8.29.2010

My besties birthday!

My dear, dear friend Liesl had a birthday, so of course we had to celebrate! Of course, I didn't take any photos of the festivities (!!!) but the cake making was certainly well documented. :) I baked my very first lemon curd cake for the occasion ~ Here's the step-by-step process:
First, I baked two lemon cakes. Next time I will 1.5x the batch as I prefer a thicker cake...
Then I made the curd - it consisted of egg yolks, lemon juice, cornstarch, butter & sugar. Very healthy. :) After boiling it for three minutes it had to chill for three hours. This little siesta was quite beneficial for getting some laundry done! :)
Once the curd chilled, I sliced the two cakes (which subsequently also had plenty of time to cool as well!) in half. Viola! Now I had four cakes! A tip I read that I'm VERY glad I followed was to pipe frosting around the outside of the cake to hold the curd in. Brilliant!
Once the first layer was topped with lemon curd, I placed the second layer gently on top...
...frosted the second piece with a thin layer of lemon butter-cream frosting...
...then placed the third layer on top of the frosted layer, piped frosting around the edge again and filled with remaining curd.
I placed the fourth (and final) cake layer on top and frosted with a thin "crumb layer" of frosting, then refrigerated to allow the frosting to harden.
Once hardened, I frosted the final "pretty layer" of lemon butter-cream.
Happy birthday dear Liesl!!! Thank you for your wonderful friendship.
Recipe here. (Oh - it WAS good, I'd make it again!)

3 comments:

Sherrie said...

mmmm, the cake sounds really, really good! I have a birthday in May! Peter and you surely have done a lot of work. You will really enjoy your trip down south. Good days, S

Diana said...

Happy B-day Liesl!!!

Gram says her grandchildren cook circles around her nowdays. :) She also says that Grampa would approve - lemon is his favorite.

I say: you can cook for me anytime!

Kenneth Nopp said...

That was some absolutely enjoyable cake!