Serves 8 to 10
This Devil’s Food-style cake is packed with chocolate flavor. For an accurate measurement of boiling water, bring a full kettle of water to a boil, then measure out the desired amount.

WHY THIS RECIPE WORKS:
For this Chocolate Layer Cake recipe, we recommend Dutch-processed cocoa, which has a better flavor. “Blooming” the cocoa powder and unsweetened chocolate with hot water and instant espresso produced the strongest chocolate flavor. Sour cream added moisture and tangy flavor, while baking powder and baking soda united to create the greatest rise. This Chocolate Layer Cake recipe can be combined with many frostings and fillings for a different result every time.

Makes 3 8-inch layers or two 9-inch rounds
If you’ve forgotten to bring the milk and egg white mixture to room temperature, set the bottom of the measuring cup containing it in a sink of hot water and stir until the mixture feels cool rather than cold, around 65 degrees. Cake layers can be wrapped and stored for one day.

WHY THIS RECIPE WORKS:
We developed a recipe for White Layer Cake to bake up moist, tender, and flavorful, rather than dry and bland. We used a reverse creaming method for a sturdy cake with a tender crumb. Plenty of butter and vanilla extract add moisture and flavor to our White Layer Cake.

Serves 8 to 10

WHY THIS RECIPE WORKS:
Similar to Lady Baltimore Cake, Pink Azalea Cake comprises three white cake layers swathed in billowy seven-minute icing. For our recipe, we used our favorite white cake recipe that yielded three 8-inch rounds. We made the filling by gently folding in the nuts, chopped fruit, and Kirsch (a clear cherry brandy) with some of the icing. Toasting the nuts in a skillet over medium heat until lightly browned intensified their flavor.

Serves 12
The best tool to remove an angel food cake from the pan is a thin, flexible, non-serrated knife that is at least 5 inches long. Present the cake sitting on its wide, crustier top, with the delicate and more easily sliced bottom crust facing up. To cut the cake, use a long, serrated knife, and pull it back and forth with a gentle sawing motion.

WHY THIS RECIPE WORKS:
To get an angel food cake recipe for a tall, perfectly shaped cake with a snowy white, tender crumb encased in a thin, delicate, golden crust, we experimented with egg whites. We found the key was the speed at which we beat the egg whites, starting at low speed just to break them up into a froth and increasing the speed to medium to form soft, billowy mounds. When large bubbles stop appearing around the edges, this is the point the sugar should be added. Once all the sugar is added the whites become shiny and form soft peaks when the beater is lifted. This is just right for making the perfect tall, light yet firm angel food cake.

Makes two 9-inch cakes
To quickly bring the eggs and milk to room temperature (65 degrees), submerge them in a bowl of warm water for about 10 minutes after mixing them together. Adding the butter pieces to the mixing bowl one at a time prevents the dry ingredients from flying up and out of the bowl.

WHY THIS RECIPE WORKS:
Traditional yellow layer cake should melt in the mouth and taste of butter and eggs. But many layer cake recipes that we tried came out crumbly, sugary, and hard. As for the flavor, they tasted merely sweet. We made a few refinements to the usual yellow layer cake recipe. For starters, we took down the sugar slightly, which allowed more buttery flavor to come through. Softened butter blended more easily into the dry ingredients and coated the flour particles with fat. If the butter was too cold or too warm, the cake became heavy or greasy. Rotating the pans once during baking ensured that both cakes cooked evenly and could stand up to a heavy slathering of frosting.

Serves 8 to 10

WHY THIS RECIPE WORKS:
Lane cake gets its name from Emma Rylander Lane of Clayton, Ala., who first published the recipe in 1898, after it won the blue ribbon at a county fair in Columbus, Ga. Her cake became famous when it was featured in Harper Lee’s 1960 novel To Kill a Mockingbird. For a modern Lane Cake recipe, we made the filling by pulsing together pecans, coconut, cherry preserves, and bourbon in the food processor until coarsely ground. After spreading cherry preserves in a thin layer over the top of the cake, we decorated our Lane Cake with toasted and chopped pecans.

Serves 15
You can use 6 ounces of finely chopped semisweet chocolate in place of the chips.

WHY THIS RECIPE WORKS:
This no-bake dessert is typically made by layering a mixture of instant vanilla pudding and Cool Whip between graham crackers and topping it with chocolate frosting. We loved the convenience of these store-bought items, but our enthusiasm waned when confronted by their flavor. With a couple of easy techniques (a quick stovetop pudding, whipped cream, and a microwave-and-stir glaze) and very little active time, we produced a from-scratch version that easily trumped its inspiration.

Serves 8
Use your favorite pie dough or our recipe (related).

WHY THIS RECIPE WORKS:
The majority of Thoroughbred Pie recipes that we prepared were far too sweet. We reduced the amount of sugar to almost half of what was called for in some recipes. Brown sugar contributed a hint of spice and depth, while more neutral white sugar ensured that the nuts and chocolate weren’t eclipsed. To bring more balance to the pie, we replaced semisweet chocolate chips with chopped bittersweet chocolate.

To give the top of our pie its trademark crunch, we went with cornstarch instead of the flour that we’d been using as a thickener. Removing some egg white from the recipe also helped. We settled on blind baking our pie crust to ensure that it didn’t come out of the oven underbaked. Sprinkling the chocolate over the still-warm crust provided a hit of intense chocolate in every bite.

Makes 12 cupcakes

You can substitute 3/4 cup hot coffee for the boiling water and instant espresso powder. For an accurate measurement of boiling water, bring a full kettle of water to a boil, then measure out the desired amount.

WHY THIS RECIPE WORKS: A cupcake piled high with creamy chocolate buttercream frosting is the perfect single-serving dessert, yet on average it packs in more than 25 grams of fat, leaving plenty of room for improvement. To start, we tried a number of low-fat cupcake recipes that included “alternative” ingredients like prunes or applesauce, but they were overwhelmingly disappointing, giving us dry, crumbly cakes. Instead, we worked with a more traditional recipe and trimmed the fat by reducing the amount of chocolate and switching from butter to canola oil, which is lower in saturated fat. Adding a hefty dose of cocoa along with a bit of instant espresso powder boosted the chocolate flavor immensely, and swapping in bread flour for the all-purpose flour provided plenty of lift and structure to our lean batter. Finally, topping the cakes with a simple yet ultra-creamy frosting made of confectioners’ sugar instead of an over-the-top buttercream frosting helped to make these cupcakes a reasonable, yet still indulgent, treat.

http://www.americastestkitchenfeed.com/comfort-food-makeovers/2013/04/recipe-makeover-challenge-chocolate-cupcakes/

Serves 8 to 10

WHY THIS RECIPE WORKS:
Cool, creamy icebox cheesecake meets a salty, pucker-inspiring margarita. We bring the best of both worlds to center stage in our Margarita Cake. As the top glaze has the boozy kick of its namesake, this cake is a lively contribution to a grownups-only party.