Yes, We Cook!

Yes, this post is a few months late.  If you haven’t noticed, I really haven’t been posting.  But don’t worry!  The Fabergé themed Easter caked tradition did not die.

The white cake recipe used in the past cake efforts was also used in this; however, this year fondant was replaced with Buttercream frosting!  Here is the recipe:

• 2 cups (1 pound) unsalted butter, room temperature
• 1 cup vegetable shortening or hi-ratio shortening
• 1 tablespoon fresh lemon juice or 1.5 teaspoons lemon extract, pure vanilla extract or almond extract
• 1 teaspoon salt
• 3 pounds 10x confectioners sugar
• 3 tablespoons meringue powder
• 0.5 cups + 1 tablespoon water, mild or clear liquer

Instructions:

1. Cream shortening and butter with an electric, handheld or paddle-whip mixer.
2. Add flavoring and salt.
3. Gradually add sugar, on cup at a time.
4. Add meringue powder. (The mixture will appear dry)
5. Add liquid of choice and beat until light and fluffy (approximately 5-8 minutes). Keep the bowl covered with a damp cloth or plastic wrap.

Oh, the frosting was SO GOOD.  SO very good.

I don’t ever recall having this before.  I just saw the picture of a simple chocolate cake that serves a small crowd people and that filled the need I had for this past weekend’s festivities.  This turned out different – GOOD different – than I expected as this was not the way I had ever made chocolate cake before!

2 tsp all purpose flour

2 c all purpose flour

2 c granulated sugar

1 tsp baking soda

1 tsp ground cinnamon

1/4 tsp salt

3/4 c water

1/2 c butter

1/2 c unsweetened cocoa, divided

1/2 c low fat buttermilk

1 tbsp vanilla extract, divided

2 large eggs

6 tbsp butter

1/3 c fat free milk

3 c powdered sugar

1/4 c chopped pecans, toasted

1. Preheat oven to 375. Coat a 13 x9 in pan with cooking spray, dust with 2 tsp flour.

2. Combine 2 c flour with next 4 ingredients in a large bowl, stir with a whisk.  Combine 3/4 c water, 1/2 c butter, and 1/4 c cocoa in a small saucepan; bring to a boil, stirring frequently.  Add to flour mixture.  Beat with a mixer at med speed until well blended.  Add buttermilk, 1 tsp vanilla, and eggs; beat well.  Pour batter into prepared pan.  Bake for 22 – 25 mins (closer to 25 for me).  Place on a wire rack.

3. Combine 6 tbsp butter, fat free milk, and remaining 1/4 c cocoa in a saucepan; bring to a boil, stirring constantly.  Remove from heat and gradually stir in powdered sugar and remaining 2 tbsp vanilla.  Spread over hot cake.  Sprinkle with pecans.  Cool completely on a wire rack.  Makes 20 servings.

I wish I had alternate views of an actual slice for you but I had to leave the party a bit early to go to work.  My husband saved me a slice and I ate it by the time I remembered I needed another pic :-p  Anyway, as you can see the frosting has a light crispness to the very surface.  The frosting is distinct yet the moistness of the cake (I believe d/t the buttermilk) blends nicely with it and gives it a definite richness.  Very good! I would definitely make this again for a large event.  You can make this the night before and let it cool overnight to save you time.

Nutritional Information:

Calories: 298

Fat: 10 g

Protein: 3.1 g

Carbohydrate: 49.8 g

Fiber: 0.5 g

Cholesterol: 44 mg

Sodium: 188 mg

In 2009, the wife and I decided to start an Easter Brunch Holiday tradition – The yearly Easter Egg Cake. (the original cake and recipe can be found here) Each year we intended on simply trying something new, something creative, and sharing the joy with the family…

Here is the result of the 2010 Easter Egg Cake effort – The Fabergé Egg Cake.

Here is the base cake, fresh with Fondant.

Adding the ribbons…

And the final Cake…

Again, this cake reminds me that, yes, I/we should be baking for a living.

I have no problem with experimenting… when it comes to food that is.  Recently the baking bug kicked in and I thought to myself “Hmm… how could I make a classic white cake?” Having no desire to do a box cake, I decided to do a little research on what I could use.  One thing leads to another and a bunch of reading later, I came up with the following recipe:

Dense White Cake

• 1 ½ sticks of salted butter, softened
• ¾ cup buttermilk
• 6 egg whites
• 1 ¾ cups of sugar
• 2 cups flour
• 2 teaspoons baking powder
• 1 ½ tsp French Vanilla Extract

Now, I know what you may be thinking… YES… buttermilk.  The characteristic of the typically sour dairy product produces a unique flavor especially when introduced to the French Vanilla.

Pan Prep

Before you start mixing everything together, make sure your pan is prepped. As a non-professional baker, what do I know, but here is what I do. Using Crisco, grease the bottom on the pan so that all surfaces are covered.  Take wax paper, enough to cover all surfaces of the pan, and place into the pan and press so that coverage is as even as possible.  Cut off any extra wax paper that extends over the edge of the pan to prevent browning/burning once it gets into the oven.

Directions

Pre-heat your oven to 350.

Bowl number two – mix your butter and sugar together until the mixture does not retain the “grainy” aspect of the sugar.  Set aside.

Bowl number two – mix flower and baking powder. Set Aside.

Bowl number three – mix buttermilk, egg whites and French vanilla. Set aside.

Slowly mix the flower/baking powder into the butter/sugar mixture, adding the milk/egg mixture to keep the butter/sugar base as moist as possible.  Once all contents are mixed, pour into pan.  Bake for for 30 minutes and test.  If your cake is not finished, back for 5 minute intervals until finished.

White Cake Baking Away

Once your cake is finished, let it cool for 5 to 10 minutes.  Place some wax paper on the counter and turn the cake over onto the wax paper.  It should come right out of the pan.  You will need to remove the wax paper that lined the pan from the cake but that will be no isssue.

The cake, fresh from the pan.

Time to decorate.  It’s important to point out that 24 hours passed from the time the cake came out of the oven until the decorating started. 

 How you want to do this is up to you.  We decided to use fondant purcahsed from a baking suply company, then paint the fondant.  

Here is the fondant going on.

Fondant looks.... so smooth.

Remember how I said I like to “experiment?”  Well, I also attempted to make butter cream frosting for the first time.  It was going to be used as the bonding agent between the cake and the fondant.  Yea, well…  the butter cream frosting did NOT work out.  One wouldn’t think it’s that hard – some confectionery sugar, some butter, some milk…  Yea, no.  Not so much.   I ended up having to use a can of frosting from the store.

The finished Easter Egg Cake

In the end, I think this turned out extremely well all things considered.  I have a number of things I want to try moving forward, maybe some variations on the cake recipe, but an overall successful first attempt.

I hope you enjoy Easter!

Update – one thing I forgot to say previously.  This cake tastes better the longer it sits around.  Obviously, there would be a point where it would start to go stale but I baked a practice cake and it tasted so much better on day 5 than fresh out of the oven, it really caught me off guard.