Mandarin Orange Cake: Frugal Food Friday

This week the Hubby and I celebrated our 10th wedding anniversary.  It's hard to believe that we've already been married 10 wonderful years...but it's true!  (Believe it or not, no wedding pics have been scanned into our computer, and we were married before the digital boom...but here's one from our honeymoon.)

We had a pretty low-key anniversary celebration since he had class that night, but we'll do more to celebrate when the semester is over.  I thought about making pineapple cake since I'd made it for our one week anniversary, but the kids were helping me and wanted to branch out a bit, so we made Mandarin Orange Cake.

Instead of the suggested brown sugar/milk glaze, we topped it with some whipped topping.  It was delicious!  We were a bit surprised that you couldn't really taste the oranges in it.  Of the two, the pineapple cake I shared earlier is our favorite, but this is a great choice if you want a smaller batch and less fruity flavor.

My 5-year-old had her heart set on frosting the cake with the whipped topping.  I'm not sure exactly what went wrong.  I think maybe stirring the food coloring in while it was still partially frozen was partly to blame, because it was a runny...but delicious mess. 

I plan to experiment more with whipped topping as frosting and get back to you.  I had some great success with a previous experiments decorating a baby food lid.  This one stayed looking this way for half and hour or so in the warm kitchen before it was eaten, while the "flowers" on our anniversary cake turned to blobs in less than a minute.

No matter how it looked, though...it definitely got the kids' stamp of approval.  The especially had fun with the mashing the oranges step.

This is once again from one of my favorite cookbooks "Quick and Healthy Recipes and Ideas" by Brenda J. Ponchtera, pg. 217.

Mandarin Orange Cake

1/2 cup sugar

1 cup unbleached flour

1/4 cup egg substitute (equal to 1 egg)

1 can 11 oz. mandarin oranges, drained

1 tsp baking soda

1/2 tsp salt (optional)

2 Tbl. oil (canola)
1 tsp vanilla

Preheat oven to 350 degrees.  Mix all ingredients, mashing the oranges, and pour into a 9-inch by 9-inch pan that has been sprayed with non-stick coating.  Bake for 30-35 minutes.  Prepare topping (below).

Topping: 2 Tbl. firmly packed brown sugar
2 tsp. skim milk

Combine sugar and milk.  In the microwave, heat on high until mixture starts to boil.  Drizzle over hot cake.

Yield: 9 servings
One Serving: 1 piece
Calories per serving: 140
Fat: 3 grams
Exchanges 1 3/4 starch