Camp Cooking #9: Rice Cake

Really?  You really thought this was about rice cake?  Wow, I love you for jumping on over to read then, because this is sooo much better than stale-as-air rice cake. 

This is a rice cooker cake.

Yum.

Our Easter Camping trip coincided this year with one of D&J+3's munchkin's birthdays, so I decided to surprise them with a cake for the little guy.   It's a small cake at about 6 inches - the size of your cooker bowl- but we were able to stretch it to give 12 people (mostly kids) a taste.   I was thrilled with the results and hope you'll try this on one of your upcoming trips.

First, gather your ingredients.

For the Cake:

Jiffy brand White Cake Mix

3/4 c Milk

1 Egg White

For the Frosting:

Canned Frosting 

Sprinkles

measuring cups, fork or spoon, baking non-stick spray

This one's about as easy as it gets - following the directions on the Jiffy Mix box, combine wet and dry ingredients and stir briefly.  I prefer the Jiffy mix because it makes a smaller amount of batter, but it only comes in white and yellow.  If you're in the mood for a different flavor cake you can certainly try this with a different box mix - but it may take longer to cook, and you may end up with a lot more batter than what fits in the cooker bowl.

Once you have your batter mixed, take a quick moment to grease the cooker bowl. I use a Pam spray for baking (flour and oil in one) but you could probably get away with a smearing of butter or oil that you already have on hand.  After your bowl is greased, pour in your batter.

Pop the lid on your cooker and press "cook."  Oh, and lick the spoon (or fork).  Very important step there.  Quality control and all.  ;-)

The rice cooker is designed to cook its contents until a certain temperature is reached and then turn itself to warm, but often that temp is reached before the cake is fully cooked.  Through trial and error, I've figured out that my brand of cooker needs three cook cycles to fully cook the cake but really, it's not that big of a deal.  Hit the button, go play a round of corn-hole, come back, turn the bowl, hit the button again, go play another round.  Repeat once more and you're done. IMPORTANT TIP: Be sure to rotate the bowl each time you reset the cook cycle - otherwise you'll end up with one spot on the cake that's burned.  Again, trial and error.  (Oh the things I do for you, my lovely readers!) 

As always, the tooth-pick test will let you know if you need to run another cook cycle.  This baking method does steam the top of the cake, so it's gonna be sticky to the touch (and stick to whatever plate you turn it out on) but the stickiness doesn't mean it's not finished on the inside.  Tooth-pick test, 'nuff said.

I took the easy route and used canned frosting for this one (why make it harder than it has to be, right?).  I do recommend a crumb cost first - though it's golden brown and firm on top (that used to be bottom closest to the heating element) since the to (now bottom) was steamed, it crumbles apart a bit.  A good crumb coat will make fully icing it much easier.  Personal preference on this, but since it's such a small cake, it didn't need the entire jar of frosting, in fact, there was quiet a bit left over and I still feel like the cake got a thick coating.

I'm a huge fan of simple and plain - so we could have left the cake just as it is above - luscious, thick, white vanilla frosting.  Yum!  But, since it was for a kiddo, it certainly needed to be adorned with fun and festive sprinkles.

I hope your camping adventures continue to be full of great food and good times - and that you'll attempt this awesome rice cooker cake on your next trip out!