Angel Food Cake

My husband bought an angel food cake pan about a year ago because he wanted to try making some.... Fast forward to a year later, and I have finally broken the seal on our angel food dreams. I went down the rabbit hole for angel food because people were scaring me about fucking it up. It's MUCH easier than I had thought it would be and way more delicious than store-bought. So what I'm saying is, don't be afraid! Come into the light, Carol Anne. I will say that there are some key tips to help you be successful, so it's not about the ingredients as much as it is the technique. You WILL want a food scale for this. I think that's really the only way to go. The ratios for an angel food cake are 3:3:1 by weight- 3 parts egg whites, 3 parts sugar, and 1 part cake flour (and you do want to go cake flour on this one because it is much lighter). Without a way to measure these weights, it's a difficult cake to do correctly.   

For the Cake:

407 g egg whites (this was 11 eggs for me- that's what I had; for a full sized angel food cake, you're looking at 10-12 egg whites)

407 g granulated sugar

136 g cake flour, sifted *You know I wouldn't say sift if I didn't mean it

1/2 tsp cream of tartar

1/2 tsp salt

1 tsp vanilla bean paste (or vanilla extract if you don't have it)

zest of 1 lemon, juice of 1/2 a lemon 

1. Preheat oven to 350F. Do NOT grease your angel food pan. It needs the sides to be able to climb up and get height. It can't do that if you slick down the walls. 

2. Put egg whites into a stand mixer fitted with whisk attachment. Start to whip up egg whites. *I only put it at max a 6 on a Kitchenaid because that's what I do for macarons and it always works. Does it matter here? No idea. If you're brave, you can crank it up faster if you want and see if it works. Report back please. 

3. Once egg whites start to get foamy, add in the cream of tartar. Then slowly stream in the granulated sugar. 

4. Continue to beat until at about a medium peak. You don't want it to be a stiff peak, but it needs to have some body. Like it can stand up on itself in the bowl for a bit, but it's not super excited about it.  

5. Add in the salt, vanilla bean paste, zest, and lemon juice. Incorporate. 

6. Turn off the mixer and gently fold in the cake flour until just incorporated. 

7. Fill up the angel food pan and bake for about 50-60 minutes. The internet told me not to put in a tooth pick because it can be deceptive for angel food, so I did the finger press- if you touch it gently with a finger and it starts to spring back, it should be done. It will also be golden in color. 

8. When it is out, immediately flip it over so that it cools upside down, preventing it from collapsing. I flipped it over onto a small bowl. 

9. When it is cooled, turn out onto cake stand. Serve with berries and whipped cream if you like. Or do like I did, and just rip off chunks of it throughout the day like a heathen.