Vanilla Layer Cake with Bittersweet Buttercream

Did You Know? The history of birthday cakes come from the Greeks, who would take their round, moon-shaped cakes to the temple of Artemis-the Goddess of Moon. The tradition of placing lit candles on these cakes signified the glowing moon, and many believed the smoke of the candles carried their wishes and prayers to the Gods who lived in the skies above.

It was my Mom's birthday last month, so I went with the usual 'I'll-cook-for-you-since-I-have-no-money-to-buy-you-anything' present. A yellow cake with chocolate frosting is what she requested, so that's exactly what I made, jazzed up with a little heath bar of course. I love baking for birthdays, and cooking up dishes that are unique to the tastes of who they're intended for. For my mom, I went with the classic 1,2,3,4 cake. I mean it's all over the web for a reason - it's good, really good. The whipped buttercream frosting on Smitten sounded amazing, so I topped it off with that, and sprinkled some toffee bits all over the top.

The day I made this was unbelievably hot and humid, so I had a hard time keeping the frosting from melting. It wasn't a problem for too long, as we ate our fair share of cake pretty quickly, and shared the rest with our neighbors. If you're tempted to refrigerate this cake, I strongly urge you not to. I put a few pieces in the fridge overnight, and they dried out terribly. I later read that butter cakes should never be chilled for that specific reason. Other than that, this cake will definitely be one of my go-to recipes. Next up will be a cupcake version for sure.

In other news, my bakery has been pretty successful these past few weeks, and me and Chris couldn't be more excited. We have an event at Felt Night Club in Boston on July 8th, so we're really looking forward to that - a lot of great advertising. They host girl's nights every Wednesday, and the 8th is chocolate-themed. I've already got our menu planned out, but if you live in the area, I'd love to meet some of you, so contact Felt for all the details. I've also set up a Facebook page for Sweet Inspirations, so check that out, and make sure you become a fan! We can use all the support we can get. I've put a Facebook widget on the bottom of this page, so click over from here or there. Thanks!

Vanilla Layer Cake with Bittersweet Buttercream
Adapted from Smitten Kitchen

1 cup (2 sticks) butter, softened
2 cups sugar
4 eggs
3 cups sifted self-rising flour
1 cup milk
1 teaspoon pure vanilla extract
Bittersweet Buttercream, recipe follows

Preheat oven to 350°F. Grease and flour three 9-inch round cake pans*, set aside.

Using an electric mixer, cream butter until fluffy. Add sugar and continue to cream well for 6 to 8 minutes. Add eggs 1 at a time, beating well after each addition. Add flour and milk alternately to creamed mixture, beginning and ending with flour. Add vanilla and continue to beat until just mixed.

Divide batter equally among prepared pans. Level batter in each pan by holding pan 3 or 4-inches above counter, then dropping flat onto counter. Do this several times to release air bubbles and assure you of a more level cake. Bake for 25 to 30 minutes or until a tester or toothpick inserted into the center comes out clean.

*You'll notice only two layers in my cake. I used two 9-inch pans, along with 5 or so cupcakes.

Bittersweet Buttercream
Adapted from Smitten Kitchen

10 ounces bittersweet chocolate
1 1/2 cups heavy cream
1 1/2 sticks unsalted butter, softened
2 cups confectioners' sugar

Melt the chocolate with the cream in a double boiler or metal bowl set over a pan of simmering water. Whisk to blend well. Remove from heat and let stand, whisking occasionally, until the chocolate mixture thickens to the consistency of mayonnaise.

Place the butter in the bowl of an electric mixer, and on medium speed, whip the butter until light and fluffy. Add the chocolate cream and whip until lighter in color and somewhat stiff, about three minutes. Add in the confectioners sugar, whip again, and continue to add until you have reached your desired consistency.

Coconut Layer Cake

Did You Know? Falling coconuts kill 150 people every year - 10 times the number of people killed by sharks.

Not having a job leaves me with little money of my own to buy gifts for just about anyone, so when the occasion arises, I turn to baking. There's nothing like creating something special to present to your friends and family, especially when that someone is your mom. My mom is the best, and always by my side in the kitchen, cleaning every last pan that I make a mess of. She's great at rinsing and chopping, and always makes sure our kitchen is stocked. No request is ever too large. She's the ultimate soux chef.

My sister and I always joke around that we could never live with any other mother besides our own. No one would put up with us like she does, and no one would do as much as our mom does. She makes it really hard to ever want to get a place of my own. Why move out, when every last detail of my life is taken care of here? I guess to be a little more self-sufficient, but I've got time for crazy stuff like that. So in honor of my mom, and all the awesome things she does for my family, I made her a cake (even trade right?); A coconut layer cake, her favorite.

