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The author enjoyed a slice of Coca-Cola cake with a glass of soda. Maria Noyen/The Insider
- I recently made a Coca-Cola Cake Faith Hill on “Be My Guest With Ina Garten”.
- The cake, which Hill says is a family favorite, contains Coca-Cola in the batter and frosting.
- Coca-Cola gave the cake a noticeable fluffiness and enhanced the rich chocolate flavor.
Faith Hill impressed Ina Garten when she recently baked her family’s favorite dessert: Coca-Cola Cake.
Faith Hill and Ina Garten attend the Time 100 Gala on April 21, 2015 in New York City. Kevin Mazur/Getty Images for TIME
During a recent appearance on Food Network’s “Be My Guest With Ina Garten,” Faith Hill and her daughter, Gracie Hill, made Garten her family’s favorite dessert: Coca-Cola Cake.
Starting the episode, Garten said that cake is one of Faith’s husband, country singer Tim McGraw’s favorite dishes of all time — and not just on his birthday.
“That’s what he asks for most of the time,” Gracie said. Later in the episode, she states that “there hasn’t been a day” in her life when she doesn’t know what a Coca-Cola cake is and that introducing Garten to the dish was an “exhilarating experience”.
I love sweets – but I’d never heard of using Coca-Cola in a cake recipe before.
The author was skeptical about using Coca-Cola as a baking ingredient. Maria Noyen/The Insider
I have a track record of enjoying sweet dishes. In the past, I’ve shared my family’s favorite chocolate cake as well as my Grandpa’s delicious jam recipe.
I also like Coca-Cola. From making it straight to testing viral recipes, like mixing the soda with coffee creamer, it’s safe to say I’m a fan of bubbly soda.
But even though I’m partial to all things sweet, I never would have thought to combine Coca-Cola and baking to make a dessert like Faith’s.
However, after hearing Garten — an experienced chef — call the cake “crazy good” and give it her stamp of approval, I decided to try it myself. To keep an eye.
Faith’s Coca-Cola Cake contains lots of butter, cocoa powder, marshmallows, and of course, Coca-Cola.
Ingredients for Faith Hill’s recipe Maria Noyen/The Insider
To make Faith’s Coca-Cola Cake Batter, you will need:
For frosting, you will need:
After preheating my oven to 350 degrees Fahrenheit, I began making the batter.
There’s a lot of butter in this cake.Maria Noyen/Insider
The first thing Faith does is to slowly heat 1 cup of butter on the stove, using a spatula to help melt it.
Next, I added cocoa powder before pouring in a full cup of Coca-Cola.
Coca-Cola was poured over the wet batter. Maria Noyen/The Insider
It was strange to see Coca-Cola, a drink I’ve always enjoyed cold, being heated on the stove.
The Coca-Cola formed a noticeable layer of bubbles on top of the hot mixture.
Wet Ingredients. Maria Noyen/The Insider
Like Faith, I stirred the mixture with my spatula a few more times before working on my dry ingredients.
To keep the mixture warm but not overheated, I left it on the lowest heat setting as possible.
On the counter, I sifted the three main dry ingredients — flour, sugar, and baking soda — into a large bowl.
The dry ingredients are flour, sugar and baking soda. Maria Noyen/The Insider
“Forgive us,” Faith said to Garten when she asked him to put “a lot of sugar” in the bowl.
Once the dry ingredients are sifted, I pour a mixture of hot Coca-Cola, cocoa powder, and butter into the bowl.
Mixture of wet and dry ingredients. Maria Noyen/The Insider
Before I get into the hot ingredients, I should point out that it took me a while to sift through the dry ingredients. I found it helpful to use a wooden spoon to break up the bits of dough that were a bit more difficult to sift through.
The next step involved adding buttermilk, vanilla extract and eggs, which Faith told to “spank” until runny with a fork.
Next, the author added eggs, buttermilk, and vanilla extract. Maria Noyen/The Insider
According to Gracie, buttermilk is “an essential to any Southern dish.”
I added half a cup of buttermilk as required by the recipe as well as vanilla extract before whisking in the two eggs. On the show, Faith joked that she had to “spank” the eggs because “they were bad”, causing Garten to laugh out loud.
The last ingredient in the cake batter are the little marshmallows.
The final ingredient of the batter are the tiny marshmallows. Maria Noyen/The Insider
Faith didn’t specify how many marshmallows to add. I estimated it to be around a cup.
