Black Chocolate Party Cake - Rose Levy Beranbaum Bake-off

German Chocolate Roulande

Rose released the BLAD of her new cookbook and our challenge for Father's Day was to cook one of her new recipes using it, the recipes from Marie's Blog, or the Angle food cake .

Many from the group were planning on making the Chocolate Party Cake so I decided I'd do something different with mine. I've never made a cake roll or a roulande so I decided to try it with this cake. This was all about learning after all. (The original cake is supposed to be baked in a bundt pan)

I collected all my ingredients and mixed them together and baked it in a 17 x 12 x 1 inch pan for 14 minutes.

I let the cake cool for 5-10 minutes then rolled it up in a silpat. While the roll was cooling I made Rose's German Chocolate Cake Filling
Then I unrolled the cake... uh, oh. I guess not all recipes are meant to be rolled. Or perhaps I should have used the chocolate syrup on the cake before rolling it up. I wasn't deterred. I spread the still warm filling on the cake, rolled it back up and placed it in the refrigerator overnight.

Hard to believe this was salvageable, eh?



I sliced the roll and syruped each side. It was a good cake before the syrup but the chocolate syrup really set the cake off.


I'll definitely make this cake again.. but maybe in the bundt pan as directed. :-)



This cake's taste is amazing as is the German chocolate filling. Definitely a winner.

Whoopie!

While viewing pictures on foodgawker.com, Whoopie pies caught my attention. I had some cream cheese frosting I needed to use, so I decided to make Whoopie pies using my grandmother's recipe for red velvet cake.

I gathered all the necessary ingredients

Mixed them together

Then used a #30 scoop and plopped them on to the parchment paper.

I baked them for 10 - 11 minutes, let them cool, then filled them using a pastry bag and tip #23.
How were they? Very moist and sticky ....finger licking good. Yummmmmmmmmmmmmm!

Red Velvet Cake
1/2 cup shortening
1 1/2 cups sugar
2 large eggs
2 (1-ounce) bottles red food coloring
1 ounce water
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
2 cups AP flour
1 teaspoon salt
2 tablespoon cocoa
1 cup buttermilk
1 tablespoon white vinegar
1 teaspoon baking soda

Preheat oven to 375 degrees F. Line cookie sheets with parchment paper.

Sift flour, salt, and cocoa; set aside.

Beat shortening at medium speed with an electric mixer until fluffy; gradually add sugar, beating well.

Add eggs, 1 at a time, beating until blended after each addition.

Stir in food coloring, water and vanilla, blending well.

Add flour mixture to shortening mixture, alternately with buttermilk, beginning and ending with flour mixture. Beat at low speed until blended after each addition. Beat at medium speed 2 minutes

Sprinkle baking soda over vinegar, fold into cake mixture.

Using #30 scoop, place batter onto prepared pans.

Bake at 375° for 10 minutes.

Cool in pans on wire racks 10 minutes; remove from parchment and cool.

Fill with your favorite frosting and eat.

Yields 21 Whoopie pies using #30 scoop

Other places to find Whoopie pie recipes:

Pumpkin with maple cream cheese http://www.culinaryconcoctionsbypeabody.com/2008/09/28/i-was-doing-so-good/

Chocolate with marshmallow http://www.notquitenigella.com/2009/03/24/making-whoopie-pies/

Wicked Whoopie Pies from IssaMac's http://www.wlbz2.com/news/local/story.aspx?storyid=18974

• Whoopie Pies, from Gourmet
  
• Pumpkin Whoopie Pies, from Rachael Ray magazine
  
• Pumpkin Whoopie Pies with Cream Cheese Filling, from Martha Stewart
  
• Red Velvet Whoopie Pies, from Food Buzz
  

Wilton Cake 2 Class

I forgot to take a picture of my final cake before Rick took it to work. Luckily, his friend's cell phone had a camera and he snapped a few pictures for me. Thanks, Tony! The cake was a red velvet cake (old family recipe) with a crusting cream cheese frosting I found on cake central.