Mother's Day was held at my house this year, and my aunt, uncle, and grandparents came over for a late lunch to celebrate the occasion. My mom made the meal, and I finished it off with this cake. I'm not a huge fan of shredded coconut, and cream cheese is definitely not my thing, so I opted out of tasting this one. But from the reactions of all of our guests, along with the multiple servings, I'd say it was a huge success. My mom loved it too, so that's all that really mattered. I hope you all enjoyed your Mother's Day, and I promise to post a little more often now that I'm done with school!

Coconut Layer Cake
Adapted from Bon Appetit via Epicurious
I sliced each cake into 2, for a total of 4 layers. The recipe below is for a basic 2 layer cake.

2 3/4 cups all purpose flour
1 teaspoon baking powder
1/2 teaspoon baking soda
1/2 teaspoon salt
1 3/4 cups sugar
1 cup (2 sticks) unsalted butter, room temperature
1 cup canned sweetened cream of coconut (such as Coco Lépez)*
4 large eggs, separated
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
1 teaspoon coconut extract
1 cup buttermilk
Coconut Cream Cheese Frosting (recipe below)*

Preheat oven to 350°F. Butter and flour two 9-inch-diameter cake pans with 2-inch-high sides (I lined mine with parchment paper as well). Whisk flour, baking powder, baking soda and 1/2 teaspoon salt in medium bowl to blend. Using electric mixer, beat sugar, butter and sweetened cream of coconut in large bowl until fluffy. Beat in egg yolks and vanilla and coconut extracts. On low speed, beat in dry ingredients and then buttermilk, each just until blended.

Using clean dry beaters, beat egg whites with pinch of salt in another large bowl until stiff but not dry. Fold beaten egg whites into batter.

Divide cake batter between prepared pans. Bake cakes until tester inserted into center comes out clean, about 45 minutes. Cool cakes in pans on rack 10 minutes. Run small sharp knife around pan sides to loosen cakes. Turn cakes out onto racks and cool completely.

Place 1 cake layer on cake plate. Spread 1 cup Cream Cheese Frosting over cake layer. Sprinkle 1 cup sweetened shredded coconut over. Top with second cake layer. Spread remaining frosting over top and sides of cake. Sprinkle remaining coconut over cake, gently pressing into sides to adhere.

Coconut Layer Cake can be prepared up to 1 day ahead. Cover with plastic wrap and refrigerate. Let stand at room temperature 2 hours before serving.

Coconut Cream Cheese Frosting
Adapted from Ina Garten

2 (8 oz) packages cream cheese, at room temperature
2 sticks unsalted butter, at room temperature
1 teaspoon coconut extract
1/2 teaspoon vanilla extract
1 pound confectioners' sugar, sifted
14 ounces sweetened shredded coconut

In the bowl of an electric mixer fitted with a paddle attachment, combine the cream cheese, butter, and the coconut and vanilla extracts on low speed. Add the confectioners' sugar and mix until just smooth (don't whip).

Sydney's Double Chocolate Layer Cake

Did You Know? At the time Marie Antoinette uttered the infamous quotation "let them eat cake," the word "cake" did not refer to the familiar dessert item that the modern-day French call le gateau. The operative term was brioche, a flour-and-water paste that was "caked" onto the interiors of the ovens and baking pans of the professional boulangers of the era. At the end of the day, the baker would scrape the leavings from his pans and ovens and set them outside the door for the benefit of beggars and scavengers. Thus, the lady in question was simply giving practical, if somewhat flippant, advice to her poor subjects: If one cannot afford the bourgeois bread, he can avail himself of the poor man's "cake."

After a ridiculous conversation about boxed cake versus homemade, I decided to put the argument to rest, and convince my skeptical sister that homemade is the only way to go. We often joke about how off her taste buds are, prefering all the cheap, artficial foods over a nice, healhy meal. She says if she knows one thing, it's chocolate cake (something about an entire Entenmann's?). And she was positive the boxed cake was superior to anything I could bake from scratch (she's kind like that). From that statement on, I was on a mad hunt for the ultimate chocolate cake recipe.

High on the list when Googling "chocolate cake," this particular recipe had it's devoted followers. Originally featured in Gourmet, this cake must have been replicated at least a thousand times since. Declared as Deb's favorite, the layered masterpiece I was about to recreate had my approval. And since I had a skeptic on my hands, I had to buy only the finest quality ingredients. So off to Whole Foods I went. Two pounds of Callebaut later, and thirty dollars lighter (well I guess I wasn't thirty dollars lighter - thanks Mom), I was in my kitchen, and ready to conquer the chocolate cake.

I was surprised at the amount of hot coffee the recipe called for. I definitely didn't want a mocha-flavored cake, so that made me nervous. I couldn't have been more wrong. The coffee brought out a depth of flavor from the chocolate that I had never tasted before. And that chocolate. I will never go back to Ghirardelli again. The original called for semisweet. But I could only find bitter and milk, so I bought both and combined the two. The end result was truly amazing. Moist, tender crumbs, sandwiched by a rich chocolate ganache. The flavors were beyond complex. And the debate we had on our hands? Long forgotten.

