Ricotta Cake w/ Rosemary: Cheating
I am a cheater. I feel guilty, dirty, bad.
But would I do it again? ABSO-TIVELY!
I have a confession to make (yet another one).
I have never made a cake with a store bought boxed cake mix before. It reminds me of Sandra Lee from Food Network. She uses too many short cuts and her color tablescapes are just plain annoying. She always uses box mixes for everything, hence the name "Semi Homemade" ugh.
(That's a lot of hate for a Monday!!!).
I love ricotta cheesecake, but it always gets soggy after I refrigerate it, so I googled a recipe for a ricotta cake. I found many and decided on one that sounded decent. It called for a box of yellow cake mix. What does "yellow" mean? Dye? Lemon? Cornmeal?
I bought a box of Trader Joe's Vanilla Cake Mix because it had less artificial ingredients and additives than the others, but I am sure Betty Crocker or Duncan Hines would work too. The Trader Joe's mix actually had little black specks of real vanilla bean in the mixture! How bad could it be?
Well, it was one of the best cakes we have ever had! No kidding.
Here is the recipe:
Ricotta Cake w/ Rosemary: (inspired from All Recipes)
In 2 separate bowls:
1. Prepare the cake batter as per the box directions: 2 eggs, 1 stick of melted butter, 1 cup of cold whole milk and then add cake mix & mix together.
Now in your second bowl:
2. Make your ricotta mixture by mixing: 24 oz. of ricotta cheese, 1/4 tsp vanilla, 3 eggs, and 3/4 cup of sugar.
3. Now for my addition: add a tbsp of chopped fresh rosemary (optional) to the ricotta mixture.
Grease a 13" x 9" glass baking dish. Pour the ingredients from the first bowl (the cake batter) into the dish.
Now pour your ricotta mixture on top of the cake mixture. Do not swirl them together, just let the ricotta mixture sit on top, the cheese will sink to the bottom layer on its own.
Bake at 350 for 40 minutes. Cool for about 10 minutes in pan before cutting. When cool, sprinkle with powdered sugar. Garnish with fresh rosemary sprigs. The rosemary and vanilla go so well together.
This cake was only FANTASTIC! Everyone loved it, and I even fessed up that I made it with a little help from a box!!!!!
Comments
Psst...I'm coming to NYC.
I swear, this cake mix from Trader Joe's was terrific, and mixed with the fresh ricotta and rosemary, it was a great cake!
Lisa, you were the one w/ your peanut cake! that told me "it's ok to use a box cake once in a while!". You were right!
Stacey
By the way, love your blog.
Years ago, I use to make a cake similar to this but not with the rosemary. That sounds so good!
I agree with you.
Since I had to melt a stick of butter, add a cup of milk and eggs to the mix, then why not just make a vanilla cake from scratch.
That makes sense.
It was still soooo good!
Thanks for the comment!
Stacey
;-)
Is there rosemary inside the cake or just as a garnish? I didn't see it in the ingredients list unless I missed it.
I just edited the recipe, thanks for letting me know.
Yes, you add a tbsp of chopped fresh rosemary to the ricotta mixture. This is optional of course, but I promise the results are wonderful!
Stacey
One question - did this cake have a cheese cake consistency or more of a 'cakey' texture?
I would say the ricotta cake was half and half.
You can see in the photos that the cheese sinks to the bottom, so that part is like a ricotta cheesecake, and the top layer is a nice vanilla rosemary cake.
It's 2 for one!
Stacey