So, it’s no big secret that I listen to a lot of My Brother, My Brother, and Me (MBMBAM). And I also end up watching a lot of different animations made by fans of different notable bits that have been done by the brothers three. One of my favorite animations/bits is this one where they discuss the ethics of having warm fruit. Their incessant discussion about hot grapes had me wondering… Has anyone really made a grape cake?
I mean, I’ve seen different kinds of fruit related cake. Lemon cake, blueberry cake, and, most notably, the infamous strawberry cake, but I’ve never really heard about someone eating a grape cake. So, after doing some research, I found out about an Italian cake that has its origins from around the 1800s. It has a festival that is based on it, there are people who like it, et cetra et cetra. Point is, this is a very well-known cake. Who knows though. According to the Wikipedia page, recipes for this particular cake tend to be passed down through generations.
In any case, this is the recipe that I decided to use for this bake. I decided to go off this recipe because… It seemed like the simplest of the recipes that I looked at.
One of the main ingredients that it asked for, besides the grapes, was lemon zest and orange zest. Unfortunately, all I had for orange zest was clementine’s, so I used that instead… Same difference, right? Also, I couldn’t get what I thought was enough clementine zest, so I added a little more lemon zest. And a little
I also didn’t have the purple grapes that was required, so I substituted in green grapes. According to the internet, there isn’t much of a difference between the two, so I thought it would be fine.
Honestly, besides mixing all the ingredients and baking the cake, nothing exceptional happened with the cake. Once the batter was complete, I mixed in the grapes and had it bake in the oven for around 10 minutes. After the 10-minute mark, I took the cake out and put the remaining grapes on top, so that they wouldn’t all sink to the bottom.
A quick slideshow presentation of how the cake was made. Batter was really good...
The final product was… The least appetizing cake I had ever seen. I mean, I’ve seen several different “pimple” cakes because I watch a lot of pimple popping videos, but this cake looked like boils were put on the top of the cake. I think that is probably why they use purple grapes instead of the green grapes? To maybe make the cake look more appealing? Although, I don’t I don’t see how the difference in color could have possibly made it look any better.
It just looks so disgusting. I don't understand.
However, in terms of taste, it was all there. Because of the intense lemon flavor that came from the almost doubling of the lemon zest, the cake really came out to be more of a lemon cake with a little burst of grape flavor. According to the recipe, the cake should really only be eaten in thin wedges, so I made sure not to give myself too much, and I think that was ultimately for the good of the cake. It came out a bit denser that I would have like it (for some reason, all my cakes have been coming out denser that I wanted), so the thinner slices are probably for the better for the cake as a whole.
I guess it comes down to the question: would you make this cake ever again? And the answer is no. I would not ever make this cake again. Maybe if I had a burning curiosity as to how the flavors change when I change the zest or the kind of grape, but I honestly don’t think that it will change the flavor profile too much. Also, wherever the grapes were in the cake, it was a bit too wet? The texture change was an unwarranted attack of my tongue. But the taste was okay. I imagine that it would taste better if there was no grape in it though.
Final rating: I’d give it a solid 6/10. Flavor was okay, it was just weird and unappealing to look at.
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