Tuesday, May 17, 2011

Cake Nirvana

As I am sure you all have figured out I like to cook.  I can't draw worth a damn or paint a nice bowl of fruit or anything, but I can cook.  My love of cooking actually began with baking.  I don't do much baking these days because I don't like to measure, it takes too much time and cake tends to make my bottom bigger rather than smaller...  Never the less, this weekend my mom decided to host a party, which gave me the perfect opportunity to get my bake on.

As strawberries are in season here in NC, I knew I wanted to feature them in my creation.

I started with this recipe for the cake.  The only adjustment I made was to follow the advice of others and use an additional 1/2 cup of milk.  I was able to make 3 8 in round cakes.  They came out moist and absolutely perfect.

And then I made this frosting.  It was super easy to make and so delicious.  Its not overly sweet, which let the flavor of the strawberries shine through.

And speaking of those strawberries, I ran down to the Farmers Market and grabbed a freshly picked gallon of beautiful berries. Once home, I gave them a quick wash, cut 'em up, added some sugar and let them sit.

To assemble the cake, I started with a layer of cake (duh), added a blop of icing and then some strawberries. I repeated with the next layers.  The top layer was another blop of icing with some artfully arranged strawberries on top.  I swear, it was the most beautiful cake I have ever made. 
The only problem was that the damn cake was so tall, I couldn't get the lid of the cake plate on...

PLEASE PLEASE PLEASE make this cake.  I promise your efforts will be well rewarded.  And also, promise you will use real, fresh, local strawberries, cause those driven across the country strawberries are no good (sorry, California!).

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