I just celebrated a birthday. A significant one to me. But this post is not about birthday cake. Well, not my birthday cake. I did get one (actually two), but I wasn’t responsible for the baking of either one of them. What I did get for my birthday, among other things, was a cake decorating class from my husband. In other words I signed myself up for a course called “Wedding Cakes and Pastries” offered by the Toronto District School Board. It’s once a week for 9 weeks and it started last night. The bonus is I’m taking it with my good friend, Karen, making it that much more fun. There were about a dozen of us sitting around the staff room table at the local high school. All I brought was myself and my apron (which says “Just Call Me Martha” on it) and we spent the next 2 hours learning about different kinds of cakes, icings and tools required from our lovely instructor, Margaret. She even demonstrated how to make her version of tiramisu–what I call a “no bake cake”–that would impress the pants off of any guest you have over for dinner. Her secret is making it look just like a cake instead of layering it in a dish using sweetened whipped cream like icing, which she made herself. Not unlike Martha Stewart’s recipe for sweetened whipped cream, it only requires three ingredients: whipping cream, icing sugar and vanilla. She begins by dipping lady fingers into coffee and then dousing them in a liquer of your choice (she uses Kahlua). Margaret then arranged the lady fingers side by each in a small rectangle. She put the sweetened whipped cream between two layers of cookies and then slathered the whole thing with another layer of the whipped cream. To make it pretty, she made rosettes out of the whipped cream using a piping bag, and then puts a coffee bean on each rosette. The finishing touch is a light dusting cocoa and cinnamon. We each got to sample it and it was light and delicious and not overly sweet. Now I’ve got a laundry list of cake decorating implements to acquire and a doozy of an assignment: my son’s 6th birthday cake in 2 weeks. I’ll keep you posted on how that one is coming along.
Sweetened Whipped Cream
1 cup of whipping cream (35%)
2 tablespoons icing sugar
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
Directions: with a hand mixer or standing mixer, beat the cream and sugar on high until it begins to stiffen. Then add the vanilla extract and keep beating until cream is stiff and forms peaks.
Margaret’s Tip: chill the bowl and beaters before whipping the cream. This will encourage the cream to stiffen.