Pinterest Try it Out Tuesday: 3-2-1 Cake in a Mug!

Have you fallen in love with Pinterest the way I have? I seem to spend hours every day just perusing Pinterest. Pinterest is chock-full of great ideas for every area of life. One of the pitfalls of Pinterest though is that you can quickly find yourself pinning a lot, but not trying a lot of the brilliant ideas you are pinning.

So I decided to kick myself into gear and start trying the ideas I’ve been finding on Pinterest. The past two weeks I’ve seen so many people pin the 3-2-1 Cake in a Mug recipe that I decided I just had to try it out to see if it really works as well as the author says. I have seen cake in a mug recipes many times, but they always either turned out somewhat rubbery or required a lot of ingredients, like eggs and oil. This one seemed to be a lot simpler, one that truly could be made up easily in advance and used on the spur of the moment. I found the recipe and instructions over on The Hidden Pantry, who did a great job of explaining how it works. I thought I’d elicit my partner in crime (aka Megan Fenno) to test the simplicity by bringing it into work and trying it out in our office microwave. No special tools there–just a basic microwave. If it works there, it will work about anywhere! I stopped by Remke bigg’s on my way in to the office and grabbed Duncan Hines cake mixes, which were on sale. Since it is Valentine’s Day, I grabbed the Red Velvet cake mix for a little mid-afternoon celebration at the office with Megan.

3-2-1 Cake 

• 1 Angel Food cake mix
• 1 cake mix, any flavor (I used Red Velvet)
• 2 tablespoons water

1. In a large bowl or gallon ziploc bag, mix together both dry cake mixes. Mix until fully combined.
2. Spoon three tablespoons of the cake mix into a clean mug.
3. Add two tablespoons of water, and stir into the mix. Make sure to get the mix in the bottom edges of the mug.
4. Microwave on high for one minute. Done!

Megan samples hers while mine is cooking

Turns out, it really is as easy and yummy as they say! It comes out a bit spongy, like an angel food cake does. Based on the cake mix box, I estimate it to be about 150 calories per mug. It is warm and slightly sweet–a good sweet tooth fix mid-afternoon. You can add a small dollop of whipped cream or fruit to the top, but it really doesn’t need it. I’ve seen others use devils food cake mix and add chocolate chips to theirs as well. There are so many options for you to try–any cake mix should work, as long as you use an angel food cake mix as the base. Store the dry mix in an airtight container. I used a ziploc bag, but any airtight container would work.

I really had expected this to be not-quite-right…for something to not work the way that it should. But not only did it work, it was simple and so delicious! There were no special tools used–in fact, I forgot to bring in measuring spoons, so the mix was estimated. We used plastic spoons to measure everything with. Nothing was an exact science–and it still worked. Even better, since it is only 150 calories, I can enjoy a little cake once in a while without all the guilt. Quick cake and no guilt–that’s a winner in my book!

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