In this class we learned how to make flowers using Royal icing and a plaque (bird) using color flow. We had to bake just one cake for this class which took a lot of stress off. Cake1 wore me out because we had to make a cake every week. I had no idea how much frosting it took to frost and decorate a cake! My goodness!

I have to confess, I couldn't get the hang of making mums. I don't know why, but I'll just leave that to someone else to make. All the other flowers were fun to make.

This was my favorite one to make. It's a primrose. I used tip 103, 14 and 1
These are Victorian roses made with tip 97

Here are my pansies. I didn't realize I had left off the two shorter petals on top of the yellow until 3 days after they had dried. Oops. Luckily, no master gardeners were there to eat the cake. :-D
The final cake also consisted of rose buds, violets, daffodils and daisies.

It took me forever to do the basket weave! I used tip 47. I used the smooth side for the vertical piece and the serrated side for the horizontal piece. Another lady in the class used tip 23 for the basket weave. I think I liked it better. The rope border was easier to do than I thought it would be.

Charlotte Bake off

Some fellow bloggers from http://www.realbakingwithrose.com/decided to have a bake-off. Each person was to select one of the Charlottes from "The Cake Bible" by Rose Levy Beranbaum and then post about it.

A charlotte is made by lining a mold with a sponge-type cake in varying geometrical shapes and then filling the mold with an airy Bavarian or whipped cream. The nice thing about the charlotte is you can prepare it in advance and refrigerate it up to 3 days with no loss of texture or flavor.

I chose the Chocolate Chip Charlotte because it had an interesting look (well...and it had the least amount of components needed to assemble) All I needed was a Genoise (pronouced JenWAHZ), Chocolate Ganache, and Chocolate Chip Whipped Cream.

A Genoise is a European sponge-type cake containing butter and is leavened by stiffly beaten eggs. The ganache was made with equal amount of chocolate and cream and the Chocolate Chip Whipped Cream was made with heavy cream, sugar, vanilla, ground almonds and chocolate with enough powdered gelatin to stabilize it. I accidentally omitted the almonds. oops



I baked the genoise in a square pan, coated one side of it with half of the ganache then sliced it into thin strips. These strips were then placed in a bowl slightly overlapping each one. Once the bowl was lined with the cake strips, it was filled with the chocolate chip whip cream and refrigerated.

I was very surprised how easy it was. I'd definitely do it again.

To see pictures of the charlottes other made click here

Other blogs on Charlottes:
La Tartine Gourmande Strawberry and Raspberry
Zoe Bakes Chocolate
Happy Home Baking Mango and Peach
Cannelle et Vanille Summer Berry

Frozen Buttercream Transfer

While in Wilton's Cake 1 class, we transferred a rainbow pattern to a frosted cake using gel and wax paper then filled in the design with buttercream and a star tip.

Frozen buttercream transfer is a method of transferring your art to your cake by making a buttercream plaque to apply to your cake. It can be used on small as well as very large cakes. There's only one caveat... you have to create the design in reverse.

I had the opportunity to try this technique tonight while making a birthday cake for a retired Marine. I printed the Marines logo (below), traced the design on the back of the printed paper (so I'd have the logo in reverse), taped the reversed picture to a cake board, tape wax paper on top of it, and proceeded to trace and fill the logo using buttercream.

Once the buttercream Plaque was on the cake, I added the braided cord to the anchor


For my first time, I'm happy with the way the design came out.
In hind site, I'd outline the design in the same color as the frosted cake, use the bottom of one of my baking pans as my surface instead of a cake board (it chills super quick) and I'd use 1/2 cup of butter in place of shortening. (I think it would firm up faster and harder).

I can't wait to see Jerry's face when he sees his cake tomorrow.

