My moms birthday was quite recently so as is standard in my family I made the birthday cake. This time it was a sponge cake with a raspberry filling, a dark chocolate ganache icing, and buttercream roses.
The cake itself was simple, although I did have some difficulties with the ganache. I had wanted to make a whipped ganache icing as I had seen recipes for recently. However, it did not turn out as planned. The ganache was determined that it would not become a nice icing consistency. I did find a way to make it work, just not the way I wanted it to.
Seeing that for the few days before my moms birthday I was house sitting before her I had to make the Swiss meringue buttercream at my parents place. For some odd reason this icing never works out there and this time was no exception. Again it failed, which it never does when I am at home, but I saved what I could. The egg whites separated from the butter and became liquid again so I strained off the liquid parts and added a little cream and a lot of icing sugar. Sadly this meant I couldn't eat the roses but at least my mom had a birthday cake that she loved. That is what was important.
Here is the recipe that I used,
Enjoy!
White (vanilla) Sponge Cake
Ingredients:
4 eggs
1/4 cup butter
2 cups coconut sugar
1 tsp vanilla extract
2 cups flour
1 cup 1% milk
2 tsp baking powder
Preparation:
Preheat oven to 325 degrees F.
Beat eggs in a stand mixer with a paddle attachment for 4 minutes. During this time combine butter and milk and heat in a saucepan over medium-low heat until the butter is melted.
Add coconut sugar to the eggs and mix for another 4 minutes. Add remaining ingredients and mix until just barely combined. Slowly add the milk mixture while the mixer is running just until combined.
Bake for 30-35 minutes. Allow the cake to cool in the pan for 30 minutes before transferring it to a wire cooling rack to finish cooling.
For my moms birthday cake:
The
ganache had an extra half cup of chocolate in order to get it as thick as it needed to be in order to become more of an icing consistency.
The raspberry filling was simply frozen raspberries cooked over medium heat until they were nearly a thick liquid, then I added cornstarch and agave as needed to reach the desired consistency and thickness.
As described above I made a swiss meringue buttercream. It separated so I strained off the liquid from the egg whites and added the amount of icing sugar needed to get the icing to the perfect thickness for the roses. Of course I left out the maple extract that is listed in the
maple buttercream recipe, but the rest was left the same.
