Strawberry Layer Cake with Strawberry Butter Cream!

With less than 2 weeks to go before the arrival of the bundle of joy am still busy ticking off my 101 Things to Do Before the Baby Comes list. And cake baking is one of the things I have been keeping in pending for a very long time. Am back to my mom's home and I can hardly imagine baking a cake without my oven and baking tools. But I just couldn't say No to my brother who has been requesting and finally demanding for a cake from me. So I went back to how my mom baked her first cake when I was about 5 years old. Thank god for an old measuring cup that barely had any markings on it, a cake pan over 10 years old and a heavy bottom sauce pan I used to bake cake before we had an oven.

Without my hand held electric mixer I was back to creaming the butter in a large bowl with a heavy stainless steel spatula or ladle or whatever it is called. Yes a lot of muscle was required, I can already feel my biceps. 

Now about the cake, its a STRAWBERRY BUTTER CAKE filled and frosted with strawberry butter cream with fresh strawberry purée. The cake batter has a combination of strawberry flavoured jelly crystals and fresh strawberry purée. The jelly crystals gives a nice texture, sweetness and a lovely colour to the cake whereas the flavour comes from the purée. And the strawberry butter cream just adds even more berry punch to the cake. 

Now, I know my frosting is bad or even worse. But that was all I could manage with a plain old knife and a non rotating surface. Nevertheless, this was one moist strawberry cake and there was one happy brother!!!

You Will Need:

For the Cake:

Makes one 3 layer, 8 inch round cake 

227g of Unsalted Butter

3 Cups (300g) Cake Flour

A tbsp of Baking Powder

1-3/4 Cup (350g) of Sugar

4 Large Eggs

85g of Strawberry Jelly Crystals 

1/4 Cup (60ml) Fresh Strawberry Purée

1/2 Cup of Whole Milk

A tbsp of Vanilla Extract

3/4 tsp Salt

Strawberry Butter cream Frosting:

375g of Unsalted Butter

4 Cups (500g) Icing Sugar

A tbsp of Milk

45 ml Fresh Strawberry Purée

Pinch of Salt

Note: All ingredients must be at room temperature. 

The Baking:

For the Cake:

1. Place about 2 handfuls of strawberries in a blender and purée the strawberries. 
2. Preheat oven at 180c and grease or line with parchment paper three 8 inch round cake pan (I used one deep cake pan in my case)
3. In a bowl, sift together the flour, baking powder and salt. Keep aside.
4. In another whisk the strawberry purée, milk and vanilla extract.
5. Cream the butter, sugar and jelly crystals in a large bowl for 5 mins till light and fluffy. 
6. Break in the eggs one at a time and beat till each egg is well incorporated. 
7. Now, add half the dry ingredients into the batter followed by half of the wet ingredients. Mix just until combined. Again add the remaining dry ingredients followed by the remaining wet ingredients and beat till everything is just combined. 
8. Divide the batter into three greased / lined cake pans. you can also weigh each cake pan to make sure you have distributed the batter equally. With a spatula level the top and bake in a preheated oven for 25 - 30 mins or until a cake tester inserted in the centre comes out clean. Check cake at 20 mins but not before. 
9. Once the cakes are baked let them cool on the cake pans for 10 mins. Then run a knife along the sides of the cake pans and loosen the cakes to invert them over a wire rack and let them cool completely. 

Note: They can be kept at room temperature for 2 days tightly wrapped with a cling film or stored in an air tight container. Or they can also be refrigerated for 5 days or frozen for 2 months. 

Also refer my older post for some helpful tips on Cake Baking! 

Making the Frosting:

1. Place the butter in a bowl of a stand mixer / hand held electric mixer. Whip the butter till soft and pale for about 10 mins. 
2. Add the icing sugar and vanilla extract and whip for another 8 - 10 mins till the butter cream is soft and fluffy. 
3. Add the strawberry purée and mix till its well incorporated. 

Note: Sift the icing powder 2 or 3 times for smooth butter cream. Let the butter cream chill for 24 hrs, thaw and whip for one last time before frosting. 

Layering the Cake:

Once the cake layers are completely cooled, fill and frost the cake layers as desired. We prefer plain cakes or cakes with minimal frosting. Hence I have gone really thin on the frosting. But the recipe for frosting I have given is enough to thickly fill and frost 3 cake layers. 

Recipe adapted from allrecipes.com!

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Happy Baking!