My first attempt at a naked cake, or rather semi naked! Made for a lovely lady's 50th birthday (in case you didn't suss that from the sparklers!). It's chocolate buttermilk sponge with salted caramel buttercream. I also added some edible silver leaf to bring together the silver cake board and sparklers.
The recipe for the sponge is another Magnolia Bakery one. This time I didn't convert into grams, for no reason other than pure laziness!
Ingredients:-
2 cups plain flour
1 teaspoon baking powder
1 cup unsalted butter, softened
1 cup granulated sugar - I used caster however, does granulated make any difference here?
1 cup firmly packed light brown sugar
4 large eggs, at room temperature
6 ounces unsweetened chocolate, melted
1 cup buttermilk
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
Method:-
Preheat the oven to 180 degrees.
Grease, lightly flour and line the bottoms of 2 9 inch cake tins with greaseproof paper.
Melt the chocolate, either over a double boiler, in the microwave or on the hob and leave to cool.
In a bowl, sift the flour and baking powder together and set aside. Cream together the butter and sugar for about 3 minutes or until fluffy. Add the eggs, one at a time, beating well after each addition. Pour in the chocolate, mixing the batter until well incorporated.
Add the dry ingredients, in three parts, alternating with the buttermilk and vanilla. With each addition, beat until ingredients are incorporated.
Pour the batter into the 2 cake tins and bake for approximately 25-30 minutes, or until a cake tester comes out clean. Leave the cakes to cool in the tins for about 10 minutes, before transferring to a cooling rack to cool completely.
To make the buttercream I use my fail safe recipe, adding a couple of tablespoons of salted caramel to taste.
Ingredients:-
250g unsalted butter
500g icing sugar
2 tbs salted caramel ( I used this one)
Assemble your cake, smothering the middle with a generous dollop of the buttercream and a further tablespoon of the salted caramel. Insert all the heart eye emojis!
Frosting this cake couldn't be easier. There's just one layer of buttercream, scraped down thinly. Decorate how you please, I used fresh flowers (the ends of which I covered in cling film) and some edible silver leaf. Then scoff!
