Which cake do you love the most? My elder one loves chocolate and younger likes vanilla or yellow cakes. And so to avoid a drift I invariably end up making the combo of both either as marble cake or this zebra cake, vancho cake or sometimes add chocolate chips too just to balance the flavors of both. We both love this combo of yellow and chocolate.There are many different varieties of cakes these days and bakers are competing hard to be showcasing newer patterns of cake every day. Rainbow cake, marble cake, checkerboard cake, zebra cake are a few to list when it comes to patterns made with cake batter. However icing patterns, type of icing are n numbers and each day you get to see a new icing technique too.
'Zebra cake' as the name suggests resembles the zebra stripe pattern achieved by pouring the batter of both yellow and chocolate cake. The batter is poured in such a way alternating both batters to get zebra stripes and is then baked. The cake when cut gives a classic look without any icing and the best advantage of such cakes is that you get to taste both yellow and chocolate flavors in one single cake. My initial attempts of making zebra cake wasn't quite a success until I started pouring the batter evenly in the center of the pan. The initial zebra cakes turned like marble cake and this is so far the best zebra cake made so far I feel. Make sure to pour first two tablespoons of batter in the center of the pan then alternate each table spoon of batter till you finish all the batter. Also tap the batter in between gently to get even concentric circles. These are the few points to remember and your zebra cake gets ready in minutes just like any other bakes. Pls do give this a try and lemme know the feedback too!!
Preparation time ~ 10 mins
Baking time ~ 25-30 mins
Author ~ Julie
Serves ~ 8" cake
Ingredients
wheat flour 1.5 cupsbaking powder 1.5 tsp
salt 1/4 tsp
cocoa powder 2.5 tbsp
warm water 2 tbsp
milk 3/4 cup
butter 1/2 cup (100 g approx)
granulated sugar 1 cup
vanilla extract 1 tsp
eggs 2
Method
- Powder the sugar in a blender jar. Each cup of granulated sugar yields 1 1/4 cup powdered sugar.
- Sift the flour with baking powder and salt twice. Keep aside
- Cream the butter and powdered sugar until its creamy and pale. Add an egg each and beat until fluffy. Add in vanilla extract. Add the dry ingredients in three batches along with milk.
- Divide the dough in such a way that the vanilla batter is slightly more than chocolate layer batter.
- Now mix the cocoa in 2 tbsp warm water and keep in a bowl. Mix this in the chocolate layer reserved batter.
- Prepare a cake tin by smearing butter and dusting with flour. Pre-heat oven to 350 degrees F.
- In the center of the prepared tray, add 2 tbsp of yellow batter and then pour 1 tbsp of cocoa batter. Next layer onwards add 1 tbsp of each vanilla and cocoa batter. Pour the batter in the same place each time alternating both layers and the batter will spread. Continue doing the same till you finish all the batter.
- Place in pre heated oven and bake for 25-30 mins. Mine got done in 25 minutes.
- Remove from oven and cool on wire rack. Then cut in pieces and serve.
NOTES
* You can make the same cake using maida(all purpose flour) too if you wish. But I personally didn't feel the need to do so. If you are using maida(all purpose flour) then use 1 tsp baking powder for 1.5 cups maida and use 1/2 cup milk instead of 3/4 cup milk.
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wow this is so beautiful. I haven't baked or had a zebra cake in a really long while. Yours has me crave a huge slice now :-) An excellent recipe, Julie.
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