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Thursday 27 June 2013

Chocolate Sprinkles Cake

This week my cousin, Amanda, is visiting South Africa from Australia. She moved there a couple of years ago and any opportunity we have to see her is a special occasion. This visit especially so as it is only a week from her birthday. We had a dinner at my parents house earlier this week to celebrate her birthday and getting to spend some time with her. Of course, I had to make a cake!

During on of my many blog-hopping experiences, I found a Gummy Bear Layer Cake on Raspberri Cupcakes. Being naturally drawn to anything with sugar, cream and bright colours, this cake REALLY appealed to me! I started off making the cakes a week or so ago, but then life happened and I didn't get a chance to finish it. I stowed the cakes in the freezer, wrapped thoroughly in glad wrap, ready to stack when I got the chance. This is a great celebration cake and I knew I had to get it finished for the dinner.





I stacked, filled and crumb coated the cake over the weekend. On the evening of the dinner, I rushed home from work to ice and decorate the cake. We left for dinner with my kitchen looking like a hundreds and thousands explosion had gone off!



But it was worth it! I'm so happy with how the cake turned out! It looked beautiful and tasted delicious too. The chocolate cake is not an overly sweet cake and is perfectly complimented by the buttercream. This recipe does require a bit more effort than my usual ones, but spreading out over a few days definitely helped. So if you plan it right it can be very manageable: cakes one day, filling and crumb coat another, final icing and decorating to finish it off.


I used the recipe from Raspberri Cupcakes as is, with the exception of the omission of the gummy bears and some small changes to the icing.

Chocolate Sprinkle Cake
385g flour
560g caster sugar
1 tbsp baking powder
2 tsp baking/bicarb soda
1 tsp salt
1 & 1/2 cups unsweetened cocoa powder, preferably Dutch-process
340g butter, melted
1.5 cups buttermilk
4 large eggs
4 large egg whites

  1. Preheat oven to 180°C and line three 20 cm round cake tins 
  2. In a large mixing bowl, combine flour, sugar, baking powder, bicarb soda, and salt; set aside. 
  3. With an electric mixer, combine cocoa and 3/4 cup hot water until a thick paste forms
  4. Add butter, buttermilk, eggs, and egg whites; beat until combined. Whisk in flour mixture until smooth.
  5. Fill the cake tins with 2 tins each containing 2/5 of the mixture and the remaining tin containing 1/5.
  6. Bake until a skewer inserted in the centre of cake comes out clean, about 45-60 minutes. Mine took more toward the 60 minute mark.
  7. Cool the cake in the tin for about 10 minutes. Carefully remove from tin and cool completely on a wire rack. 
  8. You can chill the cakes at this point to make them easier to cut. As I mentioned, I put mine in  the freezer; if you are going to do this make sure your cakes are well wrapped! 
  9. Using a long serrated knife, cut cakes into 5 even layers and trim off any doming that may have occurred during baking.
Buttercream Icing
First Batch: filling and crumb coating
500g  salted butter, softened
500g  icing/confectioner's sugar, sifted
1 tsp pure vanilla extract
1 cup of double thick cream
Optional: food colouring of your choice

Second Batch: final icing coat
375g salted butter, softened
375g icing/confectioner's sugar, sifted
1/2 tsp pure vanilla extract
3/4 cup double thick cream
Optional: sprinkles, or other decorations

Filling and Crumb coating
  1. Place the butter in a large mixing bowl and beat until light and fluffy. 
  2. Gradually add sifted icing sugar while beating on low speed until combined.
  3. Add vanilla extract and cream and beat on high until fluffy. 
  4. Split mixture into 5 equal portions and colour as desired, keeping one portion uncoloured to crumb coat.
  5. Spread coloured icing between the 5 layers of cake. Use the remaining icing to crumb coat the outside of your cake. Chill in fridge for at least an hour, can be left overnight.
Final Icing
  1. Prepare the remaining icing as directed above and apply icing to cake. Try to get icing as smooth as possible. If you are using sprinkles, they cover up small bumps very nicely so you don't need to worry as much.
  2. Add decorations to your cake. If you're using sprinkles, be warned: it is a messy business, but lots of fun and so worth it for the final look!
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2 comments:

  1. That cake makes me happy just looking at it :-)

    ReplyDelete
  2. That cake made me so happy eating it - loved that it wasn't super sweet either!

    ReplyDelete

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