Filled Up, Poured Out

Last week, I had the wonderful privilege of making a dessert for a Women's Ministries Kick-off event for my church. As I was thinking about what to make, I thought of the theme for this year, "Filled Up, Poured Out." It stems from Romans 15:13, "May the God of hope fill you with all joy and peace as you trust in Him, so that you may overflow with hope by the power of the Holy Spirit." I really love this verse and the theme for this year! Hope, joy, peace, filled and overflowing with and through the power of God! Wonderful!

The image that goes along with the theme is a pitcher overflowing with water. I thought that would be perfect for a cake! So, I carved a pitcher out of cake and made it "pour" out water. Pretty cool, huh? I was very excited about how this one turned out!

I haven't carved a lot, so it took quite a bit of planning and thinking for me to get this to work. I wanted the pitcher to appear as if it was tilted, pouring out the water. That was the most difficult part! To make the shape, I took 6-inch and 8-inch cakes and stacked them on top of each other. Then I carved the shape of the pitcher little by little with a thin serrated knife. I covered the top of the cake with blue candy clay so that I could later make it look like the pitcher was filled with water. The rest of the pitcher was covered with gray candy clay. Normally, I would not cover an entire cake with candy clay or modelling chocolate, but I wanted to make the top of the pitcher appear thin and higher than the water. Unlike fondant, candy clay holds it's shape and will stand up even with nothing supporting it directly. The seams are also easier to blend away with candy clay, which melts slightly until the pressure and warmth of a finger.

To apply the candy clay, I rolled it out as thinly as possible onto a sheet of waxed paper, then used the waxed paper to wrap the candy clay around the ganached cake. I then peeled away the waxed paper and smoothed out the candy clay onto the cake using my fondant smoothers and my hands. The edges didn't come together everywhere, so I took scraps of the candy clay and pieced them onto the cake where they were needed, smoothing the edges with my fingers. It was definitely a process and not as easy as it sounds!

I decided to leave the finish on the pitcher a little rough. So, I marked it up a bit and colored it a little with black and silver petal dust, brushed on randomly to create a tarnished look. In the verse, we as humans are the vessels. We are the pitcher being filled with hope from God. We are imperfect vessels, yet we are fully accepted and even welcomed by God and freely given the gifts of hope, joy and peace. So, my pitcher cake needed to be an imperfect vessel, too. Sometimes imperfection can be beautiful!

To make the "water", I used more candy clay, a long rope for the water pouring from the pitcher and a flat piece to be the puddle of water on the board. I tinted some piping gel with blue coloring and swiped it with a spatula over all of the blue candy clay to make it look watery. It worked perfectly!

The board is cut from 1/2-inch foam core and covered with black and white fondant, marbled together. I like the effect, but I wish I would have done a different color. The board matched the pitcher a little too well! The letters and numbers were cut out of an icing sheet.

Inside this beauty is some serious deliciousness. Lightly lemon blueberry cake with blueberry swiss meringue buttercream. White chocolate ganache covered the entire thing underneath the candy clay. It was enjoyed by all!

Here is the recipe so you can make it yourself! Enjoy!!

Lemon Blueberry Cake with Blueberry Swiss Meringue Buttercream
For the Cake:
3 cups (12 ounces) unbleached all purpose flour
1 (1/2 ounce) tablespoon potato starch
2 teaspoons baking powder
1/4 teaspoon baking soda
3/4 teaspoon salt
2 cups (14 ounces) granulated sugar
3 whole large eggs
2 tablespoons pure vanilla extract or vanilla paste
3/4 cup (6 liquid ounces) buttermilk
1/2 cup (4 ounces) unsalted butter, room temperature
1 teaspoon lemon zest
1 teaspoon fresh lemon juice
1 cup frozen blueberries (do not thaw)

For the Buttercream:
6 egg whites
12 ounces granulated sugar
Pinch salt
12.5 ounces unsalted high-quality butter (I use Kerrygold), very soft room temperature
1 tablespoon pure vanilla extract
½ - 1 cup fresh blueberry puree*

Preheat the oven to 350 degrees F. Prepare 2 8-inch round cake pans by greasing them with shortening, lining them with parchment paper and dusting lightly with flour.

