7-Up Cake

We had a nice weekend. Saturday we took the kids to the school playground so they could get some practice in with their wheels. Abigail her bicycle, Zander his big wheel. We don't have a sidewalk, so it's hard to do those things at our house. The kids had a blast, and really, we just had a relaxing day. Our neighbor came by unexpectedly to chat with Andy and handed him a few more packages of Wild Boar. Well, we couldn't wait, so the package of ham steaks became dinner Saturday night. Simply marinated and grilled, they were excellent. In fact, we've determined that wild boar is most simply described as "beefy flavor, wrapped in pork fat." It's a rich meat, as if you took a beef roast and wrapped it in bacon before slow cooking it, so all the fat melts into the beef. Do try it if you have the chance, it's excellent meat, and not gamey in the least.

Last night for Sunday Company Dinner we made Bangers & Mash, and I was all set to do a post on it today, except that I forgot to take a picture, and then after thinking on it, there really isn't a recipe, so... Basically, Bangers & Mash is a British meal that really is simply sausage and mashed potatoes. Sometimes it's served with an onion gravy. Last night's version was a cheddar mashed potato, with grilled fresh Polish sausage and a caramelized onion gravy. It was very good and very comforting, and while I should have taken a picture, I suppose brownish sausages on a bed of potatoes with a pale gravy wouldn't look very appealing anyway. So use your imagination on that.

Instead, I want to talk about cake today. Specifically, a blast from the past, 7-Up cake. I actually found this recipe in a church cookbook, and then set to work looking up other versions online. There were several. There were sheet cakes and pound cakes and bundt cakes, all with slight variations. I did not want pound cake, so I headed towards the bundt cakes and discovered a doctored cake mix recipe. And with 10 ounces of 7-Up as the liquid in the cake, I was intrigued, and had to make it.

I made it as written, except that I added green food coloring to make it a green cake. And overall it was really very good. It was very moist, and nicely flavored. But the star was the icing. And I wasn't even going to make the icing, I was just going to use a glaze drizzle. The icing is a cooked icing. Crushed pineapple, eggs, sugar, butter, coconut and cornstarch are cooked in a saucepan over low heat until nicely thickened. This mixture is cooled, and then you have a delicious pina-colada flavored topping that is most excellent in flavor and texture. Think of German chocolate cake and that pecan-coconut topping. This icing, while good on the cake, would top cheesecake easily, or fill a tart shell, or in a moment of pure desperation, it would suffice, simply scooped up with a spoon. If you made a rum flavored cake and topped it with this...well, that would kind of be an edible pina colada wouldn't it?

I think I'll go have cake for breakfast now. Here is the recipe for 7-Up Cake.