Nora's Cakes and Cookies: April 2018

This AMAZING cake was inspired by two cakes from Cake by Courtney, and I couldn't be happier with how it turned out. Here's the run down.

6 inch 3 layer cake. (28 min baking time)
Cake Flavor: Chocolate (I used normal cocoa)
Frosting: Salted Caramel
Filling: Candied Pretzels

I made my first video with this cake and unfortunately learned that my camera times out after 20 minutes, so I was only able to show the crumb coat. Oh well. You live and you learn.

Here's what I learned with this cake:

Always make sure your camera is rolling when you think it is.
To avoid a somewhat top heavy hour glass shape cake, try decorating in the middle rather than the outside when you have large decor.
Always make sure the parchment rounds you have cut out are in your baking pan BEFORE you pour your batter. (lol)
Be patient with your caramel sauce--eventually you will get there.
Use a lid with your caramel sauce to help prevent crystallization if you don't have a pastry brush.
Wipe your knife after each cut of the cake, especially if it is chocolate.

I was really happy with how this cake turned out, and I will definitely make it again.

April 29, 2018 No comments

6 inch 35 min (for 2) 31 min (for 1)
Cake Flavor: Lemon
Filling: Lemon Curd
Frosting: I used a cream cheese frosting and added 1 tsp fresh lemon juice, and 1/2 tsp lemon extract.

I tried the watercolor technique using different flavors of buttercream frosting. Here's what I want to remember for next time:

For watercolor, it's probably best to use a all butter buttercream, not cream cheese. The cream cheese frosting was more difficult to get smooth, and you can't fuss with the frosting too much when your trying for the watercolor look. The result was a less finished looking cake, but super delicious.
Don't only crumb coat your cake before adding your colors--completely frost with your base color and then add your colors. Otherwise you end up with WAY too many gaps and holes in your frosting, which means going over it more times, which will change the look of your cake.
Using brighter colors will photograph better.
When doing a half moon decoration, cover more than you think.
Make sure your buttercream dam for your filling is completely secured to your cake so you don't have any leaks.

The cake flavor was good, not TOO lemony so it went well with the strong lemon curd. The texture was good in the middle, but a little overcooked for the outside.

April 26, 2018 No comments

This Ombre cake was a request for a little girls Tangled themed birthday party! She wanted the cake itself to be ombre, but also be flavored strawberry which made things a little complicated color-wise, but it all turned out great! This was my first Rosette Cake, and I think I am in love with this style. It is so easy and gorgeous!!! Tips and things I learned from this cake:

Always make sure you have the right amount of batter for you pan. Just splitting the batter evenly doesn't necessarily work---measure/weight it out, and if you don't have enough batter for all the layers, make another batch instead of baking really thin layers that won't work.
You can use a 1M or a 2D for the rosettes, but I like the 2D best.
To create the ombre effect, split your frosting into 3 batches (with the largest amount of frosting for the darkest color). Once you have the darkest color, you use a little of that frosting to color the next lighter frosting and then a little of that frosting to color the lightest frosting. The above picture doesn't do this ombre cake justice, because the purple color does not photograph as well so I had to do some color adjustments on photoshop. In reality the colors are all really well related to each other.
Always hide the "tail" of your rosette with the following rosette.
Stagger your rosettes instead of stacking them.
Mark your cake to make sure your roses are all the same size.

I can't wait to make this design again!

April 20, 2018 No comments

I think I have a new favorite frosting and its name is PEANUT BUTTER BUTTERCREAM! Oh man....I did not expect this frosting to turn out so good! I used the leftover frosting to dip pretzels, so good!

I used a basic chocolate cake recipe -- seriously, I used the chocolate recipe on the back of the Hershey's cocoa can. It is a really runny batter and makes you think that it won't turn out very well, but it does. It is light but moist and not too dense or rich (which was perfect for the rich peanut butter frosting).

For the chocolate ganache I used semisweet chocolate and heavy cream, using the method from Chelsweets. It was much easier than I thought it would be, and I'm excited to do it again.

All-in-all, one of the best cakes I've made, and I can't stop eating it.

April 12, 2018 No comments

On Easter this past week, my husband, Mitch, had a craving for some good carrot cake. I (of course) didn't have all the ingredients, but I promised him I would make it after my next trip to the store. Well today was that day, and lo and behold my three layer carrot cake. I decided to keep it simple. No nuts, pineapple, coconut, or raisins. Just soft, spice-filled layers of orange goodness. The frosting was super yum, and probably my favorite part. I used my usual soft cream cheese frosting, but added just a tablespoon of sour cream. YUM! Definitely one of the tastiest cakes I've made this year.

Things I have learned from this cake:

You always need more frosting than you think -- Not necessarily for taste, but definitely for decoration.
PLAN OUT YOUR CAKES. I thought I was doing this, but there were a few times during this cake baking process, that I realized I wasn't very organized or that I had overlooked a few things (like needing extra frosting and therefore extra frosting ingredients.
There is beauty is simplicity.

April 04, 2018 No comments

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