Fancy doing some baking over the bank holiday weekend? Well then I have thee perfect recipe for you! If you follow me on Instagram then you will have seen that my theme for March & the early part of April was Pastels. I love shooting all my lifestyle photography and I love cake, so...I decided to try my hand at baking a four layer pastel cake! This recipe is actually adapted from one that’s in Alix Carey’s Unicorn Cookbook which I’d recommend if you’re looking for pretty, whimsical baking ideas. My cake turned out even better than I expected and tasted amazing! I’ve even frozen a couple of slides in case I want to use them for photography in the future. They’ll also come in useful if someone pops over and I can serve them up some delicious cake.
I think the gel food colouring works really well in cakes as it keeps it’s colour during baking, as opposed to regular liquid colourings. So when you cut into it you see the beautiful colours you had when you originally mixed it. I was however going for a pastel blue shade in the third layer but I quickly realised as I was mixing it that it was determined to be pastel green! I’m guessing it was the yellow egg yolk combined with the blue colouring that made that happen. I don’t know how you get a cake to turn blue though - if you know please let me know in the comments!
I’ve put in the recipe to flavour the cake and buttercream with vanilla (vanilla paste or a vanilla pod are my favourite) but you can use any flavours you wish. Just make sure you use extracts not essence, as essences are and taste artificial. Or I’d recommend adding some cocoa powder or lemon or orange zest would be nice.
INGREDIENTS:
Sponge
400g Self Raising Flour
400g Butter, softened
400g Caster Sugar
6 Eggs
1 tsp Vanilla Paste
4 Different Shades of Gel Food Colouring
Swiss Meringue Buttercream
3 Egg Whites
250g Caster Sugar
300g Butter, softened & cut into small chunks
1 tsp Vanilla Extract
Decoration
Sprinkles of your choice
Equipment
Four round 20cm cake tins, a cake board & palette knife
METHOD
For the Pastel Sponge:
Preheat the oven to 180C and line your four cake tins with baking paper.
Place the butter & sugar in a bowl and whisk until light and creamy. Then add the vanilla paste and gradually add in the flour and eggs one by one. Whisk for 2-3 minutes until pale smooth and fluffy.
Divide the mixture equally into four separate bowls. Then choose your four shades of gel food colouring. I went for yellow, pink, blue (which turned more green when mixed!) and purple. You can buy these in all big supermarkets. Add the drops gradually and mix well until you get your desired colour. I think I used 4-5 drops in each of my layers in the end.
Transfer each shade of cake batter into a separate cake tin and spread evenly with a palette knife. Bake for 20 minutes.
Remove from the oven and leave to cool in the time for 15 minutes before lifting out and placing on a wire rack to cool completely.
For the Swiss Meringue Buttercream:
Place the egg whites and sugar in a heatproof bowl over a pan of simmering water and stir slowly but continuously until the sugar dissolves.
Remove from the heat and whisk the mixture until it thickens, then add the chunks of softened butter and whisk the mixture at high speed until you have fluffy, silky buttercream - at least 10 minutes but trust me it’s so worth it!
Assembling the Cake:
Choose which order you want your pastel layers to be in. Add a little buttercream to your cake board so that your first sponge layer doesn’t slide around. I always turn my cakes upside down so that you have the flat bottom on the top but you can trim any unevenness off if you wish. Sandwich your layers with a generous portion of buttercream between each layer.
Cover the entire cake with a thin layer of buttercream and smooth it out with a palette knife. Then leave in the fridge to harden.
Take your cake out of the fridge after about 45 minutes and cover in another layer of butter cream smoothing with a palette knife. Decorate the top with some sprinkles and serve.
Let me know if you make it! Tag me on Instagram @katiekirkloves.
Let me know if you make it! Tag me on Instagram @katiekirkloves.
