Purple Rose Ombre Cake

A simple yet stunning cake decorated with piped roses. It's much easier to make than it looks! Makes a great birthday cake.

This November was a dismal month, Weeks and weeks of rain ( I love rain but when it rains day and night it just gets depressing), extremely cold nights, and to top that all of exams! I haven't had time to bake much less blog.
This is usually how it is every year. October, for me, is an awesome month because my birthday(!) is at the end of it. Following the excitement of that November is pale in comparison.
So maybe you an guess what this cake was. That's right. My birthday cake!

I normally don't make my birthday cake. But this year, I just had to. 

Looking at these pictures, you could probably also guess what my favorite colour is. PURPLE!

Which is why this cake has 3 shades of it!

Piping these roses is not as hard as it looks. You just need a Wilton 1M tip  and this tutorial on the rose frosting technique. Couldn't be easier.

The cake underneath all these gorgeous roses is a simple white cake. Most of the white cake recipes available on the internet use only egg whites, I felt this was a complete waste of eggs, so I had to do quite a bit of searching to find a recipe that used whole eggs. I finally found one at Add a Pinch. It was perfect! Using whole eggs gives much better flavour to the egg and although this cake is not completely white, it's still pretty white (not yellow).

The cake is filled and crumb coated with a Fluffy Vanilla Buttercream frosting. The roses are done with the same frosting but with a lot more icing sugar in it.

Here is how I made this gorgeous cake. The colour of the roses can be changed if you like :)

The Best White Cake adapted from Add a Pinch
(Makes a 3 layer, 9-inch cake)

227 grams/8 oz/1 cup unsalted butter, softened
113 grams/4 oz/ 1/2 cup vegetable shortening (I substituted with margarine)
600 grams/21 oz/3 cups sugar
5 eggs, at room temp.
375 grams/13.2 oz/3 cups all-purpose flour
2 teaspoons baking powder
1/2 teaspoon salt
250 ml, 1/2 cup milk, at room temp.
125 ml, 1/2 cup buttermilk, at room temp.(1/2 cup milk+ 1/2 tbsp lemon juice)
1 1/2 teaspoons vanilla
1/4 teaspoon almond extract

Preheat the oven to 180C, 350F. Grease and line three 9-inch round cake tins, coating the sides with a little flour.
Sift all the dry ingredients into a large bowl. Pour the milk, buttermilk and vanilla into a jug and stir with a fork to combine.
Cream the butter and shortening with an electric whisk, for about 3 minutes. Gradually add the sugar, one cup at a time, making sure each cup is fully incorporated.
Add the eggs, one at a time, beating well between each addition (you can add a spoonful of the flour to make sure the mixture does not curdle).
With the electric mixer on lowest speed, add the dry ingredients alternately with the milk mixture,beginning and ending with the dry ingredients.Scrape down the sides and bottom of the bowl as needed.
Evenly distribute the batter between the three prepared pans. Bake for 20-25 minute until golden brown on top and a skewer inserted into the centre comes out clean.
Allow the cakes to cool in the tins for 5 minutes before turning out onto a wire rack to cool completely.


Fluffy Vanilla Buttercream

227 grams/8 oz/1 cup unsalted butter, softened*
375 grams/ 13 oz/ 3 cups icing sugar, sifted
1 1/2 teaspoons vanilla extract
2-3 tablespoons milk
1/8 teaspoon salt

With an electric mixer on the highest setting, beat the butter for 3-4 minutes until pale and smooth.
Turn the speed to low and slowly add the icing sugar, 1/2 a cup at a time until fully incorporated. Add the salt, vanilla and  2 tablespoons of milk and turn the mixer to a high speed and beat for another minute or two.
If the frosting isn't at the right consistency for spreading, add the third tablespoon of milk and beat a little more on medium speed.


*To make this frosting very fluffy a lot of air must be incorporated during the beating process. For this to happen , the butter must be just softened and still a bit firm but not cold. It should not be over-softened so that its greasy. You should be able to press down on the butter and leave an indent easily without your finger sliding anywhere. If the butter is too soft, you won't be able to incorporate enough air.

Firm Buttercream (for the roses)

227 grams/8 oz/1 cup unsalted butter, softened*
625 grams/ 22 oz/ 5 cups icing sugar, sifted
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
1/4 teaspoon almond extract
2-3 tablespoons milk
1/8 teaspoon salt
Purple gel food colouring*

With an electric mixer on the highest setting, beat the butter for 3-4 minutes until pale and smooth.
Turn the speed to low and slowly add the icing sugar, 1/2 a cup at a time until fully incorporated. Add the salt, extracts and  2 tablespoons of milk and turn the mixer to a high speed and beat for another minute or two.

If the buttercream is too thick add the rest of the milk and beat again.

How to pipe the roses.....

Prepare 3 piping bags fitted with Wilton 1M tips.

Take roughly a third of the buttercream and  colour it with enough food colouring to make the deepest shade of purple you want (it's entirely up to you).

Pipe the bottom of the cake with rosettes and if there are little spaces, fill those up with a star.

Once you are done with the bottom layer of roses, squeeze out all the remaining purple buttercream into a bowl, add some more buttercream and a little more colouring to make the second shade of purple. This way, no frosting is wasted!

Pipe the second layer of roses. Squeeze out the frosting in the bad and add it to the rest of the buttercream. Colour it the lightest shade of purple and pipe the top of the cake, filling up any gaps with stars as you go.(you can see how I've done this in the pictures)

*Gel food colouring gives a good intensity of colour without diluting the frosting.