Walnut Spice Cake | Saveur

Ingredients

• 1 cup vegetable shortening, plus more for pans
• 3 cups cake flour, plus more for pans, sifted
• 2 ¹⁄₂ tsp. baking powder
• 1 tsp. kosher salt
• 1 cup milk
• 1 tsp. vanilla extract
• 1 ¹⁄₂ tsp. ground cinnamon
• 1 tsp. ground allspice
• ¹⁄₂ tsp. ground cloves
• 2 cups sugar
• 6 egg whites, at room temperature
• 4 cups sugar
• 3 cups milk
• 12 tbsp. unsalted butter, melted
• ¹⁄₃ cup Dutch-processed cocoa powder, sifted
• 2 tsp. vanilla extract
• 1 tsp. baking soda
• 2 cups whole walnut halves