Although halloween this year may be a little different, there’s no reason not to celebrate. That’s why I’m sharing my recipe for a super simple halloween themed cake.
This is the perfect cake to make if you’re doing anything for halloween, it’s got the perfectly festive colours of purple, green and orange. It starts with 3 layers of coloured vanilla cake, sandwiched and finished with a standard vanilla buttercream and its then decorated with a white chocolate drip, buttercream rosettes and meringue decorations.
I’ll be honest, this cake is a remake of a cake I made back in 2017… I didn’t like the cake enough to share until this year when I found the old pictures and thought I could remake it and make it better. I added a white chocolate drip and meringue decorations.
This would be the perfect cake to make if you have a large household or are able to share it with your friends and family, especially if they celebrate halloween.
Anyway, lets’s get started, shall we?
Ingredients:
Meringue decorations:
2 Egg whites.
Granulated sugar (double the weight of the egg whites).
1 tsp Vanilla extract.
Cake:
375g Butter, at room temperature.
375g Granulated sugar.
6 Eggs.
2 tsp Vanilla extract.
375g Plain flour.
1 1/2 tsp Baking powder.
45ml Milk.
Food colouring paste (or gels).
Buttercream:
450g Butter, at room temperature.
900g Icing sugar.
1-2 tsp Vanilla extract.
Simple Syrup:
200g Granulated sugar.
180ml Water.
10ml Vanilla extract.
Decoration:
White chocolate spread (for the drip).
Methods:
Before you get started on the recipe, you’ll want to do some preparation. Weigh up all of your ingredients, line or butter and flour your cake tins/line your baking trays with parchment, preheat your oven to 130˚c/265˚f an 180˚c/350˚f (for the cakes), then grab any equipment you may need, such as a stand mixer (or hand mixer) and mixing bowls.
Meringue:
To start on the recipe, I like to make the meringue decorations as they take some time to bake. Start by grabbing your clean mixing bowl and placing the egg whites into it, then beating them until they are fairly frothy.
You can then go ahead and add in the granulated sugar, roughly a tablespoon at a time, allowing the sugar to be incorporated before adding anymore sugar.
Once you have all of the sugar incorporated, you’ll want to check if the meringue is ready. Take a small amount and rub it between your finger and thumb, if you feel any granules of sugar, continue to whisk until you can no longer feel any granules of sugar.
When ready, place the meringue mixture into a piping bag fitted with a round piping tip and get ready to pipe. Onto the first lined baking tray, you can pipe small meringue kisses (and top them with sprinkles or other bits, if wanted) and onto the other tray, pipe a squiggle which should look like a ghost.
Place the trays into a the 130˚c/265˚f oven and bake for 40-60 minutes or until they peel away from the baking paper. Once baked, leave somewhere to cool until needed later on (store in the fridge if you intend on using them at a later date).
Cake:
To start on the cake, preheat your oven to 180˚c/350˚f and grab a mixing bowl. Into the mixing bowl, place the butter and granulated sugar and beat them together until they are lighter and fluffier in colour and consistency (this normally takes about 7-10 minutes). The mixture should be smoother, lighter and fluffier (if you can see or feel any granules of sugar, continue to mix until you can longer feel them).
Give the bowl a good scraping down, this is just to incorporate any bits that may not have been fully worked in from earlier on.
You can then add in your eggs, roughly one at a time, beating well in-between each addition. Try your best not to add in too much egg at anytime, otherwise you may curdle or split the mixture.
Then you can go ahead and add in the flour and baking powder, passing it through a sieve, just to remove any lumps that may be in the dry mix.
Mix the dry ingredients until they are fully incorporated, then stop, try not to over mix the cake batter too much (otherwise the baked cake will be tough in texture).
Into three separate bowls, add 15ml of milk and a colour into each (make sure the colour is very concentrated. Then divide the cake batter between the three bowls and incorporate the milk and colour into the cake batter – once the cake batter is coloured and ready, transfer into your lined (or buttered and floured) cake tins.
Spread and level out the cake batter as best as you possibly can, then place into your preheated oven and bake for 30-35 minutes or until well risen and when a tester is inserted into the centre, it comes out clean.
Buttercream:
The buttercream is super easy to make. Start by grabbing a clean mixing bowl and placing the butter into it, then beat on a high speed for 7-9 minutes or until the butter has become lighter and fluffier in colour and consistency.
Once the butter has achieved the perfect consistency, you can go ahead and add in half of the icing sugar and mix o a low speed to start, working your way up to a high speed. Repeat this for the remaining half of the icing sugar.
Just before you finish mixing, add in the vanilla and mix until its been fully incorporated.
Crumb coat the cake with a layer of buttercream, then separate the buttercream equally between three bowls and colour each of buttercream with purple, green and orange. Cover and set aside until needed later on.
Simple syrup:
Place the water, sugar and vanilla extract into a saucepan and place on the hob over a high heat and allow to come to a boil. The mixture should thicken slightly once done.
Allow to cool before using.
Once its cooled, level your cakes and brush over your layers of cake.
Assembly:
To assemble the cake, start by taking your plate/stand and dolloping a small amount of buttercream onto the plate/stand and spreading it out. This is just to secure the cake cake in place, so it doesn’t move while you’re decorating it.
I like to start by placing the purple layer of cake onto the plate/stand, then top with vanilla buttercream and jam (repeat this stage with the remaining cake).
You can then go ahead and give the cake a crumb coat, this is just a thin layer of buttercream used to lock in all of the crumbs, so none get into your final layer of icing and ruin your decoration.
Place in the fridge, just to allow the buttercream to firm ups around 40-60 minutes will be fine.
Take the coloured buttercream and place into piping bags, this will make it easier to work with the decoration.
when you’re ready to apply the final layer of buttercream, you can do it however you like but I like the correspond the colours inside with the colours outside, so I will do purple, green and orange (in that order). I start by placing my cake on to a turntable, so I can spin the cake and get a more level and consistent layer.
I pipe on all of my layers, so they are like rough levels, you can always straighten them out if they aren’t as straight as you’d like. Then take a cake smoother/scraper and level the icing all amount the cake, so it will all become smooth and level out. You may need to go around the cake a few times, just to perfect the finish.
Place back into the fridge and allow the buttercream to firm up for a bit, about 40-60 minutes should be ideal.
After the time in the fridge, you can finish the cake. I like to do the drip first, so I melt the white chocolate spread in the microwave for a few seconds until its more liquid, then place the melted spread into a piping bag and drip it from the top, down the side of the cake. You can use more spread to create a longer drip or less if you want a shorter drip. Don’t forget to spread some of the chocolate spread on-top of the cake.
You’ll want the place the cake back in the fridge for 10 minutes, just for the drip to firm up.
Once you’re ready to finish the cake, you can go ahead and take the remaining buttercream and place it all into a piping bag fitted with an open star nozzle, then pipe your rosettes onto the top of your cake, pipe as many or as few as you’d like – it’s up to you.
Then finish by placing the meringue decorations all over the top of the cake, you’ll know where a cake need some decoration.
That’s all for today guys, I hope you enjoyed. If you did, don’t forget to share this recipe with your family and friends and enjoy it. I’ll be back soon with another blog post and YouTube video, so join me then. In the meanwhile, don’t forget to check out my other social’s – Facebook, Instagram, Pinterest, TikTok, Twitter and YouTube. The YouTube tutorial will be linked down below.
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