Earl Grey and Cassis Cake

It was my friend Cat’s birthday and I think she’ll agree that she’s a very lucky birthday girl - cake-wise at least. She got 3 cakes, 2 of which were from me! I had planned an earl grey and black currant/cassis cake, when her sister asked me to re-make a the cake from last year. So the first cake she got was this pared-down version of last year’s banana nut crunch cake.

As I was making her second cake, I was reflecting on how long we’ve been friends - a long time. How long? Since the days when she worked at Blockbuster! Do you remember Blockbuster? Ahh, those were the days.

Anyway, do you know Ribena? It’s a black currant drink concentrate and it’s something that I’ve been wanting to incorporate into a cake for a while. So I tried out a black currant (aka cassis) curd.

Check out the verdict at the end of the post!

Earl Grey Cake Layers

I used the recipe by Tessa Huff and baked in 3, 6-inch cake pans for 35 min.

Cassis Curd (Make ahead of time)

Ingredients

½ cup Ribena

3 eggs

6 Tablespoon butter

Directions

1. Combine Ribena and eggs in a small sauce pan. Put on low heat and whisk continuously until thick.
2. Place butter in a bowl and strain the curd with a fine sieve over top. Stir to combine.
3. Cool completely before using.

Toasted Meringue Decor

Ingredients

4 teaspoons of meringue powder

4 Tablespoons of Ribena (or water)

Directions

1. Combine meringue powder and liquid and whip with a hand held blender until thick and stiff.
2. When ready to decorate, spoon onto cake and make peaks with a spoon. Toast with a kitchen torch.

Tea Syrup

See directions here and cut amount in half.

Early Grey Swiss Meringue Buttercream

See directions in this earlier post.  

Colour ¼ cup buttercream purple using gel food colouring. Colour the remaining buttercream blue.

Assembly

1. Place first cake layer on your cake board or plate. Brush tea syrup on top.
2. Pipe a dam around the perimeter of the cake using the blue buttercream.
3. Spread the cassis curd inside. Place next layer and repeat. Finish with final cake layer.
4. Crumb coat the cake with blue buttercream. Freeze for 10 minutes.
5. Add final buttercream coat. Smear purple buttercream around the cake and use a bench scraper to smooth it out and blend.
6. Add meringue and toast with a kitchen torch.

Verdict: Overall, this cake was really tasty. It has moist cake layers and visually, it was eye-catching. I just wish that the cassis flavour cake through more - it was a tad egg-y in flavour. In the future, I would just stick with black currant jam. I think Ribena could work well in a frosting.

Candy Cake

Happy New Year! Hope you all had a wonderful holiday. Did you have enough desserts? Well get ready for more!

For my friend’s birthday, I wanted to make her a cake covered in candies. I’ve had this idea for a while because she loves candy! So why not cover a cake with the tons of the stuff she loves?? In my case, it would be a cake covered in bread. Mmm, b...r…e…a…d. The other day, someone asked me what my guilty pleasure was that I couldn’t say no to, and I realized it was bread. In fact, skip the cake, just give me a loaf of bread (it can be shaped like a cake).

Anyways, this year my friend was having a tea party to celebrate the big day. Last year she had a sleepover (remember this) and the year before I made a fruit topped cake. Yay tea party! How refined!

Check out the verdict at the end of the post!

Vanilla Cake

Feel free to use your favorite vanilla cake recipe. I used this one and baked it in 3 6-inch cake pans.

White Buttercream Frosting

Ingredients

1 cup salted butter, softened

4 cups icing sugar

1 teaspoon vanilla

¼ cup milk

¼ cup marshmallow fluff

Directions

Add all ingredients in a bowl of a stand mixer with a beater attachment and beat on a lower speed until somewhat combined. Increase speed and beat until light and fluffy.

Ready for candy.

Assembly

1.  Fill cakes with your choice of jam. I used black currant.

2.  Apply a crumb coat and place in freezer for 5 minutes.

3.  Apply another coat of frosting and smooth with a spatula dipped in hot water.

4.  Got to town with candies!!!

Verdict: Nailed it! This cake was so fun and easy to make and the candy options were endless! The birthday girl loved it – as I used her favorite candies. Here’s a picture of us that evening.

Raspberry Cassis Layer Cake

This is a story about a cake wreck and a resulting cake scramble. 

