High Rise Glorious Skittle Skat Roarious Sky Pie Angel Food Cake

When I was little, my mom read to me all the time.  One of my favorite books was The High Rise Glorious Skittle Skat Roarious Sky Pie Angel Food Cake by Nancy Willard.

I had the itch to make something I've never made before so I decided on an angel food cake.  After quite a bit of research, I discovered that making an angel food cake is a time consuming and tedious process.  I had the day off, so time consuming and tedious sounded wonderful.

I ended up choosing a recipe that I found online from America's Test Kitchen magazine. 

I have a confession to make: I'm terrible at following recipes.  I love reading them.  I love getting ideas about different flavors to combine.  I love the theory behind why ingredients work together the way they do.  But when it comes down to it, I can't just follow the steps.  I tweak.  I omit.  I add.  I do not follow the directions.  It's my flaw.  Everyone has to have at least one, right?

Back to the cake.  I read enough warnings about flat cakes, bland cakes, clumpy cakes and disaster cakes that I decided to break my own rule and not break the rules.  That's right.  I followed a recipe to the letter.  And I'm glad I did.  Things on the stove top can be tasted, seasoned and adjusted but baking is a science.  Once it's in the oven - you can't fix it.  You just wait with bated breath and hope for the best.  And I got lucky.  My cake came out perfectly.  It was brown and cracked on the top, stayed in the pan when it was flipped to cool, but slid out perfectly after the sides were loosened.  Light, fluffy and delicately sweet, it was angel food cake perfection.  I swear to you, it was because I used my finger to write EVOL in the ingredients before it was baked.  It's more than likely that you don't know what that means.  Read the book mentioned above and all will be revealed.

I have a second confession to make.  I can't leave well enough alone.  It has to be bigger, more, crazier, weirder, tastier....     

Instead of serving the cake by itself or with some simple fresh fruit, I decided to attack it and as I like to say, "Get weird with it." I started by making a fluffy white frosting. (KitchenAid Stand Mixer, I love you.)

Then I sliced my poor cake in 1/2 horizontally, frosted the top of the bottom piece and layered it with orange slices with all the pith removed and a tart citrus simple syrup.

I put the top back on, frosted the rest of it.... and still didn't stop there.  I decided to toast coconut and coat the frosting with that.  AND THEN (Yes! There's MORE!) drizzled the whole thing with the rest of the citrus simple syrup.

So there it is...  The final product.  Sweet & tart, fluffy, light and slightly nutty.  I loved making it and can't wait to try a new variation.  Have a delicious day!

- The Little Rutabaga