Red velvet cake

My grandmother's birthday was on Valentine's Day and we ate this cake with her every year - often made in the shape of a heart. I hear it has now gotten quite trendy. They even eat it over this side of the pond.

1/2 cup unsalted butter
1 1/2 cup sugar
2 eggs
2 Tbsp. red food color
2 Tbsp. cocoa
2 1/2 cups all-purpose flour, sifted
1 tsp. salt
1 cup buttermilk
1 tsp. vanilla
1 tsp. baking soda
1 tsp. vinegar

Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Grease two 8 inch round cake pans. Cut two circles of wax paper and set one in bottom of each pan. Cream together butter, sugar and eggs. Add vanilla. In a small bowl, mix food coloring and cocoa into a paste and blend into to butter/sugar/egg mixture.

In a separate bowl, mix together flour and salt. Alternating between the two, add the buttermilk and the flour/salt mixture to the batter a little bit at a time. Quickly mix together baking soda and vinegar and gently fold into the batter with economic strokes. Pour batter into pans. Bake 30 minutes at 350F. (For standard cupcakes: 20-25 minutes; for mini cupcakes: approx. 10 minutes)

Cool cake. Frost with whipped cream frosting.


Whipped cream frosting

2 tbsp. flour
1 cup milk
1 cup sugar
1 cup unsalted butter
1 tsp. vanilla

Cook flour and milk over medium heat (stirring constantly with a wire whisk) until it turns thick like pudding. Cool. Beat sugar, butter and vanilla until fluffy (about 8-10 minutes). Cream in flour and milk mixture. Beat until sugar is not grainy.