her method to make Valentine's cupcakes for my granddaughters, who are away at college!
They turned out great, and I topped them with homemade cream cheese frosting, using a recipe from a blogger I idolize, Karen from The Food Charlatan. I knew it would be simple and wonderful, and it was!
If you wonder how to make a cake mix taste homemade, it's easy. It comes down to enriching the batter with the help of an extra egg, milk instead of water, and melted butter instead of oil. The bottom line is we add fat.
Julia Child is my cooking hero, and she wisely taught me that fat is what gives things flavor. When you use this easy hack, the cake batter is richer, moister, and more flavorful.
For red velvet cake or any other chocolate cake, adding instant espresso powder or instant dark roast coffee enhances the flavor without adding coffee flavor. Coffee and chocolate are a great marriage.😉
Julia Child extended her wisdom to advise that we eat great food in moderate portions, and I wholeheartedly believe that is the key! That's why cupcakes are so great! A cake mix makes twelve to fifteen pieces or eighteen to twenty-four cupcakes!
The batter is incredibly red! It's perfect for Valentine's Day but any day when you want something that looks extra special. I am excited to make them over Memorial Day and July Fourth when we celebrate at the lake. I'll add some red, white, and blue sprinkles and tiny flags!
I only have eighteen muffin pans; I need to do something about that! So I made eighteen cupcakes from my beautiful batter, but twenty-four would actually have been better because the top would have been flatter and more "frostingable." They were beauties, though, don't you think?
As I told you, I decided to make homemade cream cheese frosting. It was for a couple of reasons. One, I forgot to pick up a couple of cans of cream cheese frosting when I was at the store, and two, I over-bought cream cheese for New Year and the Super Bowl!😏
I want THICK frosting on a cake because I eat cake mostly just for the homemade buttercream or cream cheese frosting. Right away, I knew Karen at The Food Charlatan would have a great recipe, so I went right to her website.
Here's what Karen has to say about her cream cheese frosting, "This recipe is everything you want in a cream cheese frosting: it's irresistibly creamy and smooth, has that perfect tang that you are looking for, and is NOT overly sweet. Some recipes you can barely taste the cream cheese, amiright? I want to feel that cream cheesiness in my BONESSS."
This recipe delivers! And it's easy with just six ingredients! You can add more powdered sugar if you plan to pipe it on. I had to be this many years old before I attempted to pipe frosting on cupcakes, and my first attempt was not stellar, but if you add enough sprinkles, you can fake it! Looking good!
Now you know how to make a cake mix taste homemade, and it's a hack that works for any flavor of cake mix except angel food cake. Reminder: Only use the coffee if you're making a chocolate cake of some type, like German chocolate or Devil's Food, for example.
Here's how to make cupcakes made with a cake mix that tastes homemade! Works with any cake mix, with special instructions for any type of chocolate cake mix.
The perfect cream cheese frosting with the perfect amount of tang is from Karen at The Food Charlatan.
Allow the butter and cream cheese to soften at room temperature until you can easily push your finger into it.
Add the cream cheese and butter to a large bowl or stand mixer.
Add 1 cup powdered sugar and beat together. If it is very clumpy, Karen recommends sifting it to make sure that you don’t end up with powdered sugar lumps in your frosting. Make sure you scrape the bottom and edges as you go.
Add another cup of powdered sugar and beat well.
Add one teaspoon of vanilla, one teaspoon of fresh lemon juice, and 1/4 or 1/2 teaspoon of kosher salt. You don’t have to use the lemon juice, but it really brings out the tang in the cream cheese. It doesn’t make the frosting taste like lemon.
Add another 1/2 cup powdered sugar and beat well.
Taste your frosting and see what you think. If you are frosting a sheet cake and like the flavor and texture where it’s at, leave it as is. If you are piping the frosting onto cupcakes or using the frosting in a layer cake, you might consider adding more powdered sugar (up to 4 cups total) so that the frosting is more sturdy and will hold up. Remember that the more powdered sugar you add, the less tangy and cream-cheesy your frosting will taste.
Adjust salt, lemon juice, and vanilla to taste as desired.
I am more of a pie girl myself, but sometimes you need a cake! Here are a couple of our favorite quick and easy cakes: Mountain Dew Cake and Chocolate Caramel Poke Cake With Peanuts. Both of them start with a cake mix, and they are both amazing.
But if you like pie even more than cake (like me!), type "pie" in the search bar and find some of my favorites!😉
If you liked this recipe, you are my people! So please share this post on your social media accounts like Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, and Pinterest if you enjoyed this recipe today. It would really tickle me, and I'd be ever so grateful; thank you!
Love, GB (Betty Streff)
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