Vanilla Bean Angel Food Cake

With Spring here and the warmer weather showing its presence, what better way to celebrate than with a light and airy angel food cake with fresh berries? With trying to incorporate more healthy desserts in our lifestyle, I found this recipe from Cooking Light and just added in some vanilla bean. I love the extra vanilla that a vanilla bean gives.

I have talked to people that thought angel food cake was a hard thing to do, but it's really not. With just 6 ingredients, and you should have them all in your pantry, you can whip up this cake in no time and would be perfect a perfect dessert for the Easter weekend!

Angel Food Cake
From: Cooking Light

1 cup sifted cake flour, or all purpose
1 1/4 cups sugar, divided
10 egg whites
1 1/4 tsp cream of tartar
1/8 tsp salt
1/8 tsp vanilla extract, or 1/2 vanilla bean, split and scraped

Preheat oven to 350 degrees.

Sift together flour and 1/4 cup sugar; set aside. Beat egg whites with a mixer at high speed until foamy. Add cream of tartar and salt; beat until soft peaks form. Add remaining 1 cup sugar, 2 Tbsp at a time, beating until soft peaks form. Sift 1/4 cup flour mixture over egg white mixture, and fold in. Repeat procedure with remaining flour mixture, 1/4 cup at a time. Fold in vanilla.

Spoon batter into an ungreased 10-inch tube pan, spreading evenly. Break air pockets by cutting through batter with a knife. Bake at 350 degrees for 40 minutes or until cake springs back with lightly touched. Invert pan; cool 40 minutes. Loosen cake from sides of pan using a narrow metal spatula; invert cake onto a serving plate.