THE UNIVERSE – GALAXY CAKE RECIPE

So last weekend Mr C and I wanted to bake a cake as the weather was rubbish, now I didn’t just want to make any old cake. I wanted to create something I’d never tried before…a Universe cake! So here is the recipe I followed and how I created this cosmic cake!

225g butter, softened
225g caster sugar
4 eggs
225g self-raising flour
3 tbsp milk
1 tsp vanilla extract
2 tbsp cocoa powder
Black, blue & pink food colouring gel

For butter icing –

140g/5oz butter, softened
280g/10oz icing sugar
1-2 tbsp milk

For Cosmic Icing –

Black, blue & pink ready to roll coloured icing
White chocolate stars
Edible glitter to decorate

Heat the oven to 180C/gas 160C/gas 4. Grease a 20cm cake tin and line the bottom with a circle of greaseproof paper. To mix by hand, beat the butter and sugar together, then add the eggs, one at a time, mixing well after each addition. Fold through the flour, milk and vanilla extract until the mixture is smooth.

Divide the mixture between 3 bowls, 1 being over half of the mixture and the other two a quarter of the mixture. Put the black food colouring gel into the largest mixture, and the blue and pink into the quarter mixture bowls. Put the entire black mixture into the cake tin, then dollop the blue mixture on top and with a skewer swirl the blue into the black mixture to create a marble effect, repeat with the pink mixture. When all the mixture has been used up, tap the bottom on your work surface to ensure that there aren’t any air bubbles.

Bake the cake for 45-55 mins until a skewer inserted into the centre comes out clean. Turn out onto a cooling rack and leave to cool. You can now prepare your cosmic top layer icing! Cover the work surface with icing sugar so it doesn’t stick, this actually adds a stardust effect in the end to the icing. Take the black, blue and pink blocks of ready to roll icing and layer them on top of one another. Cut through the middle of this icing stack with a sharp knife, then place the icing on top of one another again. Keep repeating this process four times, until the colours are well mixed and creating a marble effect (if in doubt search on YouTube how to make marble icing). Finally, kneed the icing out into a circle and get a rolling pin to spread it out evenly.

 Once the cake has completely cooled you will need to cover it in buttercream. Beat the butter in a large bowl until soft. Add half of the icing sugar and beat until smooth. Add the remaining icing sugar and one tablespoon of the milk and beat the mixture until creamy and smooth. Beat in the milk, if necessary, to loosen the mixture. Get a flat knife or icing utensil to cover the cake completely in buttercream. Make sure it is a smooth as possible so the icing can sit on top. You can then take your cosmic icing and place it gently over the top of the cake. Smooth out any bumps and make sure it is covering the sides of the cake also. You can now decorate with white chocolate stars and edible glitter to make your cosmic cake Universe worthy!