Whisk together the flour, potato starch, baking powder, baking soda, salt, and sugar in the bowl of a stand mixer. In a separate small bowl, whisk together the eggs, vanilla and a splash of the buttermilk. Set aside.

Add the rest of the buttermilk and the butter to the flour mixture and mix with the paddle attachment on low speed until moistened, then on medium speed for 90 seconds. Scrape the sides of the bowl with a spatula.

Whisk the lemon juice and lemon zest into the egg mixture, then add in three parts to the flour/butter mixture. Add each part on low speed then mix on medium speed for 20 seconds after each addition. Gently mix in the frozen blueberries. (Adding them frozen keeps the batter from turning purple, as does mixing them in quickly and gently.)

Divide evenly into the prepared pans and bake in the preheated oven for 35 to 45 minutes or until a toothpick inserted in the center comes out with only a few moist crumbs attached. Cool in pans on a wire cooling rack for 10 minutes, then remove from pan and cool completely. Tort and frost as desired or wrap tightly and carefully in plastic wrap and aluminum foil and freeze for up to one month. Thaw completely before unwrapping.

While the cake is cooling, make the buttercream. Whisk together the egg whites, sugar and salt in a large bowl that sits comfortably on top of a saucepan, or in the top bowl of a double boiler. (The bowl should have no trace of fat (including egg yolks) in it anywhere or your egg whites will not whip up properly. I often wipe my bowl down with some vinegar or the cut side of a lemon to remove any residue then dry it before putting my egg whites in.) Bring about an inch of water to a boil in a large saucepan upon which the bowl will sit without touching the water, or in the bottom pan of a double boiler if that is what you are using. Make sure that the water will NOT touch the bottom of the bowl in which the eggs are placed or the eggs will scramble. Once the water is boiling, turn down the heat to a simmer and set the bowl with the egg whites mixture on top. Whisk continually until the egg white mixture reaches 165 degrees F on a candy thermometer, or until the egg whites are very foamy and all the sugar is dissolved, about 5 minutes.

When the eggs reach 165 degrees F., pour the mixture through a fine-mesh strainer into the bowl of a stand mixer. Immediately put the bowl onto the mixer with the whisk attachment and whip on high speed until the eggs reach stiff peaks and the bowl is cool to the touch. This can take 10 minutes or more. Once the egg whites have reached stiff peaks, turn the mixer to the lowest setting and add the softened butter one tablespoon at a time until all of the butter is incorporated into the egg whites. Continue to mix on the lowest speed until the buttercream comes together. It will look soupy and curdled at first. That’s normal! Keep mixing on low speed and it will come together. Just keep an eye on it and stop the mixer when the buttercream looks smooth and silky.

Once it comes together, switch to the paddle attachment and add the vanilla extract. Mix on low until incorporated. Add the puree a little at a time to ensure that it is fully incorporated. Add more to taste, being careful not to break the buttercream by adding too much.

*To make the blueberry puree, heat 2 cups of fresh or frozen blueberries in a medium saucepan with a few tablespoons of water until the blueberries begin to break down and the liquid is boiling. Once it is boiling, mash the blueberries with a potato masher or a wooden spoon. For a very smooth sauce, puree with an immersion blender right in the pot or briefly remove from the heat and puree in a blender. Reduce to a simmer and continue to cook, stirring occasionally, until reduced by half. Remove from the heat and stir in a teaspoon of fresh lemon juice.

Lemon-Rosemary Cake

I have a wonderful recipe for you today! It's light, moist, fluffy white cake flavored with lemon and a hint of rosemary. Perfect for warm summer days!