Double Chocolate Layer Cake
Adapted from Epicurious via Gourmet, March 1999

Cake Layers
3 ounces fine-quality semisweet chocolate (I used milk chocolate Callebaut)
1 1/2 cups hot brewed coffee
3 cups sugar
2 1/2 cups all-purpose flour
1 1/2 cups unsweetened cocoa powder (not Dutch process)
2 teaspoons baking soda
3/4 teaspoon baking powder
1 1/4 teaspoons salt
3 large eggs
3/4 cup vegetable oil
1 1/2 cups well-shaken buttermilk
3/4 teaspoon vanilla

Ganache Frosting
1 pound fine-quality semisweet chocolate (I used a combo of milk and bittersweet Callebaut)
1 cup heavy cream
2 tablespoons sugar
2 tablespoons light corn syrup
1/2 stick (1/4 cup) unsalted butter

Make Cake Layers
Preheat oven to 300°F, and grease two 10-inch round cake pans. Line bottoms with rounds of wax paper and grease paper.

Finely chop chocolate and in a bowl combine with hot coffee. Let mixture stand, stirring occasionally, until chocolate is melted and mixture is smooth.

Into a large bowl sift together sugar, flour, cocoa powder, baking soda, baking powder, and salt. In another large bowl with an electric mixer beat eggs until thickened slightly and lemon colored (about 3 minutes with a standing mixer or 5 minutes with a hand-held mixer). Slowly add oil, buttermilk, vanilla, and melted chocolate mixture to eggs, beating until combined well. Add sugar mixture and beat on medium speed until just combined well. Divide batter between pans and bake in middle of oven until a tester inserted in center comes out clean, 1 hour to 1 hour and 10 minutes.

Cool layers completely in pans on racks. Run a thin knife around edges of pans and invert layers onto racks. Carefully remove wax paper and cool layers completely. Cake layers may be made 1 day ahead and kept, wrapped well in plastic wrap, at room temperature.

Make Frosting
Finely chop chocolate. In a 1 1/2- to 2-quart saucepan bring cream, sugar, and corn syrup to a boil over moderately low heat, whisking until sugar is dissolved. Remove pan from heat and add chocolate, whisking until chocolate is melted. Cut butter into pieces and add to frosting, whisking until smooth.

Transfer frosting to a bowl and cool, stirring occasionally, until spreadable (depending on chocolate used, it may be necessary to chill frosting to spreadable consistency).

Spread frosting between cake layers and over top and sides. Cake keeps, covered and chilled, 3 days. Bring cake to room temperature before serving.

German Chocolate Cake

Did You Know? German Chocolate Cake was not brought to America by German immigrants. The cake took its name from an American with the last name of "German."

I mentioned in a recent post that I had spent a delicious Friday night baking with my mom, so I thought I would share what expactly we baked up. Trust me, this post is not for the faint of heart...

One of my favorite people to cook for is my Dad, and when he called home from work the other day to request some sort of dessert from my mom, I took over the bakers role. I'd been wanting to test out this recipe for some time (knowing it was one of my Dad's favorites) so I thought this was as good a time as any. The recipe at hand...German Chocolate Cake. A decadently rich, layer cake that is not to be taken lightly. This particular recipe incorporated moist cake layers sandwiched between a caramel-like pecan and coconut spread, all of which was drowned in an intense chocolate ganache frosting

What set this cake apart from other chocolate cakes I had baked in the past, was the addition of melted chocolate to the cake batter, instead of the usual cocoa powder. This definately intensified the flavor, but the addition of whipped egg whites took away any doubts I had that this cake would be to dense. After giving the bowl a good lick, I watched as my cakes rose to perfection in the heat of the oven. The daunting task awaiting in the future: cutting each cake into two layers. It didn't turn out all that bad, but they were by no means cut straight across. The coconut-pecan filling did a beautiful job at masking my imperfections. Not being a huge chocolate cake fan myself, I ended up putting a nice dent into this one. Trust me, it's really good, but really filling. I found myself hunched over on the couch after eating just a small slice.

A quick note about the frosting...mine did not set up like I thought it would, so I ended up just pouring the entire bowl over the top and letting it drip down the sides. The directions say to pipe it on, but the consistency I ended up with was in no shape for piping - much too liquidy. In the end, I loved how it turned out. It may seem like a lot of ganache to be pouring on a cake, but you won't be sorry when all is said and done.

I would have posted the recipe here, but I think David's step by step instructions are perfect as is...so check it out here and see for yourself! I'll leave you with an in-your-face slice of heaven...

Happy Baking...Hayley