All American Fourth of July Cake

What is more awesome than feeling patriotic this time of year….We know, feeling patriotic through sweets! What we love about this cake is that it is so beautiful (as well as tasty), it almost transports you to feeling like you are sitting next to Marie Antoinette stuffing your faces with pastries. This cake is slightly rustic, and easy on the eyes, and the tongue.

Side note- We were lucky enough to pick and use blueberries from our own yard, so we highly suggest starting to grow your own!

Ingredients:

Cake:
12 tablespoons (1 1/2 sticks) unsalted butter, room temperature, plus more for pans
2 1/2 cups all-purpose flour (spooned and leveled), plus more for pans
1 tablespoon baking powder
1 teaspoon salt
3/4 cups sugar
2 large eggs, plus 3 large egg yolks (reserving whites for meringue, plus 1 additional white)
1 teaspoon pure vanilla extract
1 cup milk
Blue food coloring
1 cup blueberries (some set aside for decoration)

Frosting:
4 tablespoons unsalted butter, room temperature
4 cups confectioners' sugar, sifted
1/4 teaspoon pure vanilla extract
6 ounces cream cheese, room temperature
Red food coloring

Cake:

Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Take two 8 inch round cake pines, line the bottom with parchment paper, butter, it, and dust with flour. Sometimes I butter the pan before I put the parchment down so it sticks better. In a large bowl, whisk flour, baking powder and salt together and put aside.
In a separate large bowl, using an electric mixer beat butter (make sure it is soft, so leave out for a while before baking), with sugar until completely smooth. Add your eggs and your yolks one at a time while blending, once you finish adding the eggs, add the vanilla and blend. Now you alternate adding the flour and the milk, beginning and ending with the flour- a tip Francesca learned from her beloved Martha Stewart.

Fun part now is adding the food coloring, add as many drops as you need for the desired depth of color, and then fold the blueberries in with a spatula so you don’t break them.

Divide the batter in between both pans and bake for 25-30 minutes, or until you poke with a toothpick and it comes out clean. Once done baking let cool in the pan for ten minutes, then flip out of the pans onto cooling racks so they are upside down, and let completely cool.

Frosting:

Super easy frosting…just place all of the ingredients into a bowl and blend, and add food coloring until it is pink or red as you like.
Now assemble all the elements of the cake. Frost in between the two layers, and then all around. Don’t worry about all the frosting being perfect, some runny frosting will add some beautiful character. Add a dash of blueberries for character. Slice. Eat! Let them eat cake…in the name of the USA!