Ombre Take One

I was dreaming about cakes last night a few different ideas but one in particular kept circling in my head a lavender Ombre cake. I had been wanting to try an Ombre cake for ages but never had an opportunity or an event to make one for so today when I woke up I thought sod it lack of event be dammed I'm going to make one anyway. I knew exactly what I wanted to do I wanted to use my Wilton Easy Layers tins so I could "Ombre" the layers as well and I wanted to try for the first time to make a Butter cream rose for the top. I was so excited I even put on an apron, normally I always forget till the first splatter of cake batter hits my clothes.

I got all my gear out, this was also an exciting time as it would be the first time I get to use my new mixer. So excited at first I forgot to take photos so they start late. But just like last time I made up the cake batter and then split into 5 different bowls and coloured. I used a plain Butter cake recipe but I probably should have used a Vanilla cake so the colour would have taken better as the Butter cake is slightly yellow. never mind though as I still think they came out well and you can tell it's lavender.

Here they are after their 20 minutes in the oven. I am not quite sure why they get the slight browning on the top it happened last time as well but when you cut into the cake you don't see any of this so I'm not terribly concerned about this. 

While they were cooling I made up the the icing. I made up one lot of butter cream for the crumb coating and to stack the layers. I made it up as I normally do then I added in my Whitener. Not to make it completely white but just to take away the cream tinge. I had a small about left over which I added more whitener to as I wanted to use this for the top of the cake.

Then onto my Lavender colours for this butter cream I completely made it white because I didn't want a funky purple for the icing. So for the incing rather than splitting into different I kept it in the same bowl and slowly added in the violet colouring. When I got the colour I wanted I took some out and filled up an icing bag then added a wee bit more colouring, and so on and so forth. I had planned on having just 3 different shades of the lavender, however after I filled bag 2 and 3 I decided that there wasn't enough variation between so I made a 4th before I filled up the Piping bag I added some more icing sugar to thicken and stiffen as I planned on using this colour for my Roses for the top.

Now that the cake had cooled I set up for stacking and crumb coating.

I filled up the piping bag with the about a third of the icing with the Wilton M1 star tip for piping my "Dams"

Firstly I put a dab of icing to set the first layer.

After piping the "Dam" I then dump a wee bit of icing onto to spread out with the spatula. Then onto the next layer. Luckily while they were cooking and after they had cooked I had kept them all in order so I would know which way round to stack them, especially because I only have 1 oven rack so I needed to cook them in 2 batches.

I kept up until all layers were stacked. This time around I wanted to try a trick I saw on Facebook on a Wilton video of a new way to do crumb coating. Now I didn't have this specific sized tip but I did have a smaller one so I gave it a try. I did not find it easier at all, however I will delay my decision until I get the correct sized tip and try it again, because I can understand the idea behind it.

Then a big dollop of buttercream on top and spatula away. A little trick I use is to fill a large cup with hot water and keep dipping my spatula in to heat it, but always make sure that you wipe dry with a paper towel.

Something I noticed (After I had completed cake) the first time I used the Easy Layers tins is that even as careful as you are while stacking the layers when you crumb coat you really have to watch that you are not creating the Leaning Tower of Piza, kept checking that you are straight I had to adjust a few times, but once the crumb coating is set it's too late to adjust. once realigned it was off to the fridge.

Now it's time to try making the butter cream roses. While the cakes were cooking I had a wee look on Youtube and found a tutorial here and I watched it while the second batch of cakes were cooking. I was pleasantly surprised that it didn't seem to be too difficult and was excited to give it ago. So while the crumb coating was setting I got my piping bag that I had set up earlier I used my Quick Twist Coupler so I could change tips. I used Wilton 104 to make the rose. I was over all I was pleased with how they turned out, but I do think that the consistency wasn't quite right probably needed to be stiffer and I think that is why the edges of the petals are fluted but hey it all adds to the effect, perhaps I have created a new kind of rose.

Crunch time! The crumb coating is set and now its time to get my Ombre on.

With my Piping bags "That I prepared earlier" I piped horizontal lines starting from the base, I didn't bother using tips for the 3 lighter colours and only used one on the deepest lavender because I had to have it set up for the roses. I did 4 lines of the darkest purple and slowly making my way up the cake with the other colours, for 2 and 3 I only piped 3 lines each as they were so similar in colour and then with the final and lightest of icing I just piped right up to the top. Now comes the fun part, with my heated spatula I just smoothed it out and instantly I could see the Ombre effect and I loved it!!! Was much easier than I had expected, the one thing I noted for next time is don't work it too much as is can blend the colours and you lose the Ombre, as what happen with the back of my cake, luckily it was the back aye. Then my dollop of white icing from the first batch went on top and I just had to spread this out. Lastly it was time to add the roses, years ago I had a special pair of "scissors" to remove butter cream rose and I think last year, thinking I would never use hem I threw them out so need to add this on my purchase list, bot this list is getting long, anyhow I just used a clean pair of craft scissors. I did have a wee bit of trouble getting the roses off the scissors didn't quite come off like in the video, but I just used the side of one of the nails and had no problem there.

Ta Da!

I am really stoked with how it turned out, might even be one of my favourite cakes. Hubby was obviously impressed he got a shock when he saw it in the fridge and said "wow that looks great doesn't it" This means he really likes it normally I have to ask him so that was a bit of a boost! Now that he was home I could cut into the cake and see how the inside turned out.

Yay even happier!

Ombre Take One - Success Story!