I had an early Easter dinner with my parents on Saturday.  They’re going to visit my Grandmother for Easter this year and I won’t be able to go with them, darn plane tickets being so expensive these days.  So instead of skipping Easter dinner altogether (unacceptable!) we had it a week early.  And, of course, I baked a cake.

This is the first “real” cake I’ve ever made with cake, icing, and decoration all together.  I wanted to get a practice one in before I started churning out cakes for the numerous special occasions coming up this year, and overall I’m pretty happy with it.  For a first try I feel like I did a good job, but naturally have learned a lot.

Recently I bought a 6×3″ cake pan in preparation for the WeddSplosion going on.  Not only does this make a great top-layer for a layered wedding cake, but it also makes perfectly sized cakes for special occasions like Easter.

In fact, I got to use a lot of fun tools for this project – 6×3″ pan, cake boards, icing tips, angled spatula, even my bread knife (not new, but still one of my favorite kitchen utensils).  I like sinking my teeth into a thorough project, and this one was great for starting out.

Let’s start with some lessons learned, though.  For example, my strangely dimpled cake, shown above.

This recipe, which I snagged from the most excellent Jessica at Bake Me Away!, initially called for 350F for a 9×2 pan, but to reduce the temperature to 300F if reducing the recipe.  Of course, I didn’t take into account that while my cake wasn’t as wide, it was also taller…so somehow baking at 300F in the end resulted in a divot in my cake.  Next time I figure I should try 325 and see if it bakes more evenly.

Another thing I need to improve upon is slicing a cake evenly.  I don’t have one of those fancy cake-slicers, and I didn’t have any toothpicks to make the layer’s height, so true to form I winged it and ended up with a mediocre result.  I did use a measuring tape, but I only made small cuts with my knife, assuming those would be enough to guide me.  As you can see it worked moderately well, but since I but in a circular fashion, you can tell that I cut at a bit of an angle instead of straight.  Better strategery next time!

The decoration was, unexpectedly, both very fun and not nearly as much of a pain as I’d anticipated.  Per a recommendation from the oh-so-smart Victoria the District Chocoholic, I used a chocolate ganache type frosting (practice for the cake I must send to California), and it turned out wonderfully!  I let it sit a little longer than I think I should have – it was a little stiff when I finally applied it – but it’s overall application went very well, crumb coat and all.  You can see the texture in the middle picture, but it turned out just the way I wanted it to.  I had to warm the ganache up just a touch to do the final piping, but even that went alright (even if it did end up a bit uneven.  It has character!).

Final verdict?  This was a delicious and fun experiment!  The cake was the perfect size for sharing, and it was moist and sweet without being tooth-numbing.  It’s definitely a flavor I’d be happy to make again.

Strawberry Cake with Chocolate Ganache Frosting

Adapted from Bake Me Away!

Ingredients:

• 1 1/2 cup flour
• 1 cup sugar
• 1 stick butter
• 2 egg whites
• 1 3/4 tsp baking powder
• 1 1/4 tsp salt
• 1/4 cup milk
• 1/2 cup pureed strawberries
• 2-3 drops red food coloring
• 1 cup heavy whipping cream
• 8oz sweetened chocolate

Instructions:

1. Mix dry ingredients together.
2. Add the butter, chopped into pieces, and strawberries to the dry mixture and mix for on low until combined, then on medium for 2 minutes.
3. In a separate bowl mix together milk, egg whites, and food coloring.
4. Add the egg white mixture to the strawberry mixture in 2-3 batches, mixing after each until just combined.
5. Pour the batter into a buttered and parchment-paper lined 6×3 pan.
6. Bake at 300F for 1 1/2 hours (I suggest fiddling with this…it didn’t work well for me.  Maybe 325F for 1 hour?)

For the Ganache:

1. Chop the chocolate and put into a bowl.
2. Heat the whipping cream until just boiling and then pour over the chocolate.
3. Let sit for 2-3 minutes to let the chocolate melt.
4. Once the chocolate and cream is thoroughly combined, let sit for 1-2 hours or until room temperature.  Then use to spread on the cake!