Happy Halloween

On the final night of Halloween Michael and I have made for you a devilishly delicious spiced black velvet cake oozing with a red strawberry cream cheese frosting. Make this if you dare, for you are doomed to eat the whole thing at once!!!

Ingredients:

Cake:
Vegetable oil for the pans
2 oz Black food coloring
2 1/2 cups all-purpose flour
1 1/2 cups sugar
1 teaspoon baking soda
1 teaspoon fine salt
½ teaspoon cinnamon
1 teaspoon cocoa powder
1 1/2 cups vegetable oil
1 cup buttermilk, at room temperature
2 large eggs, at room temperature
1 oz black gel food coloring
1 teaspoon white distilled vinegar
1 teaspoon vanilla extract

Frosting:
1 oz red food coloring
1 cup macerated strawberries
4 cups powdered sugar
1 cup butter
8 oz cream cheese
1 tsp vanilla extract

To start make your cream cheese frosting, because you want it to harden a bit in the refrigerator. We made two frostings, one to hold the cake together, and the other to create the eerie drips. In a large bowl whip together 2 cups of powdered sugar, ½ a cup of room temperature butter, 8 oz of cream cheese, 1 oz red food coloring, and 1 tsp vanilla extract. Now macerate your strawberries and add them to the frosting, this will make it soupy, and this will be the frosting you use to make the drips.

In another bowl, beat the rest of your butter and powdered sugar together, adding about a cup of the soupy frosting mix, to make a thick frosting you can use to hold the layers of cake together. Refrigerate and use after you bake the cakes.

In a large bowl, sift together the flour, sugar, baking soda, salt, spice, and cocoa powder. In another large bowl, whisk together the oil, buttermilk, eggs, food coloring, vinegar, and vanilla.

Using a hand mixer, mix the dry ingredients into the wet ingredients until just combined and a smooth batter is formed.

Divide the cake batter evenly among the prepared cake pans. Place the pans in the oven evenly spaced apart. Bake, rotating the pans halfway through the cooking, until the cake pulls away from the side of the pans, and a toothpick inserted in the center of the cakes comes out clean, about 30 minutes.

Remove the cakes from the oven and run a knife around the edges to loosen them from the sides of the pans. One at a time, invert the cakes onto a plate and then re-invert them onto a cooling rack, rounded-sides up. Let cool completely, if you don’t, even your stiff frosting will be runny.

To assemble the cake, us the cake layers as is, cake layers are rounded and usually you cut them to perfection, but we left them as is to create this morbid beast of a looking cake. So place the first layer on your plate or cake stand, cover the first cake layer with the stiff frosting, then dollop a large spoonful of soupy frosting and spread around letting some drip down the sides. Place the second cake layer on top, smooshing it down a bit to stay, and repeat. Once you have the final layer, really lay on top that soupy frosting to get that gory effect. This cake without fail will be the spookiest thing in the room with the harsh black cake up against the oozing red frosting!

Happy Halloween!!!