I just got some new flavors last week and came up with this creamy/buttery vanilla cake recipe. I had attempted this in the past but couldn't quite match what I was going for, but two of the new flavors I ordered -- FW Tres Leches, and especially TFA Cheesecake (Graham Crust) -- are what were missing.

• 3% CAP Vanilla Custard (V1)
• 3% FW Tres Leches
• 3% FW Cake (Yellow)
• 2% TFA Cheesecake (Graham Crust)
• 2% TFA Bavarian Cream
• 2% TFA Vanilla Swirl

I've only been mixing for a bit over a month, so I'm still learning and will probably tweak the percentages a bit, but it works great as-is. This is the most complex (as in number of ingredients) recipe I've ever made, and it definitely needs a decent amount of steeping for everything to blend together. The batch I whipped up 5 days ago has been steadily improving each day, but by day three it had crossed from "good" to "very good", and I'm hopeful that after 7-10 days it will make it to "excellent".

 

My taste buds say that this is a very creamy, moist cake flavor with moderately prominent vanilla notes. My previous attempts at this did not have the FW Tres Leches or the TFA Cheesecake (Graham Crust), and included TFA Sweet Cream and TFA Graham Cracker (Clear). But that recipe, while vapable, was nothing special. TFA Cheesecake (Graham Crust) brings some of the cookie/pastry flavor found in TFA Graham Cracker (Clear), but adds a wonderfully rich and solid creamy flavor, giving the recipe more "body". And the FW Tres Leches adds an amazingly "moist" and creamy cake flavor into the mix. It was the addition of these two ingredients that transformed the recipe from a "meh" creamy vanilla cake into an awesome and complex creamy/buttery vanilla cake.

 

If you want something more forward with the vanilla, I'd try increasing the CAP Vanilla Custard to 4% and the TFA Vanilla Swirl to 3%, and reducing each of the other flavors by 0.5% to compensate, but you're on your own here as I haven't made a batch this way yet. I'll be doing that tomorrow and will report back here after it steeps for 5 days. I will also be experimenting with using this recipe as a base with some fruit flavors. Strawberry would be the obvious choice here, but I think I will try a raspberry, or 80% raspberry / 20% strawberry first.

 

Note: This is not a diketone-free recipe. I made batches with both V1 and V2 of CAP Vanilla Custard, but the V1 batch ended up tasting a bit better. It still works quite well with V2, but I am pretty certain that at least one of the other flavors is not diketone-free.

 

Update (12/12/2015): I mixed up a batch of the "enhanced vanilla" version last night. As described above, this recipe is:

• 4% CAP Vanilla Custard (V1)
• 2.5% FW Tres Leches
• 2.5% FW Cake (Yellow)
• 1.5% TFA Cheesecake (Graham Crust)
• 1.5% TFA Bavarian Cream
• 3% TFA Vanilla Swirl

It's only had one day of steeping, so things will definitely change, but my initial impressions are that the vanilla notes are a lot more prominent, while the cake flavor has lost some of the richness and creaminess in the original recipe. With that said, however, I am unfairly comparing a juice steeped for just a single day with one that has had almost a full week to steep. I expect it to improve with time, but am pretty confident that it won't hold up compared to the original recipe, even after it's had enough time to be at its best. I think it will still turn out to be a very good recipe for those who want a more vanilla-forward juice.

 

Based on my notes from the original recipe, here is the next tweak I want to try:

• 3% CAP Vanilla Custard (V1)
• 3% FW Tres Leches
• 2% FW Cake (Yellow)
• 3% TFA Cheesecake (Graham Crust)
• 2% TFA Bavarian Cream
• 2% TFA Vanilla Swirl

In this version, the TFA Cheesecake (Graham Crust) is increased, with the FW Cake (Yellow) reduced to compensate. My hopes are increased richness without sacrificing the moist cake flavor (which I believe is coming from the FW Tres Leches, whose concentration has not been reduced in this version).

 

Update (12/17/2015): The version with the increased cheesecake and decreased yellow cake didn't work out. I'm finding it a bit difficult to describe. It is definitely richer, but this turned out to be a bad thing. The original recipe was rich but still had a sort of "lightness" or "airiness", and the modified recipe seems to have upset this balance. It really is surprising that a relatively small change (increasing and decreasing one flavor each by 1%) had such an effect. I somehow managed to get things right the first time around. But then again, it's really not the first version of the recipe, just the first version to use the final list of ingredients. If anyone has any ideas on how to improve this recipe, I'd definitely be interested to try, but as of right now, I consider this recipe to be finalized.