Here are a couple of sites where you can read up on Frozen Buttercream Transfer if you decide you want to try it.

http://www.sdbytracy.com/frozbutter.htm
http://www.soggycheerios.com/archives/197
http://thecakestylist.blogspot.com/2007/10/superman-cake-frozen-buttercream.html

Chocolate Fudge Cake with Peanut Butter Frostings

Captain Joe, our pastor at the Salvation Army Corp, likes chocolate and he likes peanut butter so for his birthday I decided to combine the two. I used my Mom's favorite chocolate cake recipe (recipe to follow) and frosted it with a Peanut Butter Mousseline Butter Cream then decorated it with a chocolate peanut butter frosting.

I don't know where this recipe originated. My Grandmother gave my Mom this recipe when I was six and it instantly became everyone's favorite.

Best of the Best Chocolate Fudge Cake

3 oz unsweetened chocolate
2 1/4 c sifted cake flour (I used 8.3 oz/236 grams)
2 t baking soda
1/2 t salt
1/2 cup of butter
2 1/4 c firmly packed brown sugar
3 eggs
1 1/2 t vanilla
1 c sour cream
1 c boiling water

1. Melt chocolate and set aside to cool while you prepare the rest of the ingredients
2. Pre-heat oven to 350 degree F
   
3. Grease and flour two 9 x 1 1/2 cake pans (I used a 13 x 9 x 2)
4. Sift flour, baking soda and salt onto waxed paper
5. In a large bowl, (I used my KitchenAid) beat butter until soft.
6. Add brown sugar and eggs to butter and beat with mixer until light and fluffy (3 mins on 4 or 6) 5 mins on high with a hand held mixer
   
7. Beat in vanilla and cooled chocolate
8. Stir in dry ingredients alternating with sour cream beating well with wooden spoon after each addition until batter is smooth (I used my KA on stir)
9. Stir in boiling water. Batter will be thin.
10. Pour at once into prepared pans
11. Bake in a moderate oven (350 F) until center springs back when gently touch in center. Everyone's oven is different so monitor closely. It took me 35 mins for 9" round, 50 for 10" and 13x9x2.
12. Cool layers in pans on wire racks 15 minutes. Turn out and cool completely.

The Mousseline Frosting came from Rose Levy Beranbaum's "Cake Bible". I added a 1/2 cup of Peanut Butter and 1 T vanilla at the end. I'll use less peanut butter next time because on day 2 I noticed the frosting became softer.

For the Peanut Butter Ganache, I used:

226 grams of chocolate

256 grams of heavy cream

8 T Jif Peanut Butter

1 T corn syrup

I processed the chocolate in a food processor.

Heated all the other ingredients in a sauce pan to a boil, then poured it over the chocolate as the processor was running. As soon as all the liquid was added, I stopped the processor and poured the chocolate into a bowl to cool.

After the ganache cooled a bit, I stirred in 1 T Vanilla

On day 2, the ganache was too bitter for me. (I used half 53% and half 62% baking chocolate) So I beat in 1 1/2 cups powdered sugar and a teaspoon of vanilla. This changes it from a ganache to a frosting.

The frosting piped like a dream and made beautiful roses.

Wilton Cake 1 Class

Final project for Wilton Cake 1 class

Week 4: Twelve Pound Final

Yesterday was the last class of four of Wilton Cake 1.

The cake above was used to celebrate Tony's birthday since Tony didn't get to have any of the cake I originally made for him. (see week 3 below)

This is a 10" chocolate cake (Mom's recipe), torted and filled with 3 cups of Beranbaum's chocolate ganache and frosted with 7 cups of Wilton's buttercream. I didn't keep track of how many cups of icing the roses used, so I'm guesstimating 1 cup. That's 11 cups of frosting to complete the entire cake. (yikes!)

The final cake weighed 12 pounds! (technically, 11 lbs 12 oz)

Lesson learned: I used two cake rounds to support the cake but I should have used 3 or 4 because the base flexed a bit as the cake was moved from class to home, then from home to the workplace, causing the crusted buttercream to crack.

