Colourful pound cake

The introduction

Hello everyone, I hope, that you are all doing just fine!

In this article I want to continue my pound cake cycle and tell you about this other type of my pound cake, which I find very delicious and it has been the most delicious one after the very first chocolate one, if you want to know the truth. Well, I put a lot of thought in preparing it and I’m glad, that it came out great, so that it was just a perfect pound cake for myself and everyone else around, and, though I had prepared it for some people, the things changed and we ate that pound cake ourselves and everyone else really liked it, so that it was just a great thing to prepare that day, if you ask me.

So, I just wanted to bake a cake, I mean, the pound cake, because it’s very easy to prepare it in my halogen oven and it comes out just great every time I prepare it, so that it’s kind of a pleasure to prepare it, if you want to know the truth. So that I usually prepare pound cakes pretty often these days, and, besides, they don’t need much ingredients as you know and it’s enough for some people and it’s very light and great to eat and, well, people just like it, you know, so that I prepare it and I haven’t prepared the same pound cakes yet, so you should know, that I’m really experimenting everything. it’s like trying new things and I just love doing that and I can’t just drop it, you know. I just have this urge of doing something and by that I mean, preparing some things, which are just really good after preparing.

Well, this other day I was just thinking about preparing pound cake and I had this idea of preparing it with chocolate chips and I had already prepared a pound cake with chocolate chips some time earlier and it was pretty delicious, so that I thought, that I would prepare something like that again, however, then I realized, that I could do something differently and I would add some orange zest, too, and it would be something that I love so much, I mean, I really love that orange taste in chocolate and I have always loved that taste and now this Barambo company made new chocolate bars with chocolate and orange and these chocolate bars just taste amazing and I can’t help but to eat them, however, I can’t really eat them plenty, because I don’t really love chocolate that much. However, when it comes to pound cakes and cakes with cream filling and cream filling itself, I can eat plenty of them and I can’t really stop then, you know. 

Buying the necessary things

Anyways, I had some time for thinking and to decide how I wanted to prepare that pound cake and after some time, I just thought, that I would prepare this chocolate chip pound cake with some colourings and then I would have this chocolate glaze on top of it and put some peanuts on it. So that I went shopping after I finished my exam and went to this Pasazhi shopping center, where I know, that they have plenty of stuff, which I need and they have many things for baking and birthday parties and stuff like that. I needed to buy some chocolate chips and maybe some other things, too, you know, you remember to buy some other things when you just go into the shop and look around and that’s what I was thinking at that time, that when I went into that shop, then I would understand, what else I was looking for and, maybe they had some interesting things, which I hadn’t thought about and then I would just take them wit me, if you want to know the truth. When I went to that shop, I looked around and saw some new things, however, I didn’t really need any of them at that time, so that I just took what I needed and that was those two packs of chocolate chips and they were 100 grams each, I guess, and I had to pay 1.50 laris for each. Well, that’s kind of expensive, if you think about it, however, when it comes to chocolate chips, people can spend much money, I guess.

I also needed some colourings and they had plenty of them and some of them were in crystals and powder and some of them were liquid and stuff like that, and I decided to take those packages with crystal forms and that’s when you have to add some water to them to get dissolved, however, you can even just sprinkle them on the dough and mix them well and everything will get colourful, if you want to know the truth. So, after some thinking, I knew, that I had a red one at home, so that I would take some other colours and I decided to have some blue and green in my pound cake and I just took the two of them and they cost 50 tetris each and, you know, they are not like for one colouring only, I mean, you can use them some other time, too, because the powder in the package is more than enough for one usage only. I barely even used  a  quarter of that package for my pound cake colouring , if you want to know the truth.

Then I noticed those chocolate bars around and I had already seen that green one and I wondered how it would taste and then I thought, maybe it was that mint chocolate bar, however, when I asked the seller about it, she told me, that it had some kiwi fruit taste or something like that and, well, hearing that it could be kiwi fruit taste, I took one piece of that thing and decided to buy it and taste it. It was somewhere about 150 grams and it cost 2 laris that piece. With that chocolate bar my shopping there in Pasazhi shopping center was over and I was ready to go home and start preparing that pound cake. However, I still had to visit some supermarkets, so that I would buy some vanilla and maybe some oranges, too, because I thought, that if I bought some oranges, I would have orange zest and I would add it to my pound cake and that would be great, because it would have this orange and chocolate taste, which I love so much.

Anyways, I went to Fresco supermarket and I bought some vanillin and vanilla with sugar and they had some oranges, however, I didn’t really like them and I thought, that there might be some oranges sold in the streets and walking towards home, I would meet someone, who would have some good oranges. Well, there were some sellers just across the street when I came out of that Fresco supermarket and I thought, that I would buy those oranges there, however, those oranges were not looking great either, and I wanted to have some good ones, you know, so that I continued walking and I knew, that there would be some oranges nearby our apartment, too, because there are always some oranges there sold to customers and I was not wrong. They had two types of oranges and one of them was Georgian and the other one was Greek and the Georgian one cost up to 2 laris and the Greek one was 2.60 laris,and they looked better, so that I took 4 Greek ones and it cost 2 laris in all. And then I went home and started preparing my pound cake.

