Red Velvet Cake

Valentine's Day is just days away. What better way to celebrate it than with a Red Velvet cake. Well, it was the last Valentines season when I first tried my hand at Red Velvet cup cakes and my husband loved it. I think he loved the cream cheese frosting more. Valentine's day is normally not a big affair at our home, but I am still excited over trying something exciting to bake or make.

I baked it from my favorite recipe below. I started out with making a 2 layered cake, but one cake got stuck badly, so instead made up cake balls from it, and just a single layer cake with the other. Ended up with not so smooth cream cheese frosting. Actually I did not get a chance to smooth the icing as 3 adults were hovering over me to get away so they can dig into it. So it wasn't surprising when it was over in a matter of minutes.

This is the recipe from pinchmysalt blog.

Red Velvet Cake

2 1/2 cups sifted cake flour*
1 teaspoon baking powder
1 teaspoon salt
2 Tablespoons cocoa powder (unsweetened)
2 oz. red food coloring
1/2 cup unsalted butter, at room temperature
1 1/2 cups sugar
2 eggs, at room temperature
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
1 cup buttermilk, at room temperature
1 teaspoon white vinegar
1 teaspoon baking soda

1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Butter and flour two 9-inch round cake pans or three 8-inch round cake pans.

2. Sift together the cake flour, baking powder, and salt into a medium bowl; set aside.  In a small bowl, mix food coloring and cocoa powder to form a thin paste without lumps; set aside.

3. In a large bowl, using a hand mixer or stand mixer, beat butter and sugar together until light and fluffy, about three minutes.  Beat in eggs, one at a time, then beat in vanilla and the red cocoa paste, scraping down the bowl with a spatula as you go.  Add one third of the flour mixture to the butter mixture, beat well, then beat in half of the buttermilk. Beat in another third of flour mixture, then second half of buttermilk. End with the last third of the flour mixture, beat until well combined, making sure to scrape down the bowl with a spatula.

4. Make sure you have cake pans buttered, floured, and nearby.  In a small bowl, mix vinegar and baking soda.  Yes, it will fizz!  Add it to the cake batter and stir well to combine.  Working quickly, divide batter evenly between the cake pans and place them in a preheated 350 degree oven. Bake for 25-30 minutes. Check early, cake is done when a toothpick inserted in the center comes out clean.

5. Cool the cakes in their pans on a wire rack for 10 minutes. To remove the cakes from the pan, place a wire rack on top of the cake pan and invert, then gently lift the pan.  Allow cakes to cool completely before frosting. Frost with buttercream or cream cheese icing (recipe below).

Recipe Notes: *Sift cake flour once before measuring, then sift again with the other dry ingredients per recipe instructions. Wear an apron and be careful with the red food coloring. As you’re mixing the cake batter, use a spatula to scrape down the bowl frequently throughout the entire process. To mix flour and buttermilk, use cut and fold method, instead of the mixer. It makes for a softer cake.

Cream Cheese Frosting

16 oz. cream cheese (2 packages), softened
1/2 cup unsalted butter (one stick), softened
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
2 1/2 cups powdered sugar, sifted
pinch of salt

With an electric mixer, blend together cream cheese and butter until smooth.  Turn mixer to low speed and blend in powdered sugar, salt and vanilla extract.  Turn mixer on high and beat until light and fluffy. Use immediately or refrigerate, covered, until ready to use.  If refrigerated, the frosting will need to be brought to room temperature before using (after frosting softens up, beat with mixer until smooth).

Recipe Notes: If you prefer a sweeter and/or stiffer frosting, more powdered sugar can be added (up to four cups). But remember, the more sugar you add, the less you’ll be able to taste the tangy cream cheese!

Happy Baking!

Bedtime Stories Baby Shower

Nitika's Surprise Baby Shower

Its been a while since I posted, but thats because I was very very busy arranging a surprise Baby Shower for my dear friend Nitika. It was a combined effort by Anu, Deepti and me. As it was a total surprise, we booked a hotel meeting room in Duncan, for the shower. We stayed in the same hotel, the night before, and it gave us enough time to rest and start preparing and decorating the room. 