This flavor combo might seem a little strange to some. I had the idea when brainstorming for different cake combos to try. I had just dried some of my own rosemary, which miraculously lived through most of our very mild winter. It seemed like a natural flavor match. And it is! Because the rosemary isn't too strong, it works really well in a dessert. It really adds a depth to the also-subtle lemon flavor.

I was thinking I was so clever to have thought of this, created the recipe, and that it works. Then I made the mistake of googling it. I should have known this wasn't unique! There really isn't anything new in the world.

I'm still really pleased with this recipe and I know you will love it! Unless you hate lemons. Or hate rosemary. Then maybe you won't love it. But try it anyway because I love the challenge of winning someone over!

Beth, if you are reading this, I'm going to convince you to love pumpkin pie one of these days! :)

I don't have a big decorated cake to show you with this one. I just made it in a 9x13 cake pan and slathered the icing on the top after it had cooled. Just like Mom used to do. It was wonderful! Sometimes it's nice to just make a really tasty cake and not feel like it has to be super fancy.

This cake is pretty enough to stand on its own, I think.

Just look at that lovely light yellow color (from the butter mostly, but it represents the lemon flavor wonderfully) and the little flecks of rosemary and lemon zest.

One of the keys to success with this cake is to make sure your rosemary is chopped very, very finely. You can use fresh or dried. I think fresh, or fresh that you dried yourself, would work best because sometimes the dried rosemary ends up really tough. If you use dried, you could try chopping it in a spice grinder. I just used my chef's knife and rocked it back and forth over my little rosemary pile again and again.

Another key to success is in the icing prep. Make sure you take your time and let the butter and the final mixture really whip up. This makes the icing really light and fluffy and super smooth. I didn't bother to sift my confectioner's sugar, but you might want to in order to be sure no lumps end up in your icing.

You may also notice that this is not my normal Swiss Meringue buttercream. You know I LOVE my Swiss Meringue! Well, I'm excited to tell you that I love this buttercream too! It is not as sweet as most confectioner's sugar/butter icings and doesn't have the greasy mouth-feel of faux-buttercream made with shortening. You can adapt this to any flavor. For example, to make vanilla, just omit the rosemary, lemon zest, and lemon juice. Add a little more milk (another teaspoon or two) until you have the right consistency. I should also note that this recipe is loosely based on Sweetapolita's Whipped Vanilla Buttercream recipe, which you can find here. Just scroll to the bottom.

Here are some baking notes about this recipe, for those of you who are interested in the science of baking, like me. First, I used bleached cake flour because the bleached particles are better able to hold the structure of the cake. I've used unbleached in the past and only recently discovered that this was the reason for my white and yellow cakes often sinking on me.

At first glance, this recipe appears to be over-leavened. The general rule is 1 teaspoon of baking powder per cup of flour OR 1/4 baking soda per 1 cup of flour. I mostly stick to just baking powder in my recipes, but I added a little baking soda to this to counteract the acidity added with the buttermilk and lemon zest. That extra acidity would have made my cake batter too alkaline and it would have collapsed. A little acidity is actually good for a cake and helps it to set properly, but when the batter is too acidic, it needs the baking soda to help restore the perfect balance.

And to think, I always hated science in school! Maybe if my high school science teacher had offered me cake, I would have learned more! :)

I also recently started using a little yogurt (I lessened the cream or in this case buttermilk content accordingly) in my white and yellow cakes. It adds a wonderful flavor and some moisture. Many of you have probably seen recipes with sour cream in them. The yogurt does the same thing. I usually use my own homemade yogurt. It is vanilla flavored, but it still works. If I were using store-bought, I would probably use Greek yogurt, but any kind will work. Just don't use vanilla-flavored store-bought yogurt because most are not flavored with pure vanilla. They use the fake stuff, which you will end up tasting in your cake.

Finally, you probably all know this, but it bears repeating because of it's importance in the final outcome of your cake: all of your ingredients should be at room temperature when you start your mixing. There are ways to speed up some things if you haven't thought ahead. I usually have to do these because I often forget to take things out of the frig in time! For eggs, put the whole egg in a bowl of warm water for a few minutes. Works like a charm, but it does make them harder to separate. Do NOT try to warm the egg whites in the microwave. You may end up cooking the edges and little bits of cooked egg whites in a cake are definitely not good eats.

