The wonderful baking members of Tuesday with Dorie Baking Group delved into the Perfect Party Cake recipe chosen by Carol of mix, mix... stir, stir. The cake is a light, tight crumbed cake with a brilliant white coloring. The flavor is superb, with a lemony background flavor to be coupled with so many different flavor combinations.
Overwhelmed with the choices, along with the slight altercation with limited time to bake, fill, and frost; my choices became greatly reduced. I was going to fill the top of the cake with pretty frosting daisies. A beautiful tribute to summer time and lemons. I could not because I did not start the cake until after work last night. The frosting had me wiggling by eyebrows in a knitted sort of way.
Recipes of buttercream frosting have drifted in through my kitchen mixer and never to be made twice. I am not a buttercream frosting fan. A hot-meringue buttercream intrigued my curiosity. Heating egg whites and sugar in a double-boiler, the whites get whipped for 3 minutes. I thought my arm may fall off after the first 45 seconds. I was trying not to watch the timer count down so I switched arms. The bowl almost flew off the pot of simmering water. Okay, coordination does not run in my left arm. This was like being at the gym, telling myself that 15 seconds more is really not going to kill me. Great! I have an out -of-shape arm. Timer goes off and I get to take a break. Where's my water bottle?Next, the mixer gets to do the rest of the work. Love the mixer! 3 sticks of butter dropping one at a time into a mixer brings in large quantities of guilt. Do I get to nibble on a small slice or be
completely rebellious and eat a full-sized slice?I had to finish making the frosting to decide just what I was going to do. Blueberries and raspberries. I had a jar of wild blueberry preserves dying to be opened and the beautiful blue color would stand out from the white of the perfect party cake. I was stingy with using buttercream as a filler on top of the wild blueberry jam, consequently, I had plenty to frost the rest of the cake with. Smooth frosting on the sides and spoon swirls on top, using dabs of extra wild blueberry jam to give a slight blue hue to the top of the cake only. Fresh blueberries were in order along with bright red raspberries to give the right summer coloring. The cake is a quick, evening masterpiece and now I think I will take it to work to share so that I stay away from over nibbling.
I love the texture, flavor, and color of the cake. This recipe has won my heart and taste buds over as a permanent go to cake recipe. For those of us that constantly try new recipes, this is a huge compliment! The frosting was yummy but I still have problems with buttercream frosting. Some of the problem stems from knowing what ingredients went into the recipe and the other is texture. The frosting is just to slippery and buttery feeling in my mouth. Great go to recipe Dorie...Thank you for sharing with the rest of us! To see the other TWD baker creations using the Perfect Party Cake, go here.
For me, I already am a faithful parchment paper user from way back for the bottom of a cake pan.
King Arthur Flour had a cake flour that I wanted to try and so I did for this recipe.
The sugar smelled delicious while rubbing the lemon zest into the sugar. Pretty little yellow flakes could be seen throughout.
I had plenty of batter for two 9" baking pans. I refuse to show the bowl that held the batter because there were a few finger markings where I may or may not have licked the leftover batter clean.
The cake had a perfect golden brown coloring when done baking.
Very easy to slice and add fillings. Overall, great recipe...LOVED IT!