PW's Strawberry Sparkle Cake: SA Style

I love the Pioneer Woman.  I look at her blog weekly. I think almost every week, I'm trying a new recipe from her, and loving every single one.  On the fourth of July, I saw her post of the Strawberry Sparkle Cake... I didn't even read the post, because I saw the strawberry filling and knew there was no way I could pull it off... strawberries have been gone here for months.

But a few days later, on a whim, I went back and read the recipe.  And I had a stroke of genius. Strawberry crush.  Have you ever bought a crush?  I bought a bottle just out of curiosity a few weeks ago, and turns out, the strawberry crush has real whole strawberries and is really sweet and yummy.  It made the perfect filling for this cake!  It turned out great, except for the whipped cream frosting, which I didn't expect to work anyway.  The regular Amul cream is only 25% fat, and to properly whip cream, it needs to have at least 40% fat... anyone had success getting a heavy high fat cream for whipping? What's it called?!?

Head on over to Pioneer Woman for this recipe, grab a bottle of Strawberry crush, and make this yummy cake this week!

Mexican Chocolate Cake

A good friend of mine, who is a fantastic cook, once told me that putting cinnamon in a chocolate cake is common in Mexico.  I didn't know that, but grew up eating this chocolate sheet cake.  I've started calling it Mexican Chocolate cake, just to differentiate it from other chocolate cakes I make.  This one might be my favorite.

Mexican Chocolate Cake
2 c. sugar
2 c. flour
100 g. butter
1/2 c. dalda or vanaspati
4 T. cocoa
1 c. cold water
1/2 c. milk
1 t. vinegar
1/4 t. salt
1 t. soda
1 t. cinnamon
1 t. vanilla
 2 eggs

Icing
1/3 c. milk
4 T. cocoa
1 t. vanilla
100 g. butter
3 1/2- 4 c. powdered sugar

Combine the milk and vinegar and let sit.  Combine sugar and flour in a large bowl.  Bring butter, shortening, cocoa and water to a boil in a saucepan.  Pour boiling mixture over flour and sugar.  Beat well.  Add the milk and vinegar combination, salt, soda, cinnamon, vanilla and eggs.  Grease a 9x13 cake pan and pour the batter in.  Bake for 20 minutes at 375/190.

To make frosting, put milk, cocoa and butter in saucepan.  Bring to a boil.  Add vanilla and sugar.  Beat.  Pour it over the hot cake.  The icing will set very quickly.  

Gooey Butter Cake

This is my husbands favorite dessert.  He's not a big fan of chocolate desserts (which are MY favorite!)  and so I like to make this for him.  This is one of the main reasons I was so excited when my import store here started carrying the Britannia cream cheese!  : )

Gooey Butter Cake
2 cups all-purpose flour (maida)
1 1/2 c. sugar
1 T. baking powder
1/2 c. milk powder (I use EveryDay by Nestle)
100 grams butter
2 beaten eggs

Melt the butter and drizzle in the bottom of a 9x13 cake pan.  Combine the dry ingredients and sprinkle over the butter.  Pour the beaten eggs in the pan and mix together with a fork until it's all moistened.  Mash it into the bottom of the pan as evenly as possible.

1 1/2 boxes of Britannia cream cheese
2 eggs
3 3/4 c. powdered sugar
1 t. vanilla

Combine and mix with a mixer.  Pour on top of cake mixtures.  Bake at 350F (175C) for 30 minutes. Don't over bake it, even if it doesn't look done!

Chocolate Cobbler

This is a nice dessert...kind of like a lava cake. And so easy to make. No eggs or butter needed, and you can serve to your vegetarian friends. This makes a spongy chocolate cake and forms a chocolate sauce underneath. The only ingredient you can't get here is brown sugar, but since Megan has figured out how to make that, you should be good to go!

Ingredients:
1 c. self-rising flour (or place 1 1/2 tsp. baking powder and 1/2 tsp. salt in a measuring cup. Add all-purpose flour to measure 1 c.)
1/2 c. sugar
2 Tbsp. plus 1/4 c. baking cocoa
1/2 c. milk
3 Tbsp. vegetable oil
1 c. packed brown sugar
1 3/4 cups hot water
vanilla ice cream, optional (but I'd highly recommend it)

In a bowl, combine the flour, sugar and 2 Tbsp. cocoa. Stir in milk and oil until smooth. Pour into a greased 8 in. square baking pan. Combine the brown sugar and remaining cocoa; sprinkle over batter. Do not stir this together. Pour hot water over the top. Again, don't stir! Bake at 350 for 40-45 minutes or until top of cake springs back when lightly touched. (I usually cook mine for about 40 min. The cake might seem done before that, but if you take it out too early, the sauce on the bottom will be way too thin. YOu want it to get a little thick, like hot fudge sauce.) Serve warm with ice cream if desired.

Cake Decorating Basics

I am by NO means an expert at this, and there are lots of websites and resources out there with all kinds of instructions and tips for making beautiful flawless cakes. But I thought I'd share what I've learned in the last couple of years anyway. :)

I started with a basic kit of supplies:

-Three Wilton piping bags, one extra large

-Two straight line tips in different sizes

-Two star tips in different sizes

-A grass tip

-Some kind of a wide flat attachment to the extra large bag for piping wide flat lines of frosting onto your cake to spread out as the base frosting layer

-Wilton food coloring box of 8 colors

-Frosting spatula

Preparing your cakes:

-When your cakes have cooled, the first thing I do is look at the tops. Usually they're uneven. This is due to my oven being uneven, or my counter top. Who knows. :) I usually take a long bread knife and get at eye level with the top of the cake, and then slowly shave off a little bit at a time until it looks more level with the edges all the way around.

