Red velvet cake

At the recent Cake and Bake Show at Earls Court, I purchased a bottle of Lorann’s red velvet bakery emulsion.  I’ve always liked the look of red velvet cakes but was totally turned off by the amount of food colouring they require (I’ve seen recipes requiring 50 or even 60ml of colouring – yuck!)...and I could always taste it in the finished cake.  This product claimed to produce the required colour with only a single tablespoon.

I find my tastes change over time, so it’s important to revisit things I haven’t liked in the past.  Cream cheese frosting is a good example – although I’ve always loved cheesecake, oddly, cream cheese frosting left me cold.  I revisited it recently and enjoyed it...so here it is again!  My eatership (male, except for me) all said – independently of each other – how much they preferred this frosting to buttercream.  I think it’s because it is less sugary and has a sharp tang.  That said, I have the sweetest tooth in the world and I liked it too!

I think my cakes are red enough to look like a red velvet but without looking radioactive.  The sponge with a light cocoa flavour was nice and worked well with the creamy, tangy frosting.

The cake will also work made in two thicker layers but there is something so pretty about a three layer cake when cut into slices – maybe it’s the more even distribution of sponge and frosting?

Ingredients

For the sponges:

120g unsalted butter, at room temperature
300g golden caster sugar
2 eggs
300g plain flour
20g cocoa powder
230g buttermilk
1 tsp vanilla extract
1 tablespoon Lorann red velvet emulsion – or your preferred red colouring
1 tablespoon white wine vinegar
1 teaspoon bicarbonate of soda

For the frosting:

180g unsalted butter, at room temperature
150g icing sugar
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
450g cream cheese – I used Philadelphia

Method

Preheat the oven to 190°C/fan oven 170°C /375°F/Gas mark 5.

Line three 20cm loose bottomed sandwich tins with baking paper.  If you don’t have three you can either bake in batches, or use a 20cm round springform tin as the third tin.

Beat together the butter and caster sugar until really smooth and slightly whipped – it won’t go really light and fluffy because of the ratios involved.

Beat in the eggs one at a time.

Weigh out the flour and cocoa and beat a third into the batter.

Beat in half the buttermilk, followed by a further third of the flour/cocoa.

Repeat so that all the flour, cocoa and buttermilk is incorporated.

Beat in the vanilla and red velvet emulsion.

In a small bowl, mix together the vinegar and bicarbonate of soda, which will fizz rather dramatically, and add to the batter.

Spoon the batter into the three cake tins – you can weigh them if you want them to be identical, but I did it by eye.

Bake for 20-25 minutes or until a skewer inserted into the sponges comes out clean.  Mine took 23 minutes.

Leave the cakes to cool in the tin for 10 minutes, then turn out on to a wire rack, remove the paper and leave to cool.

Now make the frosting: beat together the butter and icing sugar in a large mixing bowl (I used my kitchenaid).

Beat in the vanilla extract.

Beat in the cream cheese, adding it a spoonful at a time, until your frosting is smooth and well combined.

Use just under half the frosting to sandwich together the three layers of sponge.

Use the ‘bigger half’ of the frosting to cover the top and sides. 

Refrigerate until you wish to serve, ideally removing from the fridge about 30 minutes beforehand.

Bask in the glory of the wonderful thing you have created.

Eat.