With every holiday, my whole family likes to get together for a meal and good times. 4th of July is no different. We all pack into our cars and drive up to Hendersonville, NC to have a BBQ at my Aunt's house. We all bring some sort of dish to share. I usually always bring a dessert. This year I wanted to challenge myself and decided to try my hand at a three layer cake. I couldn't just do a simple three layer cake, but decided to try to make a Flag Cake.
Take three 9-inch round cake pans and spray them with cooking spray and then lightly dust them with flour. Note: I learned in the end that my pans were not 9-inch pans and one of the three were not the same sizes.
I used two white cake box mixes to make my cake batter. Separate the batter into three bowls. Then I used food coloring to dye one layer red , blue, and leave one layer white. You will have leftover batter that you can make cupcakes with. Then follow the box directions and bake your cakes. Note: You will end up using a ton of food coloring. I have been told that food coloring gel works better.
Once you have allowed your cakes to cool in the pans for ten minutes, carefully remove each cake from its pan. Once removed and allow your layers to cool for an hour, use your cake lever tool or a knife to remove the hump in the middle of the cake. This will help make the stacking go easy and keep your cake level. Also use the cake lever and cut the red and white layer in half horizontally.
Note: It is best to bake the cakes the night before you wish to assemble and serve the cake; the overnight rest in the fridge makes the individual layers very easy to cut and frost. I learned this after I made the cake.
Now take one of the red layers, white layers, and the blue layer. Stack these layers red, white, and blue. Use a large mug or bowl and place on top in the middle of the blue layer and cute around the mug. You will end up with a small circle of red, white, and blue. Save the blue layer, the one with the middle cut out. Save the small circles of red and white layer. You can discard the rest of the red and white layer.
Note: Once you cut the layers, there is quite a bit of "waste" involved with this cake. But! Do not throw it away! You can save it and serve it, cut into pieces, with ice cream.
Now take the white layer and ice the top all the way to the edge.
Note: place your white layer on the cake holder or plate that you tend to store the cake in.
Next stack the red layer on top of the white layer. Then ice the top of the red layer all the way to the edge.
Next stack the blue layer on top of the red layer. You will want to use a spoon or small knife to ice the inside of the blue circle. Then place the white circle inside the blue hole. Then ice the top of the white circle and place the red circle on top. Try to make sure once the circles are in the blue hole that the top of the cake is level. As you can see I has some problems with this. Once you have all the layers together ice the whole cake.
I think I accidentally did a crumb coat on my cake. Because once I iced the cake I realized that I had tons of crumbs in my icing. So I put the cake in the fridge for a bit. Then took it out and iced the whole cake again. This helped to clean my cake up. Then I took a knife and cut a slice out so you could see the american flag design. Mine was a little messy, but I think I learned my mistakes and my next three layer cake will be even better. Happy Fourth of July weekend everyone!
