Lego Party… Lego Cake and cake baking tips

LEGO!!!  What is more fun than a Lego party?  Well the Lego Cake of course!

I love cake decorating, and I thought I would share a few cake tips that have made preparing awesome cakes so much easier.

I started decorating cakes about 5 years ago, and it is just a hobby.  When I make one it takes quite a bit of “me” time…which you can imagine is a little tricky with 2 young kids.  So I really only make cakes for my kids (and my nieces).

For this particular cake I tapped into a new source.  Jaime from Hands on: as we grow. (remember her from earlier?)  She gave me a really easy, really yummy, cake recipe.  Would you like it?  I guess I can share;)

Chocolate Lovers Chocolate Cake Recipe

18oz pkg cake mix with pudding
(important to get the kind WITH 1 cup pudding added)
8 oz pkg sour cream
½ cup salad oil
½ cup water
4 eggs

Preheat oven to 350 degrees (F). Beat 5 minutes at medium
speed. Stir in 1 ½ cups chocolate chips. Pour into greased 12 cup
Bundt pan. Bake about 50 minutes. Test with toothpick to see if
it’s done (or press gently with finger, if it bounces back right away, it’s done).

Let cool.

Icing

½ cup brown sugar
½ cup white sugar
¼ cup milk
1/3 cup butter

Bring to a boil for 1 minute. Take off heat and add ½ cup
chocolate chips. Stir until it cools a little and thickens. Pour over top of cake.

(I made a couple of changes to so the recipe would fit my needs.  I doubled it, and used rectangle pans.  I used the Icing as a filling and used butter cream to frost the cake.)  The cake was FANTASTIC!  I will most definitely use this recipe again.

Here some cake saving tips…

1.  Prepping the pan is REALLY important!  Grease the pan with shortening,  then add a piece of parchment paper to the bottom of the pan.  (You can find parchment paper with the wax paper and tin foil at any store.)  Grease the top of the parchment paper.  Sprinkle some powdered sugar into the pan and shake it around to coat the entire pan.

2.  When you bake a cake the outside of the cake cooks first which causes the center to rise above the edges.  When you want your cake to be even and flat…that is a very bad way to start.  So I learned of this simple trick.  Wrap damp towels (wet but not dripping) around the edges of the pan.  That’s it.  So simple, and the cake rises perfect, with no burnt edges or puffy middle!

3.  Always allow your cake enough time to cool before moving to the next step.  If you rush it, the cake will crumble. =(  I have a pretty good system and I set the timer to make sure I don’t jump the gun.  I leave the cake in the pan (out of the oven) for 10 minutes.  I use a knife to loosen the edges, and then flip it onto a cooling rack.  Then I keep my hands off for an hour.

4.  No matter what type of frosting you are using (homemade or store bought) make sure to have too much.  Frosting works best if you pile it on and then scrape it off!  Before you start frosting though…do a crumb coat.  For a crumb coat, you will use a small amount of frosting thinned with water.  Coat the cake (it doesn’t need to be pretty, just covered).  Put the coated cake in the fridge for 30 min – 1 hour.  When you bring it out to frost all of the crumbs will be trapped in the crumb coat making it way easier to frost the cake!

Big M’s Lego Party Cake

I made Lego bricks out of fondant.  (Little M helped with the “i”.)

I think it turned out pretty cute!

YUM!  (Wondering where I got that super cool ice box/cake display?  Hubs whipped it up after hearing me complain about watching all of my hard work melt in the sun.  There is ice in the bottom and it kept the cake cool! Hooray!!!)

This post is a part of the Lego Party lesson plan.