Happy Sunday! I believe that Bridal and Baby Showers have become such big events for our society because smaller parties are too expensive to have all of the time. So now people are having one huge party to celebrate. This usually requires a multi-tiered cake or lots of cupcakes for everyone. But not every party is a big one and sometimes it is a small cake that you want to make that big impression.


Today's Blackberry Rose cake was for a small party of 10. This 6 inch yellow cinnamon cake was filled with vanilla buttercream and fresh blackberries and then covered in more vanilla buttercream and topped with more blackberries. The party theme was English Tea and, of course, the color palette was different shades of purple. They wanted fresh berries, either blueberries or blackberries. I felt blackberries fit the color palette better and, here in the USA, we can get fresh blackberries this time of year. If you are somewhere where you can not get fresh berries you can use frozen berries that have been thawed or even pie filling with a lot of the extra liquid drained off.


To get the variegated effect with the frosting is very easy. First I lightly tinted the buttercream with violet Americolor gel food color. Then I put the large tip into the piping bag and, using a skewer that had been dipped into the jar of food color, I ran three lines of dye inside the bag. When you pipe the frosting out the color automatically attaches in those three spots to give you this effect. 


Two things to note about using fresh fruit inside or on your cakes. Make sure the fruit is firm.  If you decide, for the filling of the cake, to cut it, it seems too juicy, or you are using frozen or canned berries then make sure you stir it into the buttercream first or it will weep into your cake and possibly out to the outside of your cake showing blotches of juice. Even though these blackberries were firm I still put a layer of buttercream first and then nestled the berries into that before putting on the top layer of cake. On the top of the cake it is also important to put a moisture barrier of buttercream down on the top of the cake before adding the berries or you stand the chance of your top layer of cake getting soaked with juice and becoming squishy. If you want the look of the juice dripping down the cake you can add sugar to the fresh berries, let them sit for about 30 minutes and you will have a nice amount of liquid along with your berries to spoon on top and then, artfully of course, drip the liquid down the sides of the cake. It can make a very beautiful presentation. 


When you add whole berries to the filling, like I did with this cake, you get the pleasure of having your guests oooh and ahhhh when they first see the cake and then ooooh and ahhh again when they are served the cake and see the whole berries in the filling! Not a single guest walked past the cake without noting how beautiful it was and that left a huge smile on the face of the hostess!


This week coming up I have a birthday cake as well as cupcakes for a CubScout Pinewood Derby Day! As always, can't wait to share them with you next Sunday!

Cat