- Hi guys, it's Beth from the Wilton test kitchen
and I'm really excited because it's my birthday!
And I get asked all the time by everybody,
Beth, you're the cake baker,
so who bakes your birthday cake?
And the answer, you might find kind of sad,
I make my own birthday cake
most of the time,
but here is the upside,
when you make your own birthday cake,
you get to make exactly what you want.
So I am going to show you today
my ultimate birthday cake.
This one's for all the scorpios,
happy birthday to all of you guys.
Now my ultimate birthday cake is
layers of really dark, moist chocolate cake
layered with smooth, silky layers of
peanut butter cream cheese icing
and I'm gonna throw a surprise layer in there,
a layer of chocolate meringue,
which is going to give this crisp, chewy texture
that nobody is going to expect
right in the center of the cake.
And I'm gonna top it all off
with a decadent layer of velvety chocolate ganache.
And then I'm gonna garnish it with some peanuts
and some chopped candies,
some more meringues and whatever I can find
laying around.
You can follow along with my recipe down below.
Let's get started.
I'm going to combine all of my dry ingredients together.
Three cups of all purpose flour,
one and three quarter teaspoons baking soda,
a half a teaspoon of salt,
one teaspoon of baking powder,
one cup of dark cocoa powder,
and then stir all of the dry stuff together
until it's nice and well combined.
I love this cake recipe because
all the dry things are in this bowl,
and everything else goes straight into the mixing bowl.
Dump it all in, all at the same time.
Two cups of milk,
two thirds of a cup of vegetable oil,
one and a quarter cups of firmly packed dark brown sugar,
one cup of granulated sugar,
four eggs,
one tablespoon of instant coffee granules
to bump up the chocolate flavor
and one and a half teaspoons of pure vanilla extract.
Just go ahead and give it a good mix,
you want everything to be well combined here, too.
Then stop the mixer and add the dry ingredients to the bowl.
This is a really wet cake batter
there's a lot of liquid in the mix,
so make sure you keep your mixer at low speeds
so nothing comes back up at you
and if you want,
you can drape a kitchen towel over it
so that you don't get a cloud coming back up at you.
After everything is moistened,
kick it up to medium speed
and beat for 30 seconds,
three oh, set a timer.
Don't forget to spray your pans.
And then divide your batter evenly
into your prepared pans.
This cake is going to bake at 350 degrees
for between 45 and 50 minutes.
You'll also need to make your meringues,
a sheet pan with parchment paper.
We're gonna trace on the parchment paper an 8 inch disc
using the bottom of your cake pan for this
is a really easy way to do it.
So just use a pencil
to trace all the way around it
and then flip it over so the pencil mark is down.
Now we're ready to make our meringues.
Into my mixing bowl, I'm going to put
two tablespoons of Wilton meringue powder,
one quarter cup of water,
a pinch of salt,
and then use a whisk attachment to beat it
until it's really foamy.
Into my mixing bowl I'm going to put
two thirds of a cup of granulated sugar,
a half a teaspoon of pure vanilla extract,
and that's what you're looking for,
stiff peaks.
Now we're gonna add our cocoa powder into the mix.
So after you add your cocoa powder,
you want to come back up to stiff peaks
and that way you know you're ready to pipe your meringue.
So I have a piping bag with a tip 1A in it
and I'm going to fill my bag with my very sticky
chocolate meringue.
Pipe a dot at each corner of your pan
to hold your parchment down.
Super handy trick.
Then we're going to trace a disc
following the outline of the eight inch pan
and so this will bake into basically,
kind of cake layer for us
and we'll be able to put it right
on top of our cake layers.
Just like that.
Then re-fill your bag.
The rest of the mix we're just going to pipe
into cute little kisses of different sizes
and we're gonna use those to decorate the top of our cake.
So you bake these at 250, they take 45 to 50 minutes
so put these in the oven while your cake is cooling.
Dump the cream cheese and the peanut butter
into the mixing bowl and beat it until it's smooth and creamy.
