Ok, guys. Before I dive into photos and posts about our spring break road trip, I need to share about this birthday cake. I know, it’s another cake. But it’s Hannah’s first ever birthday cake, and despite the storm of insanity that plopped down on our house the week of her birthday I was still determined to make it as awesome as I could.

It’s a 4 layer white cake that I dyed to match her Hawaiian-themed party. It’s covered in (from scratch) vanilla buttercream. I had all kinds of elaborate ideas for how to frost and decorate this cake, but in the end it was really delicious and a fun surprise to cut into in front of the guests.

The cake recipe was from my trusty America’s Test Kitchen Family Baking Book. I specifically wanted white cake, not yellow cake, because I wanted to make sure the dyes would be bright and vibrant and not altered too much by the color of the cake batter. Now my white cake recipe was for a 2-layer cake, so I actually made 2 batches because I wanted this to be nice and high. Here’s the original recipe, with my food coloring modifications and no almond extract (in the original recipe, but why sully a perfectly good cake with almond extract?):

Ingredients for a 2-Layer White Cake
1 cup whole milk, room temperature
6 large egg whites, room temperature (save the egg yolks for the buttercream!)
1 tsp vanilla extract
2 1/4 cups cake flour
1 3/4 cups sugar
4 tsp baking powder
1 tsp salt
12 Tbsp (1.5 sticks) unsalted butter, cut into 12 pieces and softened
4 cups frosting or buttercream (we’ll get to that in a minute)

Preheat the oven to 350 and grease your cake pans. I like to butter and flour mine, then put a piece of parchment on the bottom. I actually have four 9″ cake pans, so I didn’t have to reuse the pans for the second batch of batter. I didn’t just double the batter because I thought it might overflow my stand mixer. I actually made the cake twice.

Whisk the milk, egg whites, and vanilla extract together in a small bowl.

In the bowl of your stand mixer (or a large bowl if you’re mixing by hand), whisk all the dry ingredients (flour, sugar, baking powder, salt) together. Then on medium-low speed add the butter to the flour mixture one piece at a time. Mix until it looks like moist crumbs, 1-3 minutes.

Beat in all but 1/2 cup of the milk mixture, then raise the mixer speed to medium and beat until “smooth, light, and fluffy,” 1-3 minutes. Reduce the mixer speed to low and add the last bit of the milk mixture. Mix until the batter looks slightly curdled, about 15 seconds. Give it a good stir with a rubber spatula.

Okay, let’s get coloring.

I figured out that each layer of this particular cake recipe was about 3 cups of batter (very messy trial and error). I can’t speak to other recipes, but if you use this one you should be good to go with 3 cups of batter to a layer. So with each batch I made, I portioned out 3 cups of batter into separate bowls for coloring. I used my good Ateco food coloring gels, which get more saturation with less dye than supermarket food coloring. And I have the entire range of colors, so I don’t have to mix. I never use any other food coloring, these are wicked good to keep on hand (sorry, we just got back from New England).

You have to really mix the gel in, and only add 2 or 3 drops max at a time before you stir and check for color.

A little goes a long way.

They give such beautiful color.

So after I colored my layers I spread them into pans…

…and followed the recipes baking directions. Bake the cakes until a toothpick inserted into the center comes out with a few crumbs attached (but not wet), 20-25 minutes. Rotate the pans halfway through baking.

Let the cakes cool in the pans for 10 minutes, then flip out onto wire racks, peel off the parchment paper, and cool right side up completely before frosting. Bake your other layers (in my case, pink and green–which I did not photograph).

I made the cake layers the night before and wrapped each layer in plastic wrap once it was cool enough not to fall apart. This was to make completely sure that they were ready to be frosted on party day.

I used my favorite Vanilla Buttercream recipe for the frosting, and since it yields 4 cups, or enough for a 2-layer cake, I did go ahead and double the amount of frosting I made. That worked out fine in the stand mixer. Then I frosted the cake really simply, using this equally handy gadget to make sure the layers were exactly the same height. I stuck on her 1 candle and some of the silk flowers I had for decorating, and that’s all she wrote. I worried that a simple vanilla frosted cake wouldn’t look cool enough on the goodies table, but I got such a cool reaction from everyone when we sliced into the cake and they saw all the colored layers for the first time. So that was actually pretty awesome, and of course the birthday girl kinda dug it.

We had a horrible storm here yesterday. Thunder, lightning, a big pelting hailstorm. A nearby crack of lightning killed my computer. It’s completely fried, along with two other gadgets and the network ports they were attached to in Adam’s technology cave (also known as the laundry room closet). I’m currently posting from our library computer, which I’ve usurped until my new parts get here and Adam can fix my motherboard (I sound like I know what I’m talking about, right?).

I was kind of freaked out by the storm, what with the roof sounding like it would collapse under the hail fire and my computer dying from an apparent EMP. But someone else found it positively excellent conditions for a long summer’s nap.

So I took the opportunity to use up some of the sweet cherries I bought at Whole Foods the other day when I stumbled into a 1-day, $1.99 a pound special on them. I won’t mention how many pounds I bought, but I still have plenty of cherries (rest assured). I clearly also decided it was the day to sneak into Adam’s camera lens stash and play with my Big Girl Camera.

I used Smitten Kitchen’s Sweet Cherry Pie recipe from a few years ago, with the Pate Brisee crust that is my complete go-to pie crust now. I only had 3 tablespoons of cornstarch, so I used flour to make up the last tablespoon as per the directions here. I worried that the pie would taste like flour, but pies bake for so long it’s not a problem. It didn’t make my pie filling look wet and juicy going in, though. But it was all good in the end.

This pie was phenomenal, and it was a good flavor contrast to the mini cherry pies I made for our cookout. The little bit of almond extract makes a huge difference in getting that classic cherry flavor.

