Explosion Cake
Course:
Dessert
Seasonal Event:
Valentine's Day
Yield:
8-inch Cake
An 8-inch vanilla cake made up of three layers of pink ombre filled and frosted in sweet vanilla buttercream. Garnished with red, pink, and white sprinkles and topped with dollops of icing. The best part of this cake is the fun surprise when you cut it open to find the center exploding with sprinkles! The red fondant love heart on top of the cake can also double as a cake topper.
INGREDIENTS:
Buttercream
- 7 ½ cups confectioners' sugar
- 2 ¼ cups vegetable shortening
- 6 tablespoons unsalted butter, or ¾ stick
- 1 ½ tablespoons pure vanilla extract
- ¼ cup plus 2 tablespoons cold water
Vanilla Cake
- 2 ½ cups cake flour, plus more for flouring the cake pans
- 2 cups sugar, plus more for unmolding the cake
- 3/4 cups vegetable oil or 1 ½ sticks of butter
- 2 ¼ teaspoons baking powder
- 1 teaspoon pure vanilla extract
- 1/2 teaspoon fine sea salt
- 4 extra-large eggs, at room temperature
- 1 cup whole milk
- unsalted butter, for greasing two cake pans
DIRECTIONS:
Buttercream:
- In the bowl of a standing mixer fitted with the paddle attachment, combine sugar, shortening, butter, and vanilla and mix at low-medium speed until smooth, about 3 minutes.
- With the machine on, slowly add the water in a thin stream and continue to mix until absorbed - about 3 minutes.
- Refrigerate the buttercream in an airtight container for up to 2 weeks.
Vanilla Cake:
- Position a rack in the center of the oven, and preheat the oven to 350f.
- Put the flour, sugar, vegetable oil, baking powder, vanilla and salt in the bowl of a stand mixer fitted with the paddle attachment. (if you don't have a stand mixer, you can put the ingredients in a bowl and use a hand mixer with the blending attachments.) Mix on slow just until the ingredients are blended together, a few seconds, then raise the speed to low-medium and continue to mix until smooth, approximately 1 additional minute.
- With the motor running, add 1 egg at a time, adding the next one after the previous one has been absorbed into the mixture. Stop the motor periodically and scrape the bowl from the bottom with a rubber spatula to integrate ingredients, and return the mixer to low-medium speed. After all the eggs are added, continue to mix for an additional minute to ensure the eggs have been thoroughly mixed in. This will help guarantee that the sugar is dissolved and that the flour has been thoroughly mixed in, which will help produce a luxurious mouth-feel in the final cake.
- With the motor running, add the milk, 1/2 cup at a time, stopping the motor to scrape the sides and bottom between the two additions. Continue to mix for another minute or until the mixture appears smooth. Before baking, be sure the batter is at 70-73f or the cake will crown.
- Add pink food coloring pink to create ombre look
- Grease two 9-inch or four 6-inch cake pans (2 inches high) with the butter, and flour them.
- Divide the batter evenly between the two cake pans, using a rubber spatula to scrape down the bowl and get as much batter as possible out. Bake until the cake begins to pull from the sides of the pan and is springy to the touch, 25 to 30 minutes.
- Remove the cakes from the oven and let cool for at least 30 minutes, preferably an hour. The cakes should be at room temperature before you remove them from the pan. Put a piece of parchment paper on a cookie sheet, top with sugar, and one at a time, turn the pans over and turn the cakes out onto parchment; the sugar will keep it from sticking. Refrigerate or freeze until ready to decorate.
Assembly:
- Cut 2.3” - 3” hole in center of two cake layers
- Frost bottom layer, place one layer with a hole on top, frost the rim of that cake
- Place another layer with a hole on top, frost the rim of that cake
- Pour sprinkles into center of cake
- Top with final solid layer
- Frost and coat cake as desired