On why marshmallows are part of the recipe, Faith tells Garten that they act as a nice “surprise” when you bite into a slice of cake.
Before pouring the batter into my pan, I butter it and sprinkle flour on it.
Coca-Cola Cake before baking. Maria Noyen/The Insider
As Garten once said in an episode of “Barefoot Contessa” where she demonstrated her easy chocolate cake recipe, “There’s no point in making a cake if you can’t get it out of the pan.”
Once my pan was prepped and ready to use, I poured the batter into it and made sure the marshmallows, which were floating on top of the mixture, were evenly spread.
Afterwards, I put my pan in the oven. Gracie said the cake should be baked for about 30 to 35 minutes.
With the cake in the oven, I turned my attention to the frosting, which has the same ingredients as the batter.
The icing has the same ingredients as the batter.Maria Noyen/Insider
Garten explained that Faith’s frosting is similar to a glaze in that it is made by heating the ingredients on the stove.
The first ingredients I added were butter and cocoa powder, just like the cake batter started out with.
Nevertheless, the recipe called for Coca-Cola.
The icing also needs more Coca-Cola.Maria Noyen/Insider
If you think 1 cup of Coca-Cola in the batter is enough, think again. Following the recipe, I added the remaining amount (6 tablespoons) of Coca-Cola to the pan for the frosting.
Then I added more vanilla extract and, as Gracie said, a whole box of confectioners’ sugar. At first, I was skeptical about how lumpy the frosting turned out to be.
The confectioners’ sugar made the icing overly lumpy.Maria Noyen/Insider
The sugar instantly made the hot frosting extremely lumpy and unappealing to look at.
But when I took out the whisk to stir the mixture on high speed, the frosting turned out to be smooth.
The icing when it’s finished. Maria Noyen/Insider
When I turned my spatula to whisk, I noticed that all the lumps of sugar were gone, leaving the mixture nice and smooth.
The frosting was super thick at this point, so I made sure to stir it constantly while baking the cake in the oven to keep it from hardening too much.
I took the cake out of the oven at 33 minutes and poked it with a fork to make holes for the frosting to seep through.
Cake after baking 33 minutes.Maria Noyen/Insider
The cake was noticeably darker and lighter, which I think can be explained by where the marshmallows were floating when they melted in the oven.
Within minutes, the frosting has a shiny, glassy finish.
The icing immediately showed signs of hardening like a glaze.Maria Noyen/Insider
“The glaze hardens very quickly so you get a nice crunch when you bite into it,” Gracie tells Garten.
When I poured the frosting over the cake, I knew exactly what he meant – within minutes, the surface looked shiny and hard as Gracie had said.
Faith and Gracie told Garten that you could eat the cake “right away”—so I immediately cut myself a slice.
The cake looked moist.Maria Noyen/Insider
My first impression of the cake was that it looked incredibly moist, like a fudge brownie, but it cut very smoothly so it wasn’t dense at all.
The glaze-like frosting, which Garten also compared to ganache, gives it a professional finish, even though it’s a relatively easy recipe that doesn’t require any fancy techniques.
Now I understand why Garten calls Faith’s Coca-Cola Cake “Crazy Good.”
The author enjoyed a slice of Coca-Cola cake with a glass of soda. Maria Noyen/The Insider
Garten told Faith and Gracie, “If this was in my kitchen, I’d go back and taste it to make sure it’s okay.”
And that’s exactly how I felt after taking my first bite of Coca-Cola cake. It was mild, but moist. While I could taste the sweetness of Coca-Cola, I liked that it didn’t overpower the chocolate, rather it enhanced the natural flavor.
While I was eating, I was curious to see how the soda would have affected the texture and flavor of the cake. After doing some research, I read on the official Betty Crocker website that, like any soda, Coca-Cola contains carbon dioxide bubbles that act as a leavening agent, “the element that makes baked goods rise.” and makes them light and puffy.” I can definitely taste it in this recipe.
I would say that my only criticism was that the marshmallows didn’t make as big of an impression on me as I’d expected from Faith’s description. I didn’t really notice any difference between the pieces of cake that contained marshmallows and the ones that didn’t. If I make this recipe again, I probably won’t bother buying them.
But otherwise, I definitely think this cake is perfect for anyone who loves chocolate, Coca-Cola, and baking desserts that sound fancy but don’t take too much effort.
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