I can make roses! Finally!
Wilton's method teaches you how to make the rose in three steps over three weeks. In week two, we learned how to make the center cone (what the pedals attached to), In week 3, we learned how to make the center and three pedals around it, the last week we learned how to do the other two layers of pedals. The only thing that kept me from hating roses, was the fact they were my mom's favorite flower. It took me 60 to 80 tries before I had something that looked close to a rose.

Week 3: Send in the clowns.

This is the second cake I made. My frosting to ice the cake with was too stiff and the frosting to make the clowns wasn't stiff enough. Oh well, it's a learning experience.

And as my instructor, Karen Houdek, says "it's just cake" Does she know how many hours of my life I spent on this? :-D LOL

The clowns started out with great posture but they kicked back and relaxed on the drive home. When I open the box to show them to my husband, Rick, they were lounged back on their elbows looking up at us. I'm just glad they didn't lie down and take a nap! That would have looked too weird...
Lesson learned: Use a stiffer butter cream and let it set up before putting their heads on. Perhaps taking their heads off for the bumpy car ride home would help also. (I don't know if I can do this... clowns are scary enough with their heads on...) :-)

I made the cake by doctoring up a cake mix with sour cream, sugar, flour, vanilla and coffee. It came out really light and fluffy. It was very tasty but I was hoping for a dense cake.

My husband took this cake to work to celebrate his buddy's birthday... the problem was, his buddy (Tony) was on vacation. Rick (husband) took a lot of pictures of his co-workers eating the cake and celebrating Tony's birthday, then emailed the pictures to Tony. Guys are too funny!



Week 2: Our first Cake.

Our class used piping gel and wax paper to trace a rainbow pattern. We flipped the wax paper/gel on top of our cake and lightly pressed over the gel then removed the wax paper. We filled in the pattern using the star tip. I was surprised how much coloring gel you had to use to get a true color. The teens at our church ate this cake.



Week 1:Demo only

We met our teacher tonight. She wheeled a buggy full of items into the class to give us a demo. (little did I know that I'd be balancing a buggy full of my kitchen items with one hand and a cake to decorate in the other for the next 3 weeks. Ahhh. Ignorance is bliss.)

Karen, our teacher, explained how to make buttercream icing and frost a cake. Then she demonstrated both to us (making it look so easy) We were instructed to show up next week with a frosted 8" round cake that was 4 inches high, a cup of firm, medium and thin frosting for practice, plus enough frosting to decorate our cakes. How hard can that be? i-yi-i



Week 0:

Wilton had their classes on sale for half price ($17.50) last month, so I signed up for cake 1.
I had a 50% off coupon that I used on the required kit ($13) and thought all my spending was over. Ha! Not quite. I didn't keep track of how much I spent on powdered sugar, Crisco, and cake mixes every week. (denial is a good thing) ;-)

Wilton Fondant and Gumpaste Final

Peninsula Grill's Ultimate Coconut Cake

This cake is the signature cake belonging to chef Robert Carter of The Peninsula Grill in Charleston, SC. It is based on his grandmother's recipe and it has become the cake-of-choice for Charleston brides. After tasting it, I can see why. It is heaven.



I believe you either love coconut or you hate it. There's no in between.
My younger sister, Belinda, hates it. She can detect a teeny-tiny drop of coconut in a huge vat of anything. While growing up, I got everything she tasted that had even a hint of coconut in it. Life is good. :-)

I love, love, love coconut.
There, I've said it. I'm Tammy and I'm a coconut-a-holic. (is there such a thing?)
If a dish has coconut in it, I guarantee I will love it.

I love to bake, I love coconut, I was in the mood to try a new recipe, so I did a google search for the perfect coconut cake recipe. After reading through several blogs and seeing this recipe come up over and over again by other coconut lovers, the decision was made.

Since the cake looked very intimidating, I thought about ordering this cake from the Peninsula Grille and having it shipped to me. I justified that the $100 price tag would be well worth it 'just once' for a very special occasion. However, to have it shipped to my location, FedEx wanted $100. Time to go to plan B... make it myself!

