Although my grandmother no longer bakes, she used to be the big baker of the family. She would make me the cutest cakes for my birthdays growing up. As her 95th birthday came closer, I was excited to have the chance to finally make her a birthday cake. 95 is a big birthday so I had to go big for this cake. Originally, I was planning on going even bigger than this cake. The cake I made has a 7 inch bottom tier and a 3 inch top tier, but originally I was planning on doing a 9 inch bottom tier and a 5 inch top tier. I decided to go with the smaller version because I started adding up how many ingredients I would need, and it got to be too much for a dinner of 7 people. Even though I decided on the smaller version, the cake ended up looking great and I know my grandmother loved it!
This cake is has a 4 layer vanilla cake bottom tier and a 2 layer vanilla cake top tier. The layers are filled with a lemon buttercream frosting. For the vanilla cake, I tripled the recipe for the zebra cake (without the cocoa powder), and for the buttercream I used wilton’s decorators icing and flavored it with lemon extract.
Ombre Rose Cake
Ingredients:
- 3 cups sugar
- 12 large eggs
- 3 cups milk
- 3 cups vegetable oil
- 3 tsp vanilla
- 6 cups flour
- 6 tsp baking powder
- 3/4 tsp salt
- 1 container wilton decorators icing
- lemon extract
- wilton gel food coloring
Directions:
- Preheat oven to 350 degrees fahrenheit. Grease both 7 inch and 3 inch round cake pans with cooking spray.
- Beat sugar and eggs for about 2 minutes until lightened.
- Next add milk, vegetable oil, and vanilla to egg mixture and blend on low speed.
- In a separate bowl combine flour, baking powder, and salt. Mix to distribute baking powder and salt.
- Now add flour mixture to wet ingredients. Combine on low speed.
- Once combined, scrape down edges of bowl.
- Mix at medium speed for 1-2 minutes.
- Now divide batter equally into two bowls.
- In one bowl, add pink food coloring and whisk to combine.
- Once your batters are prepared, pour each batter at the same time into opposite sides of the same cake pan. This will make half of the cake pink and half of the cake white.
- Now take a spatula and swirl the pink and white together until marbled.
- Repeat steps 10 and 11 until you fill all 4 pans of 7 inch cake layers and 2 pans of 3 inch layers.
- Place cake on center rack in the oven and bake for 35-45 minutes, or until toothpick comes out clean.
- Let cake cool in pan for 10 minutes, then flip cake upside-down to remove.
- Cut off domed top to make each layer as flat as possible.
- Take wilton decorators icing and place in a stand mixer.
- Die frosting a light pink, and also add lemon extract to the taste.
- Next, Place small dollop of frosting on the center of the cake board to keep the cake in place.
- Place first layer of 7 inch cake onto the cake board.
- Next, take a straw and poke several holes in the layer.
- Spritz cake several times with simple syrup, but be careful not to overdo it.
- Frost top of layer with frosting.
- Place second layer on top of the first layer, and repeat steps 18-20.
- Do the same for the third layer of cake as well.
- Lastly, place the fourth layer of cake on top of the third.
- Frost whole cake with a thin layer of frosting, and refrigerate.
- Now cut a circle out of a cutting board to be about 3 and 1/2 inches in diameter.
- Place first layer of 3 inch cake onto the board. Repeat steps 18-20.
- Do the same for second layer, then frost whole cake with thin layer of frosting and refrigerate.
- Now take the 7 inch cake out of the refrigerator and pipe 1M rose swirls onto the bottom of the cake. To pipe a rose swirl you simply just start in the middle and pipe a clockwise swirl using the 1M tip. Here is a youtube video for explanation.
- After each row of roses die the frosting a little darker to create the ombre effect.
- When the 7 inch cake is fully covered in roses, cut three straws or supports to be the height of the cake and place in a triangle like shape through the center of all four layers. Make sure the straws are place directly under where the second tier will be placed.
- Remove second tier from the refrigerator and center it on top of the 7 inch tier.
- Cover second tier with darker roses.
- Next decorate cake with fresh mini roses.
Happy 95th Birthday to my grandmother, Marabel!
