Well there was a birthday in my house, last week, and I had the obligatory birthday cake order from my daughter to make a cake to her specifications. She wanted a vegan vanilla sponge cake and it was to be iced in a sage green topping with the addition of white flowers. Quite an abstract request which my daughter described as “minimalist”. My daughter isn’t vegan but after trying the Vegan Vanilla Cupcakes which I baked a couple of weeks ago she obviously liked them.
I have never used my vegan sponge cake recipe for anything but cupcakes so making a 8 inch cake from the mixture was a trial but it worked out very well. I baked the sponge the day before I was going to ice it just to give it time to settle and make it easier to decorate.
For the buttercream, I wanted to try something other than standard buttercream that would hold the sage green food colouring which I ordered from www.cocospantry.com. I went with the idea of making “russian buttercream” – something which I have never made before – but I will definitely be making it again. It was so easy to make using butter and condensed milk and it held the colour really well. The trick is to have the ingredients at the same temperature, whisk the butter till it changes colour before adding the condensed milk. If the buttercream separates it will come back together if it is placed in the fridge for 10 minutes and whisked again. Once I had the buttercream to the correct consistency I added the sage green colouring and a touch of vanilla extract.
I sandwiched the sponges together and covered it with the buttercream and then adorned it with the sugarpaste flowers which I had made a few days before. A quick piped buttercream crown on the top of the cake before I completed the cake with the birthday message which I wrote in icing. I wish I had made a video or two for TikTok and Youtube etc but I just didn’t have the time. 🙁 Maybe next time???
This cake didn’t take that long to decorate which is what I loved about it the most. I did like the overall look of the cake and I don’t think the photos did it justice. The birthday girl loved it so everything was good and I definitely fulfilled her birthday cake order 🙂