White Texas Sheet Cake

Yesterday Robin took Alex and Elisa to the Draper temple dedication at the stake center. Since Sabrina is too young to go, I stayed with her. I tried to make it a special time for her too. We looked at photos of the temple online and talked about the different rooms and different words like celestial and sealing. Then we drew a picture of the Draper temple. She loves to draw so we did that for almost an hour while listening to I Love to See the Temple over and over. Here is Sabrina’s drawing with notes coming out of Angel Moroni’s trump.

After that, I told her that we could make a treat that we could all eat together when the others came home. She wanted to make something white since we talked about everyone wearing white in the temple. I found a recipe for White Texas Sheet cake on Recipezaar, but I knew she wouldn’t eat it since she won’t eat cake. She said she didn’t mind making something she wouldn’t eat and she wanted to make it. So we made the cake as instructed. I was very nervous that it was going to be too flat since I’ve never made a sheet cake before, but it turned out great. We didn’t have time to make the frosting. I remembered that we had a little canned frosting left over from Elisa’s dessert-making with friends. I never buy canned frosting so it was nice to have that option. The only problem was I didn’t have enough white frosting to cover the whole thing so I turned it into a black and white cake. I asked the kids what the message was and they all three said basically the same thing, that the white represented Jesus and the dark was Satan and we could choose which we wanted. Alex was making fun of Elisa for choosing the chocolate frosting side to eat. Here is Sabrina with her masterpiece, sticking out her Jolly Rancher blue tongue, acting like she likes the cake. I really had a good time even though I didn't get to go to the dedication.
I love almond extract so I was happy to find this recipe. I think it would also be great with lemon or orange zest either in the cake or in the frosting. But I will be making it according to the recipe again, maybe serving it with berries. It is an easy potluck dessert that is sure to be a hit. Even Robin really liked it and he isn’t big on desserts. It's light and has the perfect texture. It didn't say whether to grease the cookie sheet or not so I used the spray with flour and it worked great.

White Texas Sheet Cake
1 c. butter
1 c. water
2 c. flour
2 c. sugar
2 eggs, beaten
1/2 c. sour cream
1 t. almond extract
1 t. salt

Frosting:
1/2 c. butter
1/4 c. milk
4 1/2 c. powdered sugar
1/2 t. almond extract
1 c. nuts, chopped

In a large pan bring to a boil 1 cup butter and 1 cup water. Remove from heat and stir until smooth. Cool slightly. Add the remainder of the ingredients into the pan and mix together; pour into a 10x15 cookie sheet pan. Bake at 375 degrees for 20 minutes until cake is golden.
Cool 20 minutes maximum before frosting.

Frosting: Bring to a boil 1/2 cup butter and 1/4 cup milk. Remove from heat and add the powdered sugar, almond, and nuts.