Ingredients:

• Eggs, 2 medium
• Cottage cheese, 1/3 cup
• Kefir, ½ cup
• White granulated sugar, ½ cup
• Butter, 100 grams
• Oil, 1 tbs
• Baking soda, 1 tsp
• Drops of vinegar
• Vanilla
• 1 cup of all-purpose flour
• Orange zest
• Dried coconut flakes
• Chocolate chips
• Colourings
• Pinch of salt
• For the topping:
• Cocoa powder
• Roasted peanuts
• Water
• White granulated sugar, 2 tbs
• Chocolate chips

Preparation process

Well, the preparation process is not that hard, I mean, anyone can do it and it’s not such a big deal, if you ask me. And if you are experienced in preparing those stuff like me, you will prepare it in a couple of minutes and then you can just put the cake into the halogen oven and set it for one hour and leave it like that without even paying any attention at all.

Well, getting home, the first thing that I needed to do was to get the butter out of the freezer. I had it in mind in the morning until I got out of the apartment, however, then I forgot about that and now I had to get it out and hope, that it would get on such temperature, when I could easily cut it and put it into a small saucepan or something like that for it to get melted and then I would add other ingredients to it, you know. And I was kind of surprised, when I took it out and after a couple of minutes I could cut it into some pieces, which I would use for melting. So that I melted that butter and I also added some oil to it and then I added the sugar to it and mixed them well and then I put them into a mixing bowl and started the mixer.

So, then it was time for the eggs, I beat them into a separate bowl and saw, that nothing was wrong with them and then added them to the mixing bowl, too. Then I had this cottage cheese and kefir mixed well together in a small bowl and I took a teaspoon of baking soda and added some drops of my vinegar and it got all foamy and stuff and I just put that spoon into that small bowl full of cottage cheese and kefir and mixed them well together.Then I added that to the mixture in the mixing bowl and I also added a pinch of salt with two packages of vanilla. You know, those packages contain about 10 grams of vanilla.

The main part of the dough was almost finished, it just needed the flour and I added it and I stirred until it got blended into the mixture and then I started the mixer again and let all the  ingredients get mixed.

In the meantime, it was time for orange zest and I needed to kind of peel themand I took this shredder thing and I shredded the zest from those 4 oranges and set them aside. Well, to tell you the truth, shredding them was not that easy, I mean, you have to put some effort in it, of course, and shredding those four oranges was not that simple, of course and it needed some time and energy to do that. So this lady told me, that those ones were pretty delicious after buying them and I knew, that Greek oranges were kind of sweet, you know, and when I tasted them, they were kind of dried out, but they were sweet and perhaps if they were juicier, they would have been very delicious.

You know, some people like sour oranges, I mean, when they are not sweet and stuff like that, for example, my cousin and he can eat lots of oranges and citrus, in general, if they are sour and not sweet and if you buy oranges, which are planted and picked in Georgia, then you will get that sour oranges, because usually Georgian oranges are not that sweet as Greek or some other ones and you can easily buy those Georgian oranges in bazaars in Georgia or somewhere in some small shops on the sides of the streets and things like that, because, usually, you won’t see them in the large supermarkets, because they usually have the imported stuff and, I guess, those imported stuff is from Turkey mostly, but I don’t know that for sure, however, there’s always those signs there, which says that those products are imported and, well, sometimes you may even see, that there is a sign, saying that those stuff are Georgian and they often have cucumbers, which are picked in Georgia and I’m telling you that for sure, because I’ve seen those ones, but I haven’t really seen oranges with that sign there, I guess, or I would remember it.

Anyways, I had this orange zest set aside while I would prepare some other things. You know, I took those chocolate chips and put them with the orange zest and I searched for the coconut flakes, which I had bought some time ago and I would add them to the dough,too. So, those things were waiting for them to be added to the mixture and I added them to the dough and blended them well together and then I had these colourings to deal with.

At first, I thought, that I would have them dissolved into some drops of water and then added some of the mixture to them to have them coloured and first of all, I took that blue one and took some of it and added some drops of water and everything just dissolved there and then I wanted to have others like that, too, however, then I thought, that it might not need some water and I could just sprinkled that powder to the dough and stir it and that’s what I did and it just got its colouring like that and then I didn’t have to dissolve those powders into the water and I would just sprinrkle some of it to the dough. Well, I had these small amounts of dough pieces coloured in three different colours. I also had this usual one and then I had the other part of it coloured dark, I mean, I added cocoa powder, so that it would be chocolatey and it would be brown and wonderful. So, to tell you the truth, these all looked just amazing and very cheerful and colourful and I was pretty proud of it and then all I had to do was to assemble the cake.

