the sweet life

As you know if you have been reading this for a while (I wouldn´t know, since no one cares to comment :P ), I´m trying to stay away from my much-loved baked goods. It´s working pretty well because it allows me to discover new things in the savory and light department, but sometimes it is hard, like when I read food blogs and see these amazing photos of cakes, cookies, et al.
This time, the culprit was Deb from Smitten Kitchen. She published a wonderful cake made famous by her mom and gave it such high praise that I felt compelled to try it myself. Yes, I know it´s cheap to blame it on her, but oh well, whatever it takes to clean my guilty oh so guilty concience lol

Here is the recipe (originally published here) followed by my comments, changes and photos.

Chocolate Chip Sour Cream Cake

1 stick butter, at room temperature
1½ cups sugar
3 eggs, separated
1½ teaspoons vanilla extract
16 ounces plain yogurt or sour cream
3 cups all-purpose flour
1 teaspoon baking powder
1½ teaspoons baking soda

12 ounces chocolate chips
½ cup sugar
1 teaspoon cinnamon

1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees F (180 C)

2. In a large bowl, cream butter and 1½ cups sugar, then mix in the egg yolks and vanilla. Sift flour, baking soda and baking powder together into a separate bowl. Alternately add sour cream and then dry ingredients into butter mixture. Beat eggs whites until stiff, then fold into batter. Mix last ½ cup sugar and cinnamon together in a separate, small dish.

3. In a greased 9″x13″ pan, pour in half of the cake batter. Sprinkle the top with half of the cinnamon-sugar mixture and half of the chocolate chips. Pour remaining batter on top, sprinkling the top with the remaining cinnamon-sugar and chocolate chips.

4. Bake for 40 to 50 minutes, or until a tester comes out clean.


The cake is nothing short of amazing, perfect flavor, very moist, just lovely. I made it with plain yogurt instead of sour cream because we don´t use sour cream in Argentina. I also added a bit of orange zest to the cake mix simply because orange+cinamon+chocolate is just heaven on earth (next time I´ll add some more for it to have more of a presence).

Since I still had like a quarter of it left over even after some friends had helped me dispose of it (I mean, with friends like that, the world would be such a better place, such generosity and sacrifice!!!), I just froze the rest of it. When another lucky friend came over on Tuesday, I defrosted a piece with a minute in the microwave and then another minute in a non-stick pan, and it was amazing. So freeze away (that is, if you have any leftovers to begin with).

Here it is in all its glory. I hope you enjoy this little detour in all things healthy and light ;)