One of my sweet nephews turned seven recently. He has just started reading “Harry Potter” and was able to watch “The Chamber of Secrets” this week! I have been waiting on pins and needles for one of my nieces and/ or nephews to get hooked so that I can share the magic with them.
I asked him before Christmas what kind of cake he would like. I had planned on making fun sorting hat cupcakes. He was precise with his request, and it quickly changed my course. ‘I’d like a vanilla cake, I guess, with strawberries. So it tastes fresh. Sometimes (I think) cake is just so sweet.’
While I had my heart initially set on the sorting hat cupcakes, it was much better to prepare something exactly as he wanted it. I would find something else to create a magical element. (Besides, he’s only seven, he isn’t old enough to be sorted yet. #hufflepuffforlife). I even practiced by attempting to mold a tootsie roll into a sorting hat at lunch one day. Some of my friends and family immediately knew it was the sorting hat. Not everyone was convinced. They may or may not have thought it looked like Poo. So I made a poop Emoji out of another tootsie roll.
When I recovered from the fixation on the cupcakes, I realized I needed to make this as a whole cake instead. I wanted to bake my nephew some custom cookies in a wizard-like font to top his extraordinary cake.
I designed five cookie-cutters to spell out his name and capture his new age! There were some trials and errors in the designs. I cursed myself several times because I kept forgetting that you have to mirror numbers and letters to have them cut properly. It doesn’t matter for symmetrical letters, but in strange fonts, even a capital “A” is noticeable when printed backward. (Oops!)
Next came the cake itself. When I think of Vanilla cake and strawberries, I immediately imagine strawberry shortcakes. Especially the shortcakes in the grocery store that look like little fruit cups. (I have a basket weave shortcake pan, but I wasn’t sure that was the right call for a seventh birthday party). Instead, I baked a cake that would taste similar, and I planned to layer in the strawberries like a giant shortcake.
I baked the cake in two layers. (I should have baked it in three-layers instead of cutting the cake, it would have baked faster, but I only have two pans 10-inch pans). Due to the birthday boy’s aversion to overly sweet cake, I opted to use a thick whipped cream in lieu of a traditional frosting. I sliced and macerated the strawberries with some fresh lemon juice and a light dusting of sugar. I let the berries hang out while I sliced the cake and whipped the cream. Waiting allowed the juices to come out of the fruit and make a lovely light syrup for the cake.
With a cool cake, sliced and ready, I piped a dam of whipped cream around the edge of the cake. Next, I used a silicone basting brush and spread some of the excess strawberry syrup on the cake, followed by filling in the whipped cream and topping it with the sliced strawberries. I repeated this X3.
At the top of the cake, I used a large star tip to pipe the thick cream over the whole surface. I reserved 7 of the most beautiful strawberries to adorn the top of the cake. I hulled them and filled the void with some more whipped cream.
Earlier in the morning, I baked the sugar cookies for the cake. When they were cool, I sprayed them with edible gold paint and inserted some toothpicks in their base.
The birthday boy was coming over for a seafood feast (at his request), so I made a few other treats to compliment the cake and bring more magic into the day. I used a frog mold to make some fruit gummies and some chocolate frogs. The gummy frogs turned out great. (They felt like frogs). The chocolate frogs had very delicate front legs. Only one survived, but they were still tasty, and everyone enjoyed them.
We also had some divination butterbeer. (Add a drop of food color in the bottom of a glass under some ice and pour over your beverage for a colorful surprise).
I also sent them home with a dozen cookies I stamped with some cookies presses I got for Christmas. The impressions weren’t as crisp as I had anticipated (because of the fine details). It was a completely magical afternoon!
