Stepping outside my comfort zone

This week has been a really busy one for me, this is why I'm updating so late. I've been baking what feels like non-stop. This week I'd been asked to create a cake that I've always avoided (until now) or I just plain don't feel comfortable doing *Cue dramatic music* a two-tiered, fully edible engagement cake (eeeeeek).

I'm usually really confident making round cakes and stacking them. But I knew there was a little more to stacking two fully-edible cakes, i.e dowels, measuring etc. I have stacked cakes before, in fact the first ever cake I had made was for my niece and it was a two-tiered princess cake, but I was (until now) only confident using one edible tier and one dummy tier. I received the message asking if I could make a two-tiered, fully edible engagement cake and my nerves were just gone. I wanted to so badly to say no but the person who asked me is super-lovely and I really didn't want to turn them down since it was a compliment in itself that I was the first person they came to. Without even thinking of the hurdles I'd have to face I accepted. After-all how hard could stacking cakes possibly be? The weeks in between making the cakes I tried not to over-face myself with thoughts of what could go wrong and in my mind the cake had already come out perfect. I had decided not to do too much research into cake stacking and to just kind of go with the flow, you know? Use my initiative. My common sense. I mean I more or less started baking using my initiative, I wasn't taught, so it was just a case of going back to basics. I knew what materials I needed and I had a rough idea of how to do it so I went ahead and did it. And it turned out better than I'd anticipated. I have to admit while my cake was in the oven I had a glance over 'The Cake Decorating Bible' by Juliet Sear of Fancy Nancy, she has wonderfully put together a few pages on how to stack cakes. I didn't read into too much detail just looked over the pictures and skimmed because I was too afraid I'd have forgotten to buy something or had the technique wrong in my head. Needless to say I overcame my hurdle and will most definitely not be letting this nor anything else get in my way again. 

Heart-Shaped Chocolatey, fudge cake

This recipe is one of my own. I decided to bake this cake for my Fiance seen as how he’s super supportive of my baking madness and he shells out a lot of money for kitchen-goods which keep me very happy. So what better way to thank him than to whip up a cake using some of his favourite flavours. I think there is a lot of science to baking and not following a recipe can make things quite complicated. It's undeniable that certain ingredients won’t work together, but ideally if you have a good base I think it’s always good to experiment with flavours and you’ll find that 9 times out of 10 it’ll turn out just right. I say this all the time, probably because it's been said to me so very often, but it really is trial and error. I often feel like George from Roald Dahl’s ‘George’s Marvellous Medicine’ when making my own recipe. There’s usually sugar in my eyes, flour all over my face, just a mess. I jot down flavours, textures, smells and most importantly how what I’m doing makes me feel at that time. Anyway, less rambling, more recipe! Here goes:

Ingredients

For the cake

4 Large Eggs

190g Butter

150g Golden Caster Sugar

40g Brown Sugar

150ml Milk (or Elmlea double cream)

1/2 tsp Baking Powder

210g Flour

30g Caramel Syrup

30g Cocoa Powder

Pinch of cinnamon

For the buttercream

140g Butter

240g Icing Sugar

15g Cocoa Powder

4 tsp Caramel Syrup

2 tsp Milk

Method

- Preheat oven at 160 degrees

-Line mould with greaseproof paper and lightly grease with butter

-Cream together syrup, butter, sugars on a high speed until you have a nice fluffy mixture  (on my notes here it says ‘Smells lovely.’ The mixture should smell like a lovely toffee, caramelly sweetness.)

-Sift in flour, baking powder, cocoa powder and cinnamon.

-Mix on a low speed adding milk/cream until you get a nice smooth mixture.

-Spoon mixture into lined mould

-Bake for 25-30 minutes or until a skewer inserted into the cake comes out clean and cake is springy to touch.

-Leave cake to cool down a little then transfer to a wire rack to cool completely.

Let’s crack on with the buttercream!

Method

-Beat butter until soft. Add half of the icing sugar and beat until smooth.

-Add remaining sugar, cocoa and milk and beat together.

-Add in caramel syrup and beat mixture until smooth and spreadable

Once the cake has fully cooled down sandwich the cake and spread a generous amount of the buttercream.

Place on top layer and sift on some icing sugar for decoration

Voila!

I got a little bit too friendly with the icing sugar!