strawberry lemonade cake

I was already planning on making a chocolate cake for Mupma's birthday, so I wanted the second cake I made to be the total opposite.  Light and fruity.  What could be better than a strawberry lemonade cake?  Sweet, tart, light, fluffy.  Total heaven.

Have I mentioned already that I'm POSITIVE there is nothing scarier in the entire world then transporting cakes?  Just imagine trying to drive somewhere with a big gift, two wiggly boys, and TWO cakes?  One of which was on a pedestal?  Completely terrifying.  Luckily Jeff is awesome.  He put one cake at his feet (with a cover over it just in case!) and held onto the pedestal cake while I drove like two miles an hour.  Or, at least it felt like it.  It was the biggest relief ever to get to my parent's house and set the cakes down.

Once the cake has been made and cooled completely, frost the bottom layer and lay thinly sliced strawberries over the top and tightly as possible.  You want to get a good strawberry chunk in every bite.  Make sure the strawberry slices have been washed and dried thoroughly before slicing.

There is nothing better than a nice fresh strawberry!

Place the second layer of cake over the strawberry slices and finish frosting the cake.  This cake came out of the oven with fairly flat tops so I didn't need to slice off any puffy tops.  I just left them as-is.  If you want to place strawberries like this around the edges of the cake, just make sure they have been stemmed and thoroughly rinsed and dried.  Also, you might want to do this part as close to serving as possible.  You really don't want to deal with the possibility of them dripping juice down the side of the cake, or sliding around on top.  No thank you!  Also, this cake should be refrigerated as soon as you finish frosting.

I just love a nice fluffy fruity cake.  It is just such a classic look.

The worst part about there being two cakes at a party is that you feel like you need to try both of them!  I love my chocolate cake, so I needed a sliver, but I was trying out new recipes with this strawberry lemonade cake, so OF COURSE I needed a little piece of it too.  *sigh*  I suppose this is a great example of first world problems?  :)

If you saw my previous post you've already seen this photo.  I made both cakes for my Mupma's birthday party.  Because you need options when it comes to cakes.

Also, I don't believe there is a four year old alive who doesn't try to help blow out birthday candles when the chance presents itself.  Am I right?

Lemon Velvet Cake
recipe from Rock Recipes
http://www.rockrecipes.com/lemon-velvet-cake/

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Prep time

20 mins

Cook time

35 mins

Total time

55 mins

Developed from an outstanding Red Velvet Cake recipe, this lemon cake is a perfectly moist and tender crumbed cake with a lemony buttercream frosting. An ideal birthday cake for the lemon lover in your life.

Ingredients

• 1¼ cups sifted all purpose flour
• 1½ cups sifted cake flour
• ½ teaspoon baking soda
• 1½ tsp baking powder
• 1 teaspoon salt
• 1½ cups sugar
• ⅔ cup vegetable oil
• ⅓ cup vegetable shortening at room temperature
• 1 tsp good quality vanilla extract
• 2 tsp pure lemon extract
• 3 large eggs
• 1½ cups buttermilk
• zest of two small or one large lemons, grated and finely chopped

Instructions

1. Grease and flour 2 nine inch round cake pans and line the bottom with 2 circles of parchment paper. Sift together both flours, baking soda. baking powder, salt and sugar, Set aside.
2. In the bowl of an electric mixer beat together the vegetable oil, shortening, vanilla and lemon extract. Beat well at high speed with whisk attachment until light and fluffy
3. Beat the eggs in one at a time.
4. Fold in the lemon zest.
5. Fold in the dry ingredients alternately with the buttermilk.
6. I always add dry ingredients in three divisions and liquid ingredients in 2 divisions. It is very important to begin and end the additions with the dry ingredients. Do not over mix the batter. As soon as it has no lumps in the batter, pour into the two prepared 9 inch cake pans.
7. Bake at 325 degrees F for 30-35 minutes or until a wooden toothpick inserted in the center comes out clean. Allow the cake to cool in the pans for 10 minutes before turning out onto wire racks to cool completely.

Fresh Strawberry Frosting

(I kinda made this recipe up, and it worked fine, but frosted cake should be refrigerated until ready to serve, and if you want the frosting to be extra stiff add an extra 1/2 to 1 cup of powdered sugar)

Ingredients:

• 2/3 cup fresh strawberried, stemmed and sliced
• 1 cup butter, room temperature
• 4 1/2 cups powdered sugar (add 1/2 to 1 cup more for firmer frosting)
• 2 tsp vanilla extract

Directions:

1. Puree the strawberries.  Set aside.
2. Add butter to stand mixer and beat several minutes until white and creamy, stopping to scrape down the sides as needed.
3. Add 1 cup of powdered sugar to the butter and beat until creamy.
4. Add 1 more cup of powdered sugar and beat again until creamy.  
5. Add the strawberry puree and beat.
6. Add remaining powdered sugar and vanilla and beat until fluffy.  
7. For extra thick frosting add in additional powdered sugar, otherwise, frost the cake.  

note: There will be about 2 cups leftover frosting unless you frost very thickly.  If desired add stemmed strawberries in a ring around the top edges like I did.  If you are planning on doing that, wait until the last second and make sure the strawberries are very well dried.  Otherwise strawberry juice might start dripping down the side of you cake.