Then add your confectioners sugar
about a cup at a time
beating well after each addition.
You want it to be really smooth and creamy.
So our peanut butter cream cheese icing is ready
this is the easiest step of the bunch
and you deserve it 'cause this cake takes a lot of work,
but it's so, so worth it.
Our cakes and our meringues are both totally cool
so now we can assemble our cake.
First off, I need to cut the crowns off
and torte both of my cake layers.
To cut each cake into two thinner layers,
first score the outside of the cake all the way around
about half way up the cake.
That'll give your knife a marking to follow
as you cut all the way through.
Now I need to take my meringue disc
and see if it matches up with the size of my cake layers.
Sometimes meringue will expand a little bit,
so it might be a little bit too large.
If it is, no problem, just trim it down.
I have to trim mine.
And also, the little scraps
it's like sustained energy for cake baking.
Just eat 'em.
Going to want to build your cake
directly on what you want to serve it off of,
so I have my pedestal right here
because an ultimate birthday cake
deserves a great presentation.
Let's build.
Sprinkle with finely chopped honey roasted peanuts
for a little extra peanut flavor.
And I love the crunch as I eat the cake.
Do your first two layers
and then, add your meringue disc
so that it's right in the center of the cake.
Press it down firmly,
we want it to adhere to the icing underneath
but still get past all the nuts
that we just sprinkled around
so you want to press it down.
And if it crumbled a little bit as you cut,
don't worry about it,
you can always add a piece right back on to the icing,
no one will ever know.
And then just continue with your icing
and the rest of your cake layers.
Ice the top of your final layer
and then just crumb coat the sides.
We want the beautiful, dark cake
to show through the icing here.
When your cake is fully crumb coated,
go ahead and clean up the cake pedestal
or your cake serving plate
and then pop it into the refrigerator.
We're gonna let it chill while we make our ganache coating.
For the ganache, you'll need six ounces
of semi sweet chocolate chopped finely
and three quarters of a cup of heavy whipping cream.
After you've microwaved for a minute at 50 percent power,
take it out of the microwave and stir it together.
This might be all the time that you need.
If it's not, pop it back in the microwave
at 50 percent power
for another 30 seconds.
So my cake is chilled
and my ganache has cooled for about 15 minutes
now we can pour it over the top and let it drizzle
all the way down the cake.
Check it out.
Super shiny
and really, really decadent.
I'm gonna do a nice dose of it on the top.
And then just guide it down the sides and over the cake
using a small spatula.
I want it to drip where it's gonna drip.
Oh!
There it is, that's what I'm looking for.
Happy birthday to me.
So now I'm going to add all the delicious garnishes
that we prepared earlier
and I'm gonna start with the meringue.
I'm gonna put a really big one off to the side here
and then I'm gonna add some candy shards,
I kind of cut it angularly,
so you can see the peanut butter inside
of the peanut butter cup
but also so they kind of make angles, triangles
and I just wanna make a really cool,
kind of a chaotic assortment.
Playing with the size and the different colors
of my pieces.
Arrange as you will.
And to top it all off,
a sprinkling of peanuts
all the way around my arrangement,
kind of falling inside a little bit,
like to use the little really dusty pieces here, too.
I think it looks really, really pretty.
And there you go,
my ultimate birthday cake.
Let's cut in.
So this is what I would say
is the ultimate piece of birthday cake.
Check it out.
I've got my delicious, moist chocolate cake layers
and my scrumptious, awesome
peanut butter cream cheese icing
and you can't see it 'cause the color is so similar,
but that surprise layer of meringue is in there too
and it's gonna be nice, chewy and crunchy at the same time.
I'm gonna give it a taste.
Get a little meringue in there too.
You know what?
It tastes like my birthday.
Tastes pretty good.
So, I want to know what your favorite birthday cake is.
Leave me a comment below
and maybe we'll make it.
Please subscribe to the channel and give us a like.
I'm Beth,
thanks for celebrating my birthday with me,
and if it's your birthday, happy birthday to you.
I'll see you next time.