Too Much Time In The Kitchen!

Pictured is a little cake that I made for my younger sister and her husband to help celebrate their move to the house they just bought (their first). I am flying up to help them move tomorrow night, and I thought it would be nice to bring along a sweet treat as a housewarming gift.

Of course, it was also my excuse to experiment with fondant a little, since I have virtually no experience with the stuff! Well, I did make it one time a few years ago to cut little bats out of it for my son's Batman cake, but that was the extent of it. It's a lot of work compared to a buttercream icing (because you get to make that too), and it's kind of tricky to get just right. I won't buy the Wilton concoction that is supposedly edible...it's expensive and it doesn't taste good. People end up peeling it off and throwing it away. What a waste!

There's a really great tutorial on making marshmallow fondant here. It just takes a lot of time and is very messy. But, it tastes great, is relatively easy to work with, and is very inexpensive. My daughter's birthday is coming up in a few weeks and I have a plan for the type of cake I want to do for her, which uses fondant for a smooth finish. So I needed some practice before a stressful party day, and bringing my sister and brother in law a cake seemed like the perfect excuse!

I made a chocolate cake in an 8" pan and 12 cupcakes so my husband and kids wouldn't feel slighted (and to share with friends). To keep the cake moist I followed a trick professional bakeries use, which is to drizzle a simple syrup over the warm cake.* I infused that with Grand Marnier for a subtle hint of orange flavor. Then I cut the cake in half so it'd be two layers.

Next I made the French Buttercream Icing, only I infused the milk with a large pinch of crumbled saffron as I was cooking it with the flour for the base. That filled and crumb-coated the cake, and then I topped it off with the naturally colored fondant.**

I did try one cupcake to see how they the flavors played together, and they're divine! Yum. I made it a day in advance to see how the cake will be tomorrow night; fondant is supposed to seal the cake and keep it moist up to three days. It could be useful to make my daughter's cake a day in advance also if it's just as good then! I have found that the cardboard bakery boxes sold at craft stores work really well in keeping cakes fresh also. Check the comments in a day or two to see if the cake held up on the plane and how it tasted on day two.


*I know syruping a cake sounds like the cake would turn out soggy, but it doesn't! Many bakeries do this to their cakes so they stay fresh and moist, even after being cut. The trick is to add the syrup when the cake isn't hot, but still very warm. Then it binds to the crumb perfectly.

**I bought my natural food colors at King Arthur Flour, but Whole Foods, Market of Choice, and some other well stocked natural foods stores carry them as well. Expect them to be more subtle and pastel than artificial colors. (Just don't EVER get the green. It's more chartreuse...yuck!)