For your liquid, you could warm it on the stovetop without letting it steam or boil or heat it for 15 seconds at a time in the microwave. You can take the chill off of your butter with short bursts in the microwave, but be very careful not to melt it at all and remember that butter often heats more on the inside of the stick, so you could end up with a puddle in the middle very quickly. I very rarely use the microwave for butter. I do sometimes warm my butter slightly by setting it on a plate on the top of my oven while it is preheating. Just make sure it's not one the hottest spot and remember to check it and turn it often so it doesn't start to melt on one side.

And now ... drumroll please...

Here is the recipe! Enjoy!


Lemon-Rosemary Cake with Lemon-Rosemary Buttercream

3 cups (10-1/2 ounces) sifted bleached cake flour
1 tablespoon baking powder
1/4 teaspoon baking soda
3/4 teaspoon salt
1-1/2 cups (10-1/2 ounces) granulated sugar
6 large egg whites (6 ounces)
1 tablespoon pure vanilla extract
1/2 teaspoon pure almond extract
1 tablespoon lemon zest
1/4 teaspoon very finely chopped rosemary
1/2 cup (4 liquid ounces) buttermilk
1/4 cup (2-1/8 ounces) plain yogurt
1/2 cup (4 ounces) unsalted butter, room temperature

Preheat your oven to 350 degrees F. Prepare a 9x13 cake pan (or you could use two 8-inch round pans instead) by greasing the bottom and sides and lining the bottom with greased parchment paper.

In a medium bowl, whisk together the egg whites, vanilla extract, almond extract, lemon zest, rosemary and a couple of tablespoons of the buttermilk. Set aside.

In the bowl of a stand mixer, combine cake flour, baking powder, baking soda, salt and sugar. Mix on low for at least 30 seconds. Add the remaining buttermilk, the yogurt and the butter. Mix on low until all of the dry ingredients are moistened, then mix on medium-high for 1-1/2 minutes. (I use level 4 on my Kitchenaid. If you are using a hand mixer, mix on high.)

Add the egg mixture to the flour mixture in three parts, adding each part on low speed and then mixing on high speed for 20 seconds. Scrape down the sides and pour into the prepared pan(s). Bake until the top springs back when touched with a finger and a toothpick inserted in the center comes back with moist crumbs clinging to it, about 25-30 minutes.

Lemon-Rosemary Buttercream

1/4 cup (4 ounces) unsalted butter
1-1/2 cups confectioner's sugar
1 teaspoon milk
1 teaspoon pure vanilla extract
1/4 teaspoon very finely chopped rosemary
1-1/2 teaspoon lemon zest
1 teaspoon fresh lemon juice

Place the butter in the bowl of a stand mixer and beat with the paddle attachment on medium speed until lightened in color and texture, 5 to 6 minutes. Add the remaining ingredients and mix on low until just combined, then mix on medium for an additional 8 minutes. Use immediately.

A Special Treat

Mmmmmm....... Looks good, doesn't it?

I put this little cake together in honor of a visit from my in-laws. Nothing too fancy, but oh was it good!

I did this the same weekend as the fishing cake, so I needed something simple. But it was just right.

The cake is my own yellow cake with Nutella swiss meringue buttercream filling. I used the same buttercream to cover it and give it a rustic look.

Don't you just love the term "rustic"? For me and cakes, it means I didn't take the time to smooth it all down as perfectly as I could. It's like a short-cut that is in vogue. Or like when a house listing says "charming" and really means "small."

I'm not judging, though! I like a rustic look on a cake. Sometimes looking homemade is comforting. It reminds me of home and childhood treats.

The chocolate shavings on the top were the perfect simple decoration.