Chef Robert Carter was generous enough to share his recipe and to show us how to make it when he appeared on Martha Stewart show. Good news for me because I learn better if I can see how it's done first! To view the video of chef Robert Carter making the cake, click here then on view video (I couldn't download the video so if Martha has changed the link, try searching on Martha Stewart's website for the Ultimate coconut cake.)

There are a lot of steps to the create this masterpiece but none of them are hard to do and it is well worth it! I took this cake to our Wednesday night Bible study and you would have thought I discovered how to walk on water. Everyone was absolutely amazed with the presentation and the taste.

Typically, I don't post recipes that others have posted on their sites but since Martha keeps updating her URLs, I'll give you the recipe at the very end of this post. That way if the link doesn't work, you still have the recipe. (Nothing frustrates me more than a broken link! ...or a bad recipe!)

Important things to note:

• You must use Plugra butter. (it has more butterfat... a key ingredient)
• You must cut this cake while it is cold (else the lovely filling squishes out...trust me on this)
• Let it come to room temperature before serving. (2-3 hours)
• You are not allowed to leave a negative comment if you made any changes to the recipe. Baking is a science and all the ingredients and measurements are essential.

The cake has five steps:
1. The filling: You make it the night before assembling the cake.. and it is awesome. (to whip it the next day, I had to divide the filling into 2 parts. My 5 qt couldn’t handle the full load) click here for recipe

2. The cake: Two 10” cakes. (At first, I was disappointed when I took them out of the pan. They reminded me of corn bread… large crumb and very yellow. I may try less baking powder next time… what do you think? When you watch the video, Rob said a tsp and a half of BP, but the recipe on Martha’s website has 1 1/2 TBS… (P.S. The final cake tasted great so maybe no change is needed) click here for recipe.

3. Simple syrup (can be made ahead of time and stored up to 1 month refrigerated in an airtight container) Click here for recipe.

4. The frosting… (warning: This is very addictive) click here for recipe

5. The assembly: click here for directions

Here's a picture of my final cake. I got a bit wild when applying the coconut to the sides and ended up covering the whole cake with coconut.



Side by side comparison:

If the URL's above are not working, use the recipes below.

Coconut Filling
This delicious coconut cake filling is courtesy of Robert Carter from the Peninsula Grill, in Charleston, South Carolina.
Ingredients
Makes enough for 1 cake .
5 cups heavy cream
3 cups sugar
1 pound (4 sticks) unsalted butter
1/4 cup cornstarch
1 teaspoon pure vanilla extract
1 T water
9 cups shredded sweetened coconut

Directions

1. Place coconut in the bowl of a food processor. Pulse until coconut is finely chopped. (this will make it easier to slice the cake. Don't skip this part)
2. In a small bowl, mix together cornstarch, vanilla, and 1 tablespoon water and set to the side. (the ratio of liquid to cornstarch doesn't seem right... I added 2 more TBS of water)
   Place cream, sugar, and butter in a medium saucepan and bring to a boil over medium-high heat, stirring occasionally until sugar is dissolved
   Add the cornstarch mixture to the cream mixture and bring to a boil. Simmer until thickened, about 1 minute.
   Remove cream mixture from heat and stir in processed coconut until well combined.
3. Transfer to a large baking dish or bowl; let cool.
   Cover filling with plastic wrap and chill overnight.
4. When you are ready to assemble the cake, place half the mixture in the bowl of an 5 qt electric mixer fitted with the paddle attachment and beat for 4 to 5 minutes. (should be smooth and creamy) Do the same process for the rest of the mixture.
   

The Cake

Makes two 10-inch round cakes. (you'll be cutting each layer into 3rds later)

Ingredients
Nonstick cooking spray with flour (I like Baker's Joy)
1 pound unsalted PLUGRA butter (can purchase at Fresh Market or other high end store)
3 cups sugar
6 large eggs
4 1/2 cups all-purpose flour
1 1/2 tablespoons baking powder
1/2 teaspoon salt
1 1/2 cups heavy cream
1 1/2 tablespoons pure vanilla extract
1 teaspoon coconut extract

Directions
Preheat oven to 325 degrees.

