I made a torte last night to welcome in the new year.  This was the birthday cake we always had as kids.  I think I had previously only tried this recipe one time in my entire life.  It is a little tricky.  Egg whites being beaten to peaks, folding in the white mixture carefully,  and it was a little tough to get out of the tube pan cleanly.

When we were kids, Mom always told us not to stomp around the house when the cake was in the oven.  We didn’t want to cause the cake to fall. I told Davey that we needed to be quiet yesterday while the cake was in the oven, and so he insisted that we whisper especially when we were in the kitchen.

He liked helping me make the whipped cream, and he liked eating it even more.  The cake itself turned out nice.  I had some problems getting it out of the pan, but the small dents were nothing a little whipped cream couldn’t hide.

I always liked chocolate chips on my cake, so I put those on.  I also liked chocolate pudding and cherries for the filling, but David and Davey would have gone running for the hills, and I would have had to eat the entire cake, so I went with vanilla pudding for one layer and plain whipped cream for the other.  (If whipped cream mixed with a little vanilla and powdered sugar can be plain.  I don’t think there’s much better!)

So have a Happy New Year’s Day!  I think it’s time for a little piece of cake.  (another post birthday morning tradition.)

Please pretend to see 11 candles on the cake.  2011 would have been a bit too many, and I actually only had 9.