To make the Nutella buttercream, mix up a batch of vanilla Swiss meringue buttercream. You can find my recipe and instructions here. Add Nutella a little at a time until it suits your taste. This buttercream can handle quite a bit, but don't try to add a whole jar at once! I think I added around 1 cup. (Sorry, I wasn't measuring!) This buttercream would be really good with chocolate cake, too!

I just finished revising my recipe for my yellow cake, so I'm sharing it with you. You are going to love it!

Now you can make this yourself and enjoy it with your family! Or hide it and eat it all yourself after the kids go to bed. Uh, not that I've done that. Very often.

Or with your morning coffee. Tasty!

Enjoy!

Yellow Vanilla Cake
Makes 2 8-inch cakes
10-1/2 ounces (3 cups) bleached cake flour
1 tablespoon baking powder
3/4 teaspoon salt
10-1/2 ounces (1-1/2 cups) granulated sugar
6 egg yolks plus 1 whole large egg
1 tablespoon pure vanilla extract
1/8 teaspoon pure almond extract
4 ounces heavy cream
2 ounces (1/4 cup) plain yogurt
4 ounces unsalted butter


Preheat oven to 350 degrees F. In the bowl fo an electric mixer, combine cake flour, baking powder, salt and sugar. Mix on low for at least 30 seconds. In a separate bowl, whisk together the egg yolks, egg, extracts and a couple tablespoons of the cream. Set aside. Add the rest of the cream, the yogurt and the butter to the dry ingredients and mix on low until just combined. Turn the speed to medium-high for 1-1/2 minutes. Scrape the bowl with a spatula, then add the egg mixture in three parts, adding each part on low speed and then mixing on medium-high speed for 20 seconds, scraping down the sides of the bowl as necessary. Pour into 2 greased and parchment-lined 8-inch cake pans. Bake until the top springs back when touched lightly with a finger and a toothpick inserted in the center comes back with moist crumbs clinging to it, about 35 minutes. Cool in pan on a cooling rack for 5 minutes, then remove from the pans and cool completely on the rack.

To make this into a white cake, sub in 6 large egg whites (6 ounces) for the yolks and whole egg. Voila! White cake. If you use pure vanilla bean paste instead of simple extract, the cake with be flecked with little vanilla seeds. So pretty! And very tasty too!

Christmas Sugar Cookies

Happy New Year!

I know that it's after Christmas now, but I'm a little behind in my posts, so I'm showing you iced Christmas sugar cookies. I did these the day before Christmas, then I did some more last week because I loved it so much!

This is the first time I've tried piping icing onto sugar cookies. Do you like them?

In the past, I've frosted with a knife and then put sprinkles on. That is also fun, but I always get a teensy bit bored with it. Piping has seemed too intimidating.

This year, I decided to try it after seeing a wonderful video tutorial on piping lines from Sweetopia. If you haven't heard of this site, you should definitely check it out! I guarantee you will end up spending a lot of time there. Just remember to come back!

Here is a link to the tutorial I mentioned. She makes it look so easy!

Also check out her link to the "10-second rule" to determine if your icing is the right consistency. I've had problems with this in the past and this rule saved me. So simple and it really works!

Here are some close-ups of some of my cookies.

Now these did take a long time to do. I thought it was fun. After awhile, I started to have a problem coming up with new things to do, so I repeated a lot. But I thought they looked really nice when finished. One of my favorite designs was the simple snowflake on the round scalloped-edge cookies.

These weren't just good-looking, they were fantastic to eat too! I used a recipe I found on another blog I love, Sweetapolita. Her blog is also fantastic and you should all definitely check it out. You will love it! Click here for her sugar cookie recipe and instructions for handling the dough. I followed all of these instructions and they worked perfectly. All of the chilling helps the cookies to not spread or lose shape when they are baking. It all makes for a much prettier cookie in the end!

To Sweetapolita's recipe, I added a quarter teaspoon of almond extract. I also used about 5 drops of lemon oil instead of the lemon extract, but only because I already had lemon oil and did not have any lemon extract. The result was delicious! Honestly, I couldn't stop eating them!

