EASTER OMBRÉ PIÑATA CAKE
March 26, 2016
It's Easter weekend and what better way to celebrate than with cake! We had a look on Pinterest and found so many exciting ideas, so we took our favourites and merged them with our own ideas to create this indulgent Easter extravaganza!
This cake combines two ideas that we have been wanting to try for a while, ombré and piñata cakes. We have gone for ombré inside with coloured cake as well as on the outside with the buttercream. As you cut open the cake, there is a surprise of mini eggs or your favourite Easter treats!
With the long weekend, there's still plenty of time to make yourself this amazing cake, so keep reading if you want to know how!
We just used our basic sponge recipe which you can find here; we made three 4oz cakes.
Ingredients for the cakes:
12oz self-raising flour
12oz caster sugar
12oz butter
6 eggs
3 tsp baking powder
3 tsp vanilla extract
mini eggs or sweets/chocolates of your choice
3 different food colourings (we used pink, orange and yellow)
Preheat your oven to 200°C/180°C Fan/Gas mark 6. You will need a 6 inch loose-bottomed round cake tin. Line the bottom of your cake tin with greaseproof paper and lightly grease the sides. We did each of the three cakes separately because we only had one tin and it is best not to leave the mixture to stand. If you do have more than one tin you can make all 12oz in one and then separate to colour.
Start by measuring 4oz of butter and caster sugar and beating together until light and fluffy. Then add in 2 eggs, 1 tsp of baking powder and 1 tsp of vanilla and combine. Then add 4oz of self-raising flour and mix until combined. Now, you can add the food colouring, adding as much or as little as you need to get the colour you desire. Pour the batter into the lined tin and bake for 25-30 minutes or until a skewer inserted into the middle comes out clean. Place onto a wire cooling rack and repeat these steps for the next two cakes.
Time to start decorating!
Ingredients for the decoration:
6oz butter
Approx. 12oz icing sugar
3 food colourings from earlier
150g milk chocolate
75g white chocolate
mini eggs or chocolates of your choice
We started by making the nest for on top to give it time to set while decorating the rest of the cake.
Start by lining a bowl with cling film. Now, melt half of the milk chocolate and leave to thicken slightly before pouring into a piping bag with a small round nozzle. Pipe the chocolate in random lines and circles inside the bowl to give the look of twigs of a nest. This doesn't need to be neat at all so don't worry if it doesn't go exactly to plan. Put this into the fridge until mostly set before repeating with the white chocolate and then again with the milk chocolate. Leave this in the fridge to set as much as possible while you continue with the rest of the decorating.
To make a space for the mini eggs you will need to cut a circle out of the bottom two layers of cake. We didn't have a round cutter, so we used a small glass to indent a circle into the cake and used this as a guide to cut the circle out.
Now, you need to make the buttercream by beating together the butter and the icing sugar. Taste the buttercream and if you feel it tastes too buttery, add more icing sugar until you are happy with the taste and consistency. We made one big bowl of buttercream and then separated it into 4 bowls; 3 for each colour and then 1 plain for the centres. Place the bottom layer onto a serving plate and spread on a thin layer of buttercream. Carefully place the second layer on top and again add a thin layer of buttercream.
Next is an extra fun part, fill the hole with as many mini eggs as possible!
Now you can place the final layer of cake on top. If there is too much of a gap in between the layers you can fill it in with more buttercream, to make the sides as smooth and straight as possible, before you start to cover the whole cake.
Take the other three bowls of buttercream that you separated earlier and add the three food colourings to make the required colours.
Starting from the bottom, spread the buttercream onto the cake matching the colours. You can use a normal knife, or even better a palette knife to spread the buttercream onto the cake. To give it the ombré look you need to use the knife to blend the colours together slightly so it doesn't look like defined stripes of colour.
We decided to give it a second layer, to cover up any imperfections or areas where the buttercream was a bit thin. We went for a slightly rough look for the buttercream, which makes it much easier to apply as it doesn't have to be completely perfect.
Now you are ready to decorate the top of the cake! Take the nest out of the fridge and lift the cling film out of the bowl. Carefully peel the cling film off the chocolate and place the nest at a slight angle in the centre of the cake. Now you can fill the nest with more mini eggs and place a few around the cake. We also used some Galaxy Golden Eggs.
We are super happy with how the cake turned out and we had a lot of fun making it!
It is absolutely delicious and perfect to share with friends and family over Easter!
We hope you enjoyed this post. Please leave a comment letting us know what you think and if you are going to give it a go!
Remember to tag us on Instagram if you give any of our bakes a go,
and follow us on Bloglovin' and Instagram!
Love, Antonia and Imogen
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