So, I went strawberry picking!
After a really fun day of strawberry picking, I had about 5 pounds of strawberries that I had to do SOMETHING with. I decided to freeze them for a week while I thought about what to make. After a week of trying to decide between cupcakes, cake, pie, or thumbprint cookies I finally decided that I wanted to do a fun duo of a cake with cupcakes because I had PLENTY of strawberries to work with anyway.
The design came to me after re arranging my office in my house. The color scheme in my office is pink, white, and gold. I wanted to make a cake that matched that level of sophistication that came with finally having a real desk and not a beer pong table with a table cloth on it. I also wanted to challenge myself by trying to get my buttercream really smooth. Before this cake, I was using watercolor designs on cakes to hide the fact that I am not very good at getting that smooth, crisp finish that everyone on Instagram seems to have mastered.
I went into this cake with full intentions of experimenting with flavor, design, and was DETERMINED to make this a cake I would be proud of.
I decided to make a strawberry shortcake cake with cupcakes. this was a real task because I could've easily just made a strawberry shortcake, but that was too easy and I wanted the cake to just have light hints towards a strawberry shortcake. The buttercream on this cake is actually a whipped buttercream similar to what you would get on a Publix cake. The cake itself was a french vanilla box mix cake that I added sour cream and extra egg whites to. I learned about adding sour cream to box mix back when I was 15 and making cupcakes for a wedding shower. The middle of the cake had my whipped buttercream and strawberry compote made from the frozen strawberries.
The design came to me after re arranging my office in my house. The color scheme in my office is pink, white, and gold. I wanted to make a cake that matched that level of sophistication that came with finally having a real desk and not a beer pong table with a table cloth on it. I also wanted to challenge myself by trying to get my buttercream really smooth. Before this cake, I was using watercolor designs on cakes to hide the fact that I am not very good at getting that smooth, crisp finish that everyone on Instagram seems to have mastered.
I went into this cake with full intentions of experimenting with flavor, design, and was DETERMINED to make this a cake I would be proud of.
I decided to make a strawberry shortcake cake with cupcakes. this was a real task because I could've easily just made a strawberry shortcake, but that was too easy and I wanted the cake to just have light hints towards a strawberry shortcake. The buttercream on this cake is actually a whipped buttercream similar to what you would get on a Publix cake. The cake itself was a french vanilla box mix cake that I added sour cream and extra egg whites to. I learned about adding sour cream to box mix back when I was 15 and making cupcakes for a wedding shower. The middle of the cake had my whipped buttercream and strawberry compote made from the frozen strawberries.
Here is a tip if you are going to freeze your strawberries: double bag them. I did not and some of them got that gross freezer burnt taste to them and made them unusable.
The cupcakes had everything that the cake had, except my strawberry compote was placed in the middle of the cake batter and then put in the oven. I slightly regret that because strawberry got EVERYWHERE and they were quite sticky! Delicious, but a mess. Next time I will bake the cupcakes, then core them and fill them. But who doesn't love a learning experience?
Overall this was just super fun to learn about baking and coming up with flavors and was a fun challenge! As you can tell by the pictures, I got my buttercream pretty smooth (I think it being SO whipped made it easier to spread).
Follow me on Instagram to learn more about my techniques on how I achieved this design! Instagram: livingthebuttercream
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