Part 3 How to bake a wedding cake at home with all the recipes

Zweistöckige Hochzeitstorte

Part three of my series on how to bake a wedding cake at home is about the recipes and amounts. Before I give these for each cake separately below, I will first give the full list of ingredients, which will help you when you buy them. I would strongly recommend getting more ingredients than you need, just in case something goes wrong. I hadn’t planned to bake three chocolate cake layers. Somehow they were thinner than expected, so I felt I shouldn’t cut them in half and decided to make three thicker layers instead. I was very happy I had enough ingredients at hand. As you can see on below picture, I ended up with three thicker layers of cake and two layers of filling instead of the planned four cake layers.

I also figured that the Swiss meringue buttercream would probably be hard to make during the hot summer weather in Spain. As expected, the buttercream was super soupy and I first had to cool it for a while before it got this silky consistency Swiss meringue is so famous for. Chilling is key for making a wedding cake. The entire cake should be chilled at least for one full night, I managed to chill mine for two complete days, which was great and which helped to transport it. It only had to be transported for 10 minutes and managed without any problem. It did sit at room temperature for several hours before it was cut into, but since it had been chilled for so long, there was no problem at all and it looked perfectly fresh (see picture below).

But now let’s get started, if you are interested in my planning, check this blog post.

Full list of all ingredients:

  • 480 grams of semi-sweet chocolate
  • 2 packages of instant caramel pudding mix
  • 780 grams of brown sugar
  • 560 grams of regular sugar
  • 19 fresh eggs
  • 12 egg whites (I like to use pasteurized egg whites, here in Germany these from pumperlgesund are my favorite)
  • 1,145 grams of flour
  • Baking poweder
  • Baking soda
  • Unsweetened cocoa powder
  • Instant coffee
  • 380 grams of milk (I used full-fat)
  • 500 grams of heavy cream
  • 550 grams of mascarpone
  • 550 grams of quark
  • 300 grams of cream cheese
  • 150 grams of natural yoghurt
  • 1975 grams of butter (I bought 2 kilos)
  • 220 grams of neutral oil
  • 260 grams of carrots
  • 140 grams of walnuts
  • Ground cinnamon, ginger, and nutmeg
  • Vanilla extract

American Carrot Cake, 18cm

  • 140 grams of walnuts
  • 220 grams of neutral oil
  • 200 grams of brown sugar
  • 4 eggs
  • 150 grams of natural yoghurt
  • 1 teaspoon of vanilla extract
  • 260 grams of coarrits
  • 320 grams of all-purpose flour
  • 1 teaspoon of baking powder
  • 1 teaspoon of baking soda
  • 1 teaspoon of cinnamon
  • 1/2 teaspoon of ground ginger
  • 1/4 teaspoon of nutmeg

Cream Cheese Frosting

  • 60 grams of all-purpose flour
  • 160 grams of regular sugar
  • 380 grams of milk
  • 300 grams of butter, at room temperature
  • 300 grams of cream cheese
  • 1-2 teaspoons of cinnamon

Preheat oven to 150 degrees and line two 18cm springforms with parchment paper. Also line a baking sheet with parchment paper. Spread the walnuts on the baking sheet and bake for about 7-8min. Let cool and chop roughly. Heat oven to 180 degrees Celsius. For the cake mix oil, sugar, eggs, yoghurt and vanilla extract in a large bowl and whisk together. Peel and grate the carrots, add to the mix and fold under the walnuts. Add all remaining ingredients and only mix until combied. Divide evenly between the two form and bake for about 30-35min. An inserted toothpick should come out clean. Let cool and cut in half each.

Meanwhile prepare the cream cheese frosting. Combine flour, sugar and milk in a pot and bring to a boil while stirring constantly with a whisk. Once it gets bubbly, whisk and let cook for about two to three minutes until really thick. Place plastic foil on the surface and let cool immediately. Beat the butter for about five minutes until creamy and lighter in color, then add the flour mix by the spoonful. Briefly mix in cream cheese and cinnamon. If your frosting is too souply, chill for about ten minutes and it is spreadable.

Chocolate Caramel Cake with Coffee, 26cm
The batter has to be prepared three times, below gives only enough for one 26cm cake layer

  • 160 grams of chopped semi-sweet chocolate
  • 225 grams of butter at room temeprature
  • 160 grams of brown sugar
  • 5 eggs
  • 1 ½ teaspoons of vanilla extract
  • 275 grams of all-purpose flour
  • ½ package of baking powder (about 2 teaspoons)
  • 3 tablespoons of unsweetened cocoa powder
  • 215 grams of freshly brewed coffee made with instant coffee and hot water

Caramel Frosting (frosting as given below is enough to frost all layers)

  • 500 grams of heavy cream
  • 550 grams of mascarpone
  • 550 grams of quark
  • 100 grams of brown sugar
  • 2 packages of instant caramel pudding
  • I also added half a can of dulce de leche

For the chocolate cake first chop the chocolate. Line the bottom of a 26cm springform with parchment paper and preheat oven to 180 degrees Celsius. Then beat the soft butter with the sugar in a large bowl for about two minutes.  Add the eggs one at a time and beat in each for about 30 seconds. Add vanilla extract, flour, paking powder, cocoa and mix in the coffee. The batter will be relatively thin, this is normal. Fold in chopped chocolate last. Bake for 30-35 minutes, an inserted toothpick should come out clean. Let cool for ten minutes, then release from forms and let cool completely. As stated, I made three of these for the wedding cake as these are a bit thicker, but not thick enough to cut in half.

For the caramel frosting beat the cream until stiff, mix in all other ingredients briefly.

Swiss Meringue Buttercream

  • 12 egg whites (or 360 grams from pumperlgesund)
  • 400 grams of regular sugar
  • 1 kilogram of butter, at room temperature

Prepare a waterbath and put egg whites and sugar in the smaller pot. Heat the water until the egg whites reach 71 degrees Celsius. If you don’t have a thermometer (I didn’t in Spain), you shouldn’t feel any sugar crystals when rubbing the mixture between your fingers. This usually takes a few minutes. Be sure to stir all the time while waiting for the sugar to dissolve. Pour the mixture into a large mixing bowl and beat until you have stiff meringue and the mixture has cooled off and is at room temperature. As this is a large amount, I believe it took me about 15 minutes. Then add the one kilo of butter by the spoonful, this again takes quite some time. The butter needs to have room temperature. In my case the mixture got soupy as it was very hot on that day. I simply placed it for about 15min in the freezer and then beat it all again until it got this silky texture Swiss meringue is so famous for. If it gets grainy, you may wish to heat a small amount or place the whole bowl briefly in a waterbath. Key is to have butter and the meringue at the same temperature for it to really combine nicely. This buttercream should always be applied at room temperature. You can chill it overnight in the fridge, but be sure to leave it at room temperature for about an hour before frosting a cake. It usually helps to beat it again for a minute if you chilled it for a longer period of time.

Zweistöckige weiße HochzeitstorteIm the last part of these series you will learn how I assembled, transported and decorated the wedding cake. See an overview below:

Part 1: How to calculate how large you want to make a cake and how many tiers

Part 2: How to plan and schedule your baking

Part 4: How to transport and stack a wedding cake

Featured photo and last picture by Hueto Fotógrafos

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