The theme, we 3 girls decided on was 'Bedtime Stories', and the color theme was Orange and Green. Here is the invitation and the favors designed by Anu.

We decided to use a canopy to create the bed effect and put matching sheets on the table which Deepti picked from Ikea. We also added a pillow on each table. Nitika can use this bed canopy around babys' crib later on as well. I made the matching banner going with the theme. Added the sleeping baby from the invitation to the banner. Deepti made the cute tissue pom poms below. 

The picture below is of the main cake and dessert table. It had cake, cookies, cake pops along with the decorations. For cake, we decided on chocolate cake, as its Nitika's favourite flavour. I decided to make the cake, and had fun making all the decoration on it.  I made a sleeping baby, and some books and a torch. Carrying the cake to Duncan was the most difficult part. Apart from some dents here and there, the cake made it ok on 2 flights to Oklahoma City and long drive to Duncan from there.

Red Velvet cake pops in orange and green were a big hit. I decorated the orange cake pops with green candy, and vice versa. It took so much longer than I anticipated, to decorate them, but it was worth it. Liked the overall effect. 

We really wanted to add toppers here and there to give a personal touch. But as there were no cupcakes, I just popped them along with the cake pops.  I made these toppers from printed card stock and die-cut butterflies I had from before. These were one of my favourite things.

I decided to make the cookies at the last minute. I had a baby feet cookie cutter in hand, and used that along with regular round one to make the cookies. I was planning to later pipe a button on the round cookie, but because of lack of time, I dropped the idea. 

We placed these colorful printouts in cute frames from Ikea all around the place. It really helped pop things up.

Food Table: We had some Indian snacks, salad and pasta along with regular chips and dip. Deepti got very cute matching paper plates and napkins for the party.

Just few hours before the flight, I made these orange circle decorations. I sewed together different sized circle cutouts in 2 shades of orange to make these.

As baby's gender is still unknown to most, especially to Dad (out of choice), I made the below door hangers(which ended up on the wall) saying 'Is it a Girl?', 'Is it a 'Boy'....

I made the food labels, and placed them with a toothpick on the fondant books that I'd made. I wish I had taken a better picture of it.

The Moment

Nitika was totally surprised. It was a nice emotional moment for all

Cutting of Cake

 Deepti, Nitika, Kabir and me. Anu couldn't make it to the party as she had a family emergency in India.

In the end, we played tons of games. Enjoyed each one of them. Pictures for few games are below..

Congratulations to Nitika & Sid, and Happy Parenting ahead.

Red Velvet Cake Balls

Last week I tried my hand at cake balls for the very first time. As Kabir was moved to a new room in his daycare, I wanted to do something for his old room teachers as my way of saying THANKS. I don't have enough words to express how grateful I am for all the teachers at his daycare. I just love them. 

I got the idea of making cake balls from Bakerella. The recipe asked to use the red velvet cake box mix, which I did. Normally, I would have used my favourite recipe for making Red Velvet cake, which can be found here, but this time, I really wanted to try a box mix. What actually prompted me to use it, was a comment on pinchmysalt.com that box mixes are as good, which I knew was not true, but still wanted to try it out. So, the cake balls were serving two purpose.

I got the Duncan Hine's cake mix, and followed the instructions on the box. When I tasted the cake, I knew my hours spent in making cakes from scratch, were not wasted. It tasted like any yellow cake, and had no flavor of red velvet cake. Next time, I will be using my favourite recipe without any hesitation. Cake balls tasted very good though, as once the cream cheese frosting was added, the mixture did not taste that bad. And the chocolate dipping made it taste like heaven. After giving it to the two teachers, I had plenty left at home. So, I took a few to my office and they were all gone by lunch.  Kabir and I ate the rest :-)

I can't wait to try these balls again with my favourite recipe for cake.