I <3 summer, don’t you?

Let me preface this with a confession. Part of why I’m so excited to be a mom is to finally have an excuse to go crazy with the party planning. I think I do a pretty good job entertaining our grownup friends, but the options for kid parties are just neverending. This is not the sole reason I wanted to start a family, but it certainly doesn’t hurt. Don’t get me started on the sewing options for homemade Halloween costumes. This Mommy business completely appeals to my inner home ec goddess.

I love Amy Atlas. I’ve been a big fan of her dessert tables for a few years now, and I’ve made my own shaky attempts at putting them together for our parties and cookouts. So I preordered Sweet Designs as soon as I heard about it, and I wasn’t disappointed. Finally I can get some insight into why my own tables never quite look like hers. I’ve learned that I should overstock the table even if it’s for a small crowd…this is why mine often look emaciated, I’m afraid to have TOO much. Mixing supermarket treats with homemade nibbles and gourmet goodies is perfectly acceptable! I do not have to spend a fortune or weeks of my life in the kitchen prepping for parties! I can finally feel comfortable busting out my Cricut for decorations without worrying about being too cutesy! I need to find my hot glue gun!

Anyway, you get the idea. The book features 14 fully styled dessert tables with step-by-step instructions for recreating them at home. But it’s not just a cookie cutter manual. The idea is to be inspired by the spreads and put your own spin on them. Amy’s packed it with tons of tips, including her list of favorite suppliers (thank you thank you!). There are recipes and templates, and encouragement to try out small-scale touches to make even regular weeknights a little jazzy.

I haven’t had much free time since Hannah was born (I can’t believe she’s 3 months old already!), but I did take the small-scale advise to heart and tried out one of the recipes from the book just because. About a month ago I made the Caramel Buttercream from the “Grandma Dotty’s Rocky Road Cupcakes” recipe. Adam’s a little funny about stuff in his cupcakes, so rather than make the chocolate chip-filled, Marshmallow Fluff-stuffed Rocky Road cupcakes I used our go-to Dark Chocolate Cupcakes recipe. I didn’t have any Fluff anyway, but at the last minute I thought I’d see how he did with some mini marshmallows in the batter. Result: he didn’t mind them, but they also basically disintegrated and brought nothing to the table. If anything somehow the cupcakes were drier than usual.

Anyway, I did make the Caramel Buttercream frosting, and it was absurdly good. I love making caramel, and this actually made me start feeling like my old self again after weeks in the Newborn Zone.

With the 4th around the corner, our summer party-planning is in full swing. I can’t wait to bust out some more tips and tricks.

I had a serious craving on Friday night for a lemony cake. Not a pound cake, and not a full-on layer cake with frosting. I specifically wanted to make a lemon Bundt cake, and it took me a surprisingly long time to find a straightforward recipe for this. I found all kinds of bundts made with puddings or oozing with fillings, but I just wanted something plain and simple. Eventually I found a perfect recipe in the American’s Test Kitchen Family Cookbook. I do love that book so. My only criticism is that I made the citrus glaze to go over the top of this cake, and it was a little bit of a tart overload to me. But that could be my own weird pregnant palette, or the fact that I slightly overmeasured the amount of lemon juice I used. Not a flaw of the recipe’s, just my own taste. A simple glaze would’ve been more delicious to me. But here are both recipes as I made them.

Lemon Bundt Cake

To coat the pan:
1 Tbsp unsalted butter, melted
1 Tbsp all-purpose flour

For the cake:
3 cups all-purpose flour
1 tsp baking pwder
1/2 tsp baking soda
1 tsp salt
4 Tbsp fresh lemon juice
1 Tbsp vanilla extract
3 Tbsp finely grated lemon zest (from about 3 lemons)
3/4 cup buttermilk (I made my own with the lemon juice and milk trick)
3 large eggs at room temperature
1 large egg yolk at room temperature
18 Tbsp (2 1/4 sticks) unsalted butter at room temperature
2 cups sugar

For the glaze:
1 3/4 cups confectioners’ sugar
1/4 cup fresh lemon juice or orange juice
Pinch salt

(more…)

Here’s what I will say about this pie: Martha Stewart failed me this Thanksgiving.

I spent a ton of time working on 2 desserts from her November 2011 issue: the 6-layer salted caramel chocolate cake, and this pie. Both sounded delicious in theory, neither really worked. And since I take baking pretty seriously this was not good. We had my in-laws staying with us Thanksgiving week, so hearing baking comments and questions from the MIL every time I brought out a new dessert fail essentially killed my festive spirit (pregnancy hormones didn’t help, either). Nobody needed to tell me they were both insane desserts, but who doesn’t want their houseguests to just lie to them?

The holiday overall was wonderful, I’ll post pictures later this week. I still have my sense of humor about the whole thing, but it was so exhausting that it’s taken the entire past week to recuperate and get some energy back. Hence, no blogging for a while. But now I’m in full Christmas mode and have lots of things to post.

Anyway, my issue with this pie was the meringue recipe itself. I never got an actual meringue despite following the directions exactly (including leaving the eggs out to get to room temperature). I got more of a droopy Fluffernutter kind of topping that was sickeningly sweet and just collapsed when you tried to cut into it. I’m perfectly willing to admit that this might just be a recipe I didn’t grasp, but since I’ve made a killer meringue before with no issues I’m not sure it’s entirely me. By the time I browned the top I knew the pie was a mess and actually forgot it was in the broiler. This is the nicest picture I have of it, and I’m not going to post my step-by-step here since I doubt I’ll ever make this again. But I wanted to document it because I did complete another month of my pie-a-month project this year. Here’s the link to the original recipe.