1. Spray two 10-inch round cake pans with cooking spray with flour; set aside.
2. In a large bowl, sift together flour, baking powder, and salt.
3. In a small bowl, mix together cream, vanilla, and coconut extract.
4. In the bowl of an electric mixer fitted with the paddle attachment, cream together butter and sugar until light and fluffy, 5 to 6 minutes.
5. Add eggs, one at a time, and beat until creamy, occasionally scraping down sides of the bowl using a spatula.
6. With mixer on low speed, add flour mixture, alternating with cream mixture, beginning and ending with flour; beat until just combined.
7. Divide batter between the two prepared cake pans and bake until a toothpick inserted into the cake comes out clean, 40 to 45 minutes.
8. Let cool completely on a wire rack before removing cakes from pans.

Simple Syrup

Makes enough for the entire cake (two 10 inch layers)

Ingredients

3/4 cup water
3/4 cup sugar

Directions

1. Place water and sugar in a medium saucepan over medium-high heat.
2. Bring to a boil, stirring occasionally, until sugar has dissolved.
3. Remove from heat and let cool.
4. Store up to one month refrigerated in an airtight container.

The Frosting

makes enough for the entire cake

Ingredients

1 cup (2 sticks) unsalted PLUGRA butter, room temperature
8 ounces cream cheese
1 teaspoon pure vanilla extract
5 cups confectioners' sugar
1 vanilla bean, scraped

Directions

1. Place butter and cream cheese in the bowl of an electric mixer fitted with the paddle attachment; beat until creamy.
2. With mixer on low speed, slowly add vanilla extract, seeds from vanilla bean, and confectioners' sugar.
3. Continue beating until smooth and creamy, about 3 minutes.

The final assembly:

Makes one 6-layer cake

Ingredients needed:
2 cups sweetened shredded coconut flakes, toasted
2 Coconut Cake
Simple Syrup
Coconut Filling
Coconut Cake Frosting

Directions

1. Preheat oven to 375 degrees.
2. Spread coconut flakes in an even layer on a parchment paper-lined baking sheet. Bake until golden, 5 to 7 minutes; set aside to cool.
   Using a serrated knife, trim tops of cakes to make level; discard trimmings.
3. Cut each cake into 3 even layers. (also known as torting)
4. Place four strips of parchment paper around perimeter of a serving plate or lazy Susan.
   Place one layer on the cake plate. Brush with about one-fifth of the simple syrup.
5. Spread 2 cups (4oz) of filling on the cake.
6. Place a second layer on top.
7. Repeat process with the next four layers and top with last remaining layer.
8. Spread top and sides of cake with frosting, keeping in mind you may not need to use all of it.
9. Press toasted coconut into sides of cake; remove parchment paper strips.
10. Chill cake at least 5 hours and up to 5 days. (the syrup is more evenly distributed after 1 day)
11. Slice immediately; bring to room temperature before serving
12. Sit back and listen to all the praises.

Bobby Flay from from the TV show THROWDOWN! challenge Robert Carter on this recipe ...and Bobby won… The next time I make a coconut cake, I’ll try his recipe and blog about it… http://www.foodnetwork.com/recipes/bobby-flay/throwdowns-toasted-coconut-cake-with-coconut-filling-and-coconut-buttercream-recipe/index.html

Wilton Fondant and Tiered cake class Final

Here’s my final from Wilton's Fondant and Tiered Cake class that I took at Michael's Craft store. The cake is a White Velvet Butter cake from The Cake Bible (TCB). It is torted and filled using TCB lemon curd mousseline and covered with TCB fondant.



I stayed up until the wee hours making the royal icing lilies. It took longer to peel the lilies from the foil after they dried then it took to make them.

Fondant make a very pretty cake and although it was tasty, I prefer a cake that is frosted with buttercream.