First of all, I took that pound cake baking form and greased it with some oil. Then it was time to pour the usual dough in it as the first layer and then would come ethe blue one and the green one and the red one and, at the very end, I would add some cocoa one at the top. Well, technically, then that top becomes the bottom, but still… And this cake already looked gorgeous and I couldn’t wait how it would come out of that oven, of course.

I had my halogen oven heated on 200 degrees Celsius and in a couple of minutes, I took that baking form and put the lid on it and put it inside the halogen oven on a low rack and I set it for 1 hour and the temperature was on 175 degrees Celsius. Well, then I wouldn’t have to do anything about it, because it would get cooked itself like that and I would just have to get there when it was finished and put it out and then turn  it upside down and take it out of the baking form and decorate it, you know. And I had been thinking about the decorations for a long time and I still hadn’t really decided everything about it, however, I would decide it in the process and I was not very worried about that, you know, because I had plenty of things for the decoratinos and it just needed to be decided which one I would use.

In the meantime, while I was waiting for the cake to be prepared, I did some other things, of course, and, well, you see, how much time you are not wasting with that, because if it was an electric oven and I was baking some cake, I would have to check it once in a while and then turn it and things like that and I couldn’t just do anything else realy besides paying attention to that cake, if you want to know the truth and that’s why I like this halogen oven, because you can put the cake into it and set the temperature and not check it at all until it’s finished.

So, after one hour, the halogen oven stopped and I knew, that the cake would be ready. I took it out and set aside to cool down, so that I could then turn it upside down and take the cake out. You know, I thought, that if it was all hot and stuff, I would take it out at once, however, then I thought about it and decided, that I would wait for it to cool down a little and then I would take it out, because I didn’t want the cake to get ruined or something like that and while being pretty hot inside, it could get crashed or whatever, so that I waited a little.

In the meantime, I started preparing some glaze, because I had decided to have a chocolate glaze poured on top of it and then added some roasted peanuts and some other stuff on it, you know. So, I took two tablespoons of cocoa powder and two tablespoons of white granulated sugar and some chocolate chips and mixed them and then I had this boiling water and I added 4 tablespoons of it to the mixture and put it on a gas on a medium heat so that it would get boiled and I would stir for a while, until it got thicker and it needed  just a couple of minutes for that, so that while stirring I also checked, whether it was already thick enough or not, so that I would pour it on my cake.

And while the chocolate glaze being prepared, I turned my cake baking form upside down and shook a little and the cake just got out and it was pretty good looking and I was flad, that everything came out okay and now I would pour the chocolate glaze on it and decorate it and that would be all, the cake would be ready. And my chocolate glaze got ready, too, and I poured it on the cake on the top and it kind of spilled on the sides, too, and it looked just amazing that way. And the glaze was just perfect, because it was thick and then it got sticky kind of and that was just what I wanted to happen. Well, until it got frozen or whatever, I put some peanuts on thop of that glaze and I also sprinkled some coconut flakes and remaining orange zest and then it was just perfect and the cake was officially finished. And I was really proud of that, however, I really wanted to taste it and see the inside of it, because it didn’t really show, that it was colourful inside, you know.

Well, after some time, we had the cake cut and tasted and it tasted really great and it was very colourful inside and the colours were just great and beautiful with each other and you would want to eat it at once it was so cute.

I must say, that this pound cake was really worth preparing and since it was not the first time of me preparing some pound cake, I was pretty experienced in that and it felt like I didn’t even waste my time preparing it, so that besides its cooking time, which was 1 hour, I just spent roughly half an hour for preparing the dough and that’s just because I had to shred that skin of those oranges, that took some time, otherwise, I would prepare the dough in 15 minutes or even less, I guess. Well, it’s all easy, when you have all the ingredients ready and you just have to put them together into a bowl and then mix them and you don’t even need to mix them yourself , I mean, all the work is done by that standing mixer , which I have at home and it just makes everything easy and when you have such gadgets at home and you don’t need to put much effort and time and energy into cooking and stuff like that, life becomes pretty enjoyable and you prepare things with pleasure, if you ask me. So that, if you want to prepare some things for yourself even from time to time, you should have those gadgets at home and then it all will be just very easy and comfortable, and you don’t have to prepare things for other people, it will just be for yourself and you will use them whenever you feel like it. It’s not that great eating out every time, I mean, sometimes there are not things, which you would like to eat, I mean, sometimes there’s something, that you would like to eat, but they are not prepared as you wish they were, so that you can just prepare them yourself and that’s when those gadgets come handy and useful.

Anyways, I hope, that you will find this recipe pretty useful and interesting and you should really find those colourings somewhere and prepare the cakes with them, because they will look really beautiful and intriguing.

Enjoy your cooking!

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