I used royal icing leftover from the gingerbread houses (see this previous post). I just added some water to thin it a little and used the "10-second rule," above, to find the right consistency.

I hope you enjoyed seeing my cookies! These would be good for any holiday, just modify the shapes (circles work for everything) and design. So, you can make them now even though Christmas is over! I'd love to see what you come up with and hear how these worked for you!

Midnight Dark Chocolate Cake

I've been tinkering with my recipe and have had some success! So, I'm sharing my recipe with you. I really think it is one of the best chocolate cakes I have had. I made the recipe initially by combining three of my favorite chocolate cake recipes. Then I tweaked and tweaked some more. I hope you like it!

One note before I give you the recipe. You will notice that I use weights for the measurements for a lot of the ingredients. If you have a kitchen scale, I encourage you to use the weights for the most accurate, consistent results. If you don't have a kitchen scale, get one! Or just use the cup measurements listed. For the flour, lightly spoon it or, even better, sift it into the measuring cup then level.

Midnight Dark Chocolate Cake
14 ounces cake flour (4 cups)
10 1/2 ounces granulated sugar (1 1/2 cups)
7 3/4 ounces light brown sugar (1 cup, packed)
4 1/3 ounces Hershey's Special Dark Cocoa (or other blend of natural and dutched cocoa)(1 1/2 cups)
1 teaspoon baking soda
1 teaspoon salt
1 cup water
4 teaspoons instant espresso powder
3/4 cup canola oil
2 whole large eggs
4 yolks from large eggs
1 tablespoon pure vanilla extract
1/2 teaspoon pure almond extract
1/4 cup buttermilk

Preheat oven to 325 degrees F. Grease and line with parchment two 8-inch round pans. Lightly dust with flour or cocoa powder and set aside

Place flour, sugars, cocoa, baking soda and salt in the bowl of a stand mixer. Here mine are, all in their little piles.

Mix for 30 seconds. After mixing, the dry ingredients should look like this.

In a small microwavable bowl, combine the water and espresso powder. Heat for one minute on high, or until hot but not boiling. Here is mine right out of the microwave.

Add the coffee and the oil to the flour mixture and mix on low until the dry ingredients are moistened, then mix on medium (high if using a hand-held mixer) for 1 1/2 minutes. I set my kitchen timer for this. You want to make sure you let it go the full time in order to set the structure of the cake. Here is what it will look like when it is done mixing.

In a separate bowl, combine the eggs, egg yolks, extracts and buttermilk.

Whisk it all together.

After your eggs are whisked, add them to the chocolate mixture in the mixer in three parts. After each addition, mix briefly on low and then on medium (high if using a hand-held mixer) for 20 seconds. Scrape the bowl with a spatula and make sure it is all incorporated together and smooth. It should look like this:

Pour it into your prepared pans.

Bake in your preheated 325 degree oven for 45-55 minutes or until a toothpick inserted into the center comes out clean and the top springs back when pressed lightly with a finger. The sides of the cake should not pull away from the pan before it is taken out of the oven. When the cake is done, cool for 5 minutes in the pan, then remove from the pan and cool completely on a wire rack.

Here is a picture of my little cake (I baked one 8X3 and one 6X3) after it has cooled and I have cut the dome off. I've been practicing leveling and torting my cakes using a long bread knife instead of any sort of leveler and I think I'm getting pretty good at it! You will see I've left a tiny lip on one side. Nobody's perfect, I guess!

I'm saving this little 6-inch cake to use in the August Miso Bakes challenge, which I will do next week.

The top, well, I ate it. And it was delicious! I pretty much had to eat it, right? I mean, I couldn't give you an untested recipe. That would just be wrong. I actually could have eaten that whole cake. It was really good. Dark, chocolatey, moist. Yum! Here is the top before I ate it. See the goodness inside that little piece?

I hope you enjoy my chocolate cake! Let me know if you try it and if you like it!