My life has been filled with a lot of cakes lately. This is due to wedding showers, weddings, birthdays, and grandparents visiting. Any situation, really, calls for cake. The relaxation theme in my life since I have graduated from college has been baking. It is a way I can be creative and also try something new without venturing out my house when I don't want to be social. Perfection.
The first cake arrived not with a bang or huge fanfare, instead it arrived in my mouth by way of a wedding shower. The bride to be was recently wed in Florida, thus the theme was tropical. One of her friends offered to make a cake for the party with a beach theme, and santo monos did it turn it out pretty!
Thoughtfully thinking of those who have wished portion control into their lives, our baker friend also made a slew of cupcakes.
The next cake entered my mouth by way of another wedding shower. A friend from school happens to live about forty-five minutes away from me here in Maryland. Her wedding is scheduled for June, so some of her dear friends threw her a surprise wedding shower last month to celebrate.
The cake eating has just continued! The next few are my fault, however. Like I said, baking is relaxing to me, thus I have taken it up on a regular basis. My grandfather and his seasonal girlfriend recently came through town on their way back from Florida [are you question the "seasonal" part of this last sentence? totally true. she is seasonal because they don't see each other during the summer when they live in new york. they simply live with each other when winter comes around every year. it's weird. i realize this.]. I recognized this as a perfect opportunity to make some huge creation and force my family to come together for a meal.
So I made this beast of a cake. It was a chocolate buttermilk cake with toasted marshmallow filling and raspberry swiss meringue buttercream topped with chocolate ganache. It was massive. I baked the layers in two cookie pans and then cut the layers in half and stacked them. The cake was literally bigger than my head. And while I don't have an overly large head [it is in fact smaller than average], that is still quite a large cake. And of course my family commented on the fact that we would never be able to consume such a large dessert.
It was eaten in a day.
And folks, that is what occurs when you have twelve people in your house for lunch.
Find the recipe here!
My next creation was baked the next week when my grandmother was in town to visit. Not wanting her to feel left out by the whole cake thing, I attempted to make a meringue cake with marscapone and creme de cocoa filling topped with dark chocolate ganache. Slowly and surely I am starting to realize that I cannot physically make a cake without including ganache. I think my hips are starting to realize that it's a problem.
It looks funny, and it also sounds like an odd combination. Yet, this was an exceptional dessert. Find the recipe here from my favorite cake blog. Seriously, her recipes are phenomenal. And while my cakes almost never turn out quite as beautiful and amazing as hers, I can also say that I have never had any formal training. That's my excuse, and I am absolutely sticking with it. They have all been tasty though. Every single dessert that I have attempted from Rosie have given me another reason to live [i'd probably still live if it weren't for her cakes, there just wouldn't be as many sugar induced hallucinations if it weren't for her]. This sounds like an odd combination for a cake, but you should at least try it.
Aside from the fact that I look incredibly exhausted in the above picture [i was, i had been making cake and pasta for about six hours], the meringue cake just was not as humongous as the cake before. Ah well, I fed my family homemade pasta to lessen their appetites for the cake.
Anyone else been baking recently? Any great recipes you want to share?
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