Fresh Strawberry Cake with Decoration Basics

Fresh Strawberry Cake

Fresh Strawberry Cake with Decoration Basics

• 2 ¼ cup of Cake flour, sifted
• 4 tsps of Baking powder
• 1 teaspoon of Salt
• 1 ¾ cups of Sugar
• ¾ cup of Unsalted butter (1 ½ sticks or 12 tblspn)
• 4 large eggs (or 6 large egg whites), room temperature
• ¾ cup of Strawberry puree
• ¼ cup of Milk
• 2 tsps of Vanilla extract
• 1 teaspoon of Strawberry extract (optional), if you don't get good
  ripen strawberries

• without sugar)
• 1 tblspn of Sugar

• Wash and hull fresh ripe strawberries. Cut it in to small pieces and transfer it to a bowl.
• Add a tblspn of sugar and give a quick mix. Cover it and allow it to sit for 2-3 hours/ overnight in the refrigerator. Strawberries will become tender and juicy.
•  Simmer the tender strawberries in a pan with ¼ cup of water for 20-25 mins in low flame. (Taking care not to burn any). Mash it well with a spatula and allow it to cool.
•  Transfer the contents to the blender with ¼ cup of water and puree the cooked strawberries.
•  Filter the puree to remove any chunky pieces. As this will result in a mushy cake.
•  Again bring the filtered puree to the stove and slow cook it in low flame for another 15 mins. Reduce
  the puree to ¼ cup. (If you have a little more puree that's fine. You can use that as a filling later)
• Strawberry concentrated puree is ready.

•  Preheat oven to 180°C/350° F.
• Grease and dust (flour) two 8" pans.
•  Take the butter cut it in to pieces and allow it to sit at room temperature.
•  Break the eggs in a bowl and keep it ready.

•  In a small bowl, take ¼ cup of cooked strawberry puree and add ¼ cup of milk and whisk it.
•  Add vanilla extract & strawberry extract (optional).
•  Whisk in eggs, one at a time and keep the mixture ready.

•  In a large mixing bowl, sift cake flour.  (Standard substitution will be 1 cup cake flour = 1 cup of APF - 2 tblspn of APF + 2 tblspn of corn starch)
•  Add baking powder and salt. Mix it slowly with a hand held mixer.
•  Toss in softened butter and continue mixing till you get 'bread crumbs' like texture.
•  Slowly add the wet ingredients mixture little by little and the cake batter is ready.
• The colour of the batter is the colour of   the cake once baked and it's not going to turn pink. So if you want the cake to look pink, add few drops of beet juice or red food dye. ( I added colour).
•  Pour the batter equally in to two prepared pans. The mixture will not be runny and it will be difficult to spread. Don't use spoon to spread it, instead drop the pans on the counter multiple times to level the batter.
• Bake for 25-30 mins or until a skewer inserted comes out clean.
•  Once done, remove the pans from the oven and let it sit in the counter for 10 mins.
• (Tip: Press the bulges of the cake with a wet clean white cloth as soon as you remove from the oven. Taking care all the time not to burn your hands. You may not need to trim a lot of cake, while stacking also it gives clean edges.)
•  Cover it with plastic wrap and transfer it to the freezer for a night. (Make sure your cake is completely wrapped and is not exposed, else your cake might turn dry).

•  Remove the cake from the freezer 4 hours before you start decorating and place it at room temperature.

• 1 ½ cups of Unsalted butter, softened
• 4 ½ cups of Powdered sugar, sifted
• 3 tblspn of Heavy cream
• A pinch of Salt
• 1 teaspoon of Clear vanilla extract

•  In a large mixing bowl, add softened butter and mix it till it becomes creamy.
•  Add sifted powdered sugar, heavy cream, salt and clear vanilla extract and mix it for couple of
  mins.
• Delicious butter cream is ready.

• Trim the edges and level the cake.
• Take a cake board. Add a spoon of frosting in the center and spread it. Top it with a cake layer. Trimmed edge facing down.
•  Add a tblspn of strawberry puree to ¼ cup of frosting (Since my puree had been licked clean from the container I used plain butter cream).
•  Mix it and fill it between the cakes. Spread evenly with a spatula.
•  Stack another layer on top with trimmed side facing down.
•  Add ½ cup of frosting on top and spread it evenly on the sides. Just make sure the cake is totally covered with frosting. This is called crumb coat. (We are just locking up the crumbs of cake with the frosting). Let it sit in the refrigerator for 1 hour.
•  Remove the cake from the refrigerator and add generous amount of frosting on top and sides. Spread the frosting. You don't need to have a smooth finish as we are going to have an unfinished look. (This is the look I wanted and could manage without stretching my art skills).

• Take a spoon. With the rounded sided up slowly move on the sides from down to up, creating a pattern on the cake.
•  Then on top creating a rustic unfinished look. It's easy & very simple to follow.

• Cut the ends of decorating bags and insert tip 1M inside.
• Place the bag on a cup and fill ½ of decorating bag with frosting.
• Roll the edges and you are all set to pipe.
• Start in the lower side of the cake. Make a dot and pipe all around the dot like a circle. Go all the way around the cake. Try not to leave space between the roses.
• In the end cover-up all the spaces with the frosting.

Fresh Strawberry Cake

 

Day 24

 

 

 

 

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