Maple-Brown Sugar Angel Cake with Walnuts

I agree with MichelleH29. This is a great recipe and "cookingontherun" definitely did not know what they were doing when they made this cake which does require knowing how to cook (and cool) in a tube pan (NOT a bundt pan). This is only the second from scratch angel food cake I have made in 30 years, and it turned out fantastic! Mind you, this is not your box-cake angel food cake - so much better! Made for my son's 16th birthday as he has never had angel food cake before. I used pecans instead of walnuts since we prefer their sweetness and was not disappointed! One tip: the topping is soooo good, next time I will quadruple it and add the pecans in it so I have enough to spoon over individual pieces. Don't skip toasting the nuts - their flavor is so much better! One last comment...I do not invert my tube pan over a bottle. My tube is long enough to just invert onto a cooling rack, and then I elevate the cooling rack a little with some custard cups to allow circulation below.

I can't believe there aren't more reviews for this--it's so good! Made for hubby's birthday, as he loves maple and walnuts and isn't a huge traditional cake fan. He was delighted and found it to be excellent, as did I! The person who gave it 2 stars should not have rated it, as it was incorrect procedure on his/her fault to not invert on to a bottleneck (to his/her credit, the recipe should clarify this, but seems to make the presumption that everyone who cooks already knows to do this with any angel food cake). Totally yummy, and do make sure to sift your brown sugar (I will be doing this in my future cookie recipes for better blending, too).

So, I will start my review by saying that it may be my lack of experience making angel-food type cakes that made this go awry for me. But, I followed the directions completely, baked it, inverted it onto a plate, and when I loosened it and flipped it out of the pan, it became clear that the moisture that had been trapped in with the cake while the pan was inverted and the cake was cooling had ruined the cake. The texture was doughy and disgusting. My mom recommended that I somehow prop the cake up on a beer bottle next time to allow the moisture to escape.