-Then I place one cake on the serving platter, bottom down. Next, I put about two cups of frosting on that cake, and smooth it out with the frosting spatula. If my cake is still a little high in the middle, this means that I'll work hard to distribute the frosting to where it's thicker on the outside and thinner in the middle, in an attempt to level it out again.

-Next, I place the second cake, top down, on top of the frosting. I want the bottom on top so there is a nice smooth edge to the top of the cake. I'm not sure if you're "supposed" to do this, but it always works well for me. I pretty firmly but evenly push on the cake top to mash the frosting out to the edges evenly. If you don't get the frosting to fill in the full gap between the edges of the cake, it will sag and then the middle will be much higher than the edges. Add some frosting and fill it in if you need to.

Once you've got the cake stacked:

Brush the top and sides with your fingers lightly to remove any loose crumbs. You don't want them getting stuck in your frosting.(If they do anyway, you can pry them out with a toothpick). I put about 2 cups again of frosting on top of the cake. With the spatula, I smooth it out to the edges. You want to hold the spatula or knife at an angle and either push or pull the frosting so it's moving evenly and smoothing out. If you end up with too much on top, just push it down the side. Once the top is smooth and even, add some more to the sides if necessary. Take a glob (about 2 T?) and stick it to the side. Then hold the spatula, handle up, at an angle and pull it toward you as you turn the platter or cake base. This takes some practice. If the frosting is getting dry and difficult to smooth, grab a bowl of water and dip your spatula or knife into the water and start again. Keep dipping in water and scraping off the excess frosting on the edge of the bowl.

-If you're doing a design on the cake, I always take a tooth pick and kind of sketch it into the first layer of frosting, then pipe the border, then fill it in.

-Once you're done frosting, for a nice finished look, take a paper towel and fold it into a sharp point, and run it around the platter to pick up any frosting spills, make it clean, and give a nice edge to the bottom of the cake.

Confectioners Frosting

About two years ago, I decided I wanted to learn to decorate cakes, just in a basic way. Nothing too fancy, but I wanted to be able to make fun things for my kids birthdays. My sister-in-law is an amazing cake decorator and so she put together a beginner's kit for me of things I'd need. More on that in my next post on basic decorating techniques. But I had a hard time coming up with a frosting recipe that I could work with. Most buttercreams use a lot of shortening, and the dalda/vanaspati is NOT good for frostings. :) Fondant was out of the question because it uses marhsmallows. For a long time I've used a cream cheese buttercream. But recently I ran across this recipe, and it worked great for Kiryn's recent birthday cake. So much cheaper and easier than the cream cheese buttercream, plus I got my smoothest result yet! The amount of this recipe will fill and frost a 9 inch round two layer cake.

Confectioners Frosting

5 c. icing sugar

250 g. butter, at room temperature

2 1/2 t. vanilla

3-4 T. cream or milk

Beat the butter with an electric mixer til it's nice and fluffy. Add the vanilla and beat til combined. With the mixer on a low speed, add the icing sugar, about a cup at a time, and beat to combine. Scrape down the sides of the bowl with a spatula often to keep it well mixed. Once you've added all the sugar, add about 2 T. of cream. Beat on high to combine. If the frosting looks dry, add another T. of cream and keep beating. You want it to be shiny, but to stand up on it's own and be a bit stiff. If you get it too wet, just add a little more icing sugar. Keep going back and forth until you get it right!

If you want to color your frosting, set aside the amount you want in a separate bowl, and add your color to it. Probably went without saying. :) Happy Baking!

*taken from joyofbaking.com*

Classic Birthday Cake

This week was Kiryn's birthday, and I had such a fun time making this cake for her! Here's a classic white cake recipe that makes one 9x13 or two 9 inch round cakes.

Classic Birthday Cake

2 ¾ c. all-purpose flour

1 T. baking powder

¼ t. salt

12 T. (or 1 1/2 sticks, 150 grams) butter, at room temperature

1 ¾ c. granulated sugar

3 eggs, at room temperature

2 t. vanilla extract

1 ¼ c. buttermilk

Preheat an oven to 350˚. Lightly butter the bottoms of two 9 by 2 inch round cake pans and sprinkle with flour. In a bowl, whisk together the flour, baking powder and salt until well blended. Set aside.

In another bowl, using an electric mixer, beat the butter on medium speed until smooth. (If you forgot to set out your butter like I always do, just pop it in the microwave for a minute or two until it just barely starts to melt). Gradually add the granulated sugar and continue beating until well blended and fluffy. Add the eggs one at a time, beating well after each addition. Beat in the vanilla.

Reduce the speed to low and add the flour mixture in three additions, alternating with the buttermilk and beginning and ending with the flour, beating with each addition. Divide the batter between the prepared pans and spread it out evenly. Bake until a toothpick inserted into the center of a cake pan comes out clean, 25-30 minutes. Transfer the pans to a wire rack and let cool for 15 minutes. Run a small knife around the inside of each pan to loosen the cakes. Invert onto the rack and lift off the pans. Let the cake layers cool completely before frosting.