I saw this goose candle holder (from Camp Hollow) earlier this year, and how could I resist? He’s even wearing a tiny party hat! I knew the little guy had to take a starring role on my birthday cake this year, and it also gave me an excuse to get a little over-the-top with the decoration.
If you’re interested in doing something similar, you’ll need candy melts for the dramatic swishes (swipe it onto a piece of parchment like you’re a chef plating a fancy sauce), star sprinkles, two piping nozzles (I use a round and a star), and to try your hand at color-matching your frosting with food coloring.
WARNING: If you decide to also go for a dark blue frosting, be warned that it will dye your entire mouth blue. And uh, your insides… for at least 24 hours…
But, the cake. This is the same cake I make every year for my birthday because it is my absolute favorite cake in the world. Despite this, though, I realized I’ve never posted the recipe here. Whoops. Better late than never.
The cake is — deep inhale — yellow cake with vanilla bean pastry cream and fresh fruit filling and Italian buttercream frosting. I’ve also done Swiss meringue buttercream but if you can swing Italian buttercream, I say go for it because something about it is so much more silky and luxurious despite being comprised of the exact same ingredients as far as I can tell.
An unintended but nice thing: The cake and pastry cream uses egg yolks, but you will get to use some of the leftover egg whites on the buttercream. I like that symmetry.
I usually make the cake and pastry cream ahead of time, but recommend doing the buttercream the day you plan on assembling and decorating the cake. I know plenty of people say you can make buttercream ahead of time, but I’ve never gotten it to work. It just ends up hard and when I try to restore it, it separates and becomes a heartbreaking mess. Save yourself the grief (and eggs) and just make the buttercream on Assembly Day.
Finally, I recommend serving the cake chilled but not cold. Letting it sit out for about an hour before serving is perfect to let the frosting and cake soften while keeping the pastry cream nice and firm. I hope y’all love this cake as much as I do.
My Favorite Birthday Cake: Yellow Cake with Pastry Cream Filling
Equipment
- 2 8" round cake pans
Materials
Yellow Cake:
- 3 1/4 cups cake flour (425 g)
- 1 tbs baking powder
- 3/4 tsp salt
- 1 cup unsalted butter room temperature
- 2 cups sugar (400 g)
- 2 tsp vanilla bean paste
- 6 large egg yolks (120 g) room temperature
- 1 1/2 cups whole milk
Pastry Cream:
- 2 cups whole milk
- 1/2 vanilla bean seeds scraped out and pod discarded
- 1/4 tsp salt
- 1/2 cup and 1 tbs sugar (115 g)
- 5 tbs cornstarch (35 g)
- 1 whole large egg and 2 egg yolks
- 1/4 cup unsalted butter
Italian Buttercream:
- 5 large egg whites (180 g)
- 1/4 tsp cream of tartar
- 1 3/4 cups sugar (350 g)
- 3/4 cup water
- 2 cups unsalted butter
- 1 1/2 tsp vanilla extract
- 1/2 tsp fine sea salt
Other:
- 1/4 cup fresh fruit thinly sliced or halved — I usually do strawberries and raspberries
Instructions
Make the Cake
- Preheat the oven to 350°F and move rack to upper third. Grease and line two 8″ cake pans.
- In a large bowl, sift together the cake flour, baking powder, and salt.
- In the bowl of a stand mixer fitted with the paddle attachment, cream together the butter and sugar until light and fluffy on medium-high. This usually takes about 5 minutes. Scrape down the sides and bottom.
- With the mixer on medium-low, add the egg yolks one at a time, followed by the vanilla bean paste. Scrape down the sides and bottom again.
- Turn the mixer to low and add the flour mixture in three parts, alternating with the whole milk. Begin and end with the flour mixture.
- When the last of the flour has been added and incorporated, scrape down the sides and bottom of the mixer bowl one more time. Beat on medium for about 20 seconds to fully mix everything.
- Divide the batter between the two pans and bake for 30-35 minutes, or until a cake tester comes out clean in the center. Cool the cakes in their pans on a rack for 10 minutes before flipping them out and letting it cool completely on the rack.
- If you’re making the cakes ahead of time, wrap them in cling film after they’ve cooled and store in an airtight Ziploc bag in the fridge until assembly time.
Make the Pastry Cream Filling
- Bring the milk, salt, and scraped vanilla bean seeds to barely a simmer in a small pot over medium heat. Stir often to prevent the milk from scalding.
- While the milk is warming, whisk together the sugar, cornstarch, and eggs in a medium mixing bowl.
- When the milk is hot, carefully stream about 1/3 of it into the cornstarch-egg mixture making sure to frantically whisk the eggs the entire time so you don’t scramble them as you add the hot milk. Once that is well whisked, pour the now-hot egg mixture back into the pot with the rest of the milk.
- Whisk this constantly over medium heat until the mixture thickens. You want to bring it to just at a barely boil so that the cornstarch is cooked — look for a few bubbles as you whisk like a maniac. Do not let it boil more than this or else it’ll scramble. Once it’s as thick as pudding and you’ve seen the slow bubbles, immediately pull it off the heat.
- Quickly pass this through a fine mesh sieve into a mixing bowl to remove errant clumps. Whisk this mixture once in a while as you let it cool until it’s about 140°F — about 10 minutes, usually.
- Whisk in the butter one tablespoon at a time, letting the previous piece completely incorporate before adding the next one.
- Let cool in an airtight container overnight in the fridge before use. Just whisk it again the next day to loosen it up.
Make the Italian Buttercream
- Put egg whites and cream of tartar into the bowl of a stand mixer fitted with a whisk attachment.
- In a medium pot, bring the water and sugar to a boil. Stir until the sugar is dissolved, then let it boil untouched until it reaches 230°F. At this point, turn the stand mixer on at medium-high to whip the egg whites.
- When the sugar syrup mixture reaches 240°F — which should only be a few more minutes — take it off the heat. Kick the mixer up to high and slowly stream the syrup into your running mixer.
- Let the mixer keep running once all the syrup has been added until there’s no more heat escaping out of the top and the mixer bowl feels barely warm. This usually takes my mixer about half an hour. Yes, it’ll be loud.
- Once the bowl has cooled and your meringue is holding glossy stiff peaks, add the butter in one tablespoon at a time, allowing each addition to incorporate into the meringue before adding the next.
- When all the butter has been added and incorporated, add the vanilla extract and salt. Beat for another minute to fully incorporate. Your buttercream is now ready for use as is or to be colored.
- NOTE: If your mixture looks soupy during the butter-adding stage, pop it into the fridge for a few minutes before resuming the process.
ASSEMBLY:
- Slice each cake in two to form two layers. It's up to you whether to keep the last layer for yourself (yielding a three-layer cake) or for the cake (yielding a four-layer cake).
- Place one layer on your cake board.
- Pipe a dam of buttercream around the perimeter of the cake slice. This will keep your filling from oozing out.
- Spread a generous layer of pastry cream inside the dam, using as much as to match the height of the dam.
- Scatter the thinly sliced fruit on top and press it into the cream.
- Stack with the next slice of cake. Repeat steps 3-5 for the remaining layers except the last.
- Frost the outside of the cake with the remaining buttercream. Decorate as you like!