For a long time now, I had been fantasizing about making a cake that’s covered in torched meringue.  They look so awesome with the white and caramelized brown edges. Plus how often do you come across a chance to eat a cake like that?

Well, an opportunity to make the cake opened up for a birthday. I knew that I wanted the inside of the cake to be light and fluffy, just like the meringue outside.  And I knew that I wanted it to resemble a pie – think lemon meringue pie, blueberry pie, coconut cream pie, banana cream pie. I landed on something like a mango pie.

This is how the mango meringue cake turned out.

This is what happened after about 15 minutes.

The chiffon cake was too soft, the meringue disk in the middle became a slip-and-slide for the mango curd, the meringue frosting was not stiff enough, and the entire cake shifted (even though I had put a dowel in it!). I couldn’t serve this (although, I was quite happy with myself for not having a mental breakdown and getting upset as I normally would have!).

So, I had 3.5 hours to put together a new cake with whatever I had. Out popped out a Raspberry Cassis Layer Cake.  Luckily, I had made baked meringue peaks with leftover meringue from the previous cake.

By the way, cassis is black currant and also the best flavour of ALL time.

Check out the verdict at the end of the post!

Raspberry Cassis Layer Cake

Vanilla Cake

Adapted from here.

Ingredients

1/2 cup unsalted butter, room temperature

¼ cup vegetable oil (e.g., canola)

1 1/3 cup sugar

3 eggs, room temperature

2 teaspoon vanilla (+ ¼ teaspoon ground vanilla bean, optional but highly recommended)

2 cups cake flour

½  cup all purpose flour

1 ½ teaspoon baking powder

½ teaspoon baking soda

¼ teaspoon salt

1 cup buttermilk, room temperature

Directions

1.  Preheat oven to 350 degrees F. Line the bottom of 2, 6-inch cake pans with parchment and grease and flour the sides.

2.  Beat butter to soften. Add oil and sugar, and beat until fluffy.

3.  Add eggs one at a time, beating after each addition. Add vanilla and beat to combine.

4.  In a separate bowl, sift both flours, baking powder, baking soda, and salt to combine.

5.  Add flour to butter mixture in 3 additions, alternating with buttermilk and beating on low just until combined.

6.  Divide into the cake pans and bake for about 25 minutes, or until a toothpick comes out clean.

7.  Spoon about half of the vanilla simple syrup (recipe to follow) over the three cakes while in pans, and cool for 20 minutes.

8.  Turn out on rack and spoon the remaining syrup over the bottom of cake layers and cool completely.

Vanilla Simple Syrup

Combine ¼ cup sugar, ¼ cup water, and 1/8 teaspoon ground vanilla beans in a small saucepan and heat on medium until sugar is dissolved.

Raspberry Cassis Swiss Meringue Buttercream

Adapted from here.

Ingredients

3 egg whites (75g)

½ cup + 2 Tablespoons sugar (125g)

1 cup unsalted butter, room temperature, cut into ½-inch cubes

1 teaspoon vanilla

¼ teaspoon salt

½ cup fresh raspberries or thawed frozen raspberries

2 heaping Tablespoons black currant jam

Directions

1.  In a clean metallic bowl, with a clean whisk (no trace of grease/oil/fat), combine egg whites and sugar, and lightly beat over a pot of simmering water until the mixture reaches 140 degrees F.

2.  Take off heat and whisk on high until thick, glossy, and cooled.

3.  Switch to a beater and while on medium high, add cubes of butter one at a time.

4.  Beat on high until smooth and silky. Add vanilla, salt, raspberries, and black current jam, and beat to combine.

Assembly

1.  Level cake layers with a bread knife.

2.  Place first layer on cake plate. Pipe a bridge of buttercream around the edge of the cake.

3.  Fill with black currant jam.

4.  Place next cake layer on top, and repeat. Top with final cake layer.

5.  Spread entire cake with a thin crumb coat, and final layer.

Verdict: The Raspberry Cassis Cake was a hit! No one had made a cake for the birthday girl before so she was really happy, PLUS, raspberry happened to be one of her favorite flavours! Yay, luck was on my side! The cake layers were fluffy and moist with a pretty delicate crumb and the baked meringue peaks gave it a texture contrast.

By the way, the mango meringue cake was phenomenal – super fluffy and cloud-like. Just what I wanted – at least now I know that it needs more of a sturdy structure. I’ll try again another time.