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Friday, May 31, 2013

Mug Cake--Instant Gratification

Do you ever have a time when you're just plain relaxing, maybe knitting or reading or watching television and without warning, the munchies attack?  Especially the sweet munchies? In my house, that thought entails a hopeful trip into the kitchen. I open the frig to see if there's anything sweet in there. Nope. I open the double doors to the pantry and scout out the offerings. Nothing appealing. If that craving also includes chocolate, which is so often the case for me, I'm double stumped. And no--I don't want to get into the car and go to the grocery store. So I pick my knitting back up and try to take my mind off of my sweet-tooth. It doesn't always work.

As luck would have it, a friend told me about this instant mug cake that was beyond good and so easy to make. I doubted it could satisfy a chocolate longing, but how would I know unless I gave it a try.

So it was that the very day I did my grocery shopping and picked up the ingredients for the mug cake, that I came home and got out a big bowl and a wire whisk. I dumped the entire contents
of an angel food cake mix into the bowl. Right on top, I dumped the box of chocolate fudge cake mix. Then I sat myself down and gently wire whisked the two mixes until they became one. I'd say about 2-3 minutes to get everything mixed well.

Now comes the fun part.

I put 3 Tablespoons of that mix into a coffee mug and added 2 Tablespoons of cold water. I grabbed a fork and mixed it well. It turned sort of foamy, like it has soap in it, but of course it was just the egg whites bubbling up.

I set it in the microwave for 45 seconds. 
The recipe calls for 1 minute, but my new micro is so powerful I've had to cut the time on everything or I end up with burnt offerings.

When the micro beeped, I removed the mug. Sure enough. There was a cute little cake sitting in the bottom. I ran a knife around the edge and moved it into a custard cup. It came out easy and clean. I thought it seemed a bit plain looking so I took some frozen non-dairy topping from the freezer and scooped out a Tablespoon full and pretended it was ice cream. Then my tummy was happy. I think yours will be too. The rest of the mix went into a plastic zip lock for the next time I get "the craving."


Additional info:

You can use any kind of regular cake mix you want; I just chose chocolate. Mom used to make chocolate angel food cake back in the day before cake mixes ever graced the grocery shelves. This cake reminded me of that. She generally frosted that cake with chocolate mousse, but I had no desire to get that fancy. I liked my pretend ice cream, but you could easily use the real thing--or just pour chocolate syrup over the top. Or caramel. Or anything that sounds good to you.

This is so simply to make that your older grade school kids could whip up a mug cake after school. Just be warned that they might eat more than one. Or two.