Cake #28: Spanish Meringue Cake

I made this cake and Cake #29, both double batches, for multiple things- Parent Teacher Conferences, our offices, and an anniversary celebration. 4 cakes in one day was a bit much, especially since the Spanish Meringue Cake has a LOT of steps. But, it is tasty.

The recipe calls for a springform pan, so I used the angelfood cake style one (above left) and a similar sized bundt pan. The left one DID NOT WORK so my main note for this cake is to use a bundt pan, although typically with a bundt pan you flip the cake upside down, and since this one has the baked in meringue topping you have to serve it bottom-up, which isn't as presentable.

The first thing I noticed with the angelfood pan cake was how much it shrunk after being baked- and let me say- I did the toothpick test on both and it came out CLEAN. Both cakes' tops had risen well above the cake pans, which was a good sign, but after cooling in the pan the first one shrunk back down:

In hind sight, this should have been a sign. The bundt cake turned out fine. The other one, after cooled, was actually quite gooey:

I SWEAR THE TOOTHPICK CAME OUT CLEAN.
I was motivated to save it, since it was a LOT of work. So I scooped it all up and put it in a glass pyrex bowl, and baked it in the toaster oven at 325 for over an HOUR more before the top stopped being squishy. The end result:

I scraped off the burnt parts, and it was edible, although much darker than the bundt pan version.

I also stuck a fork way down in the bundt version to make SURE it wasn't full of goo. (It wasn't)

The bundt pan looked fine, but not as nice as the picture in the book (below right):

 

In conclusion, this cake is excellent and worth it, but my tips are: 

Make sure you have plenty of cake flour, light brown sugar, eggs and TIME. And use a bundt pan (or 2 if making a double batch)!!