Cake Pieces

From cupcakes and small pastries, I've shifted to baking cakes. My family loves cake. Even on a regular family lunch or any gathering there should be cake on the table. We've tried almost every cake in the market. From commercial birthday cakes and specialty cakes sold at any bake shop and even restaurants. These cakes doesn't come in cheap. A regular specialty cake can cost for as low as 700php and as much as 1,000++php.

Since we're so into cakes, I've decided, why not bake our own. For the past 2 months, I've made a total of 5 cakes in different flavors and types. My first project was my son's birthday cake. I made an 8", 2 layer Chocolate Cake with Dark Chocolate Ganache. It was very good. From there, I went on with more. There's Red Velvet which is my Dad's favorite, a traditional Sponge Cake and recently, I made 2 cakes in a span of 1 week: 

Chocolate Chiffon and Triple Chocolate Mousse Cake

Other than the old-fashioned sponge cake, I concentrated on Chocolate cake recipes because everyone loves chocolate. Chocolate is easy to make and is easy to coat around the cake. Chocolate can perfectly go with any other frosting as well. 

My Chocolate Chiffon was soft and fluffy, but my mom advised me that I could have gotten better results if  I used a tube pan. Well, the reason why I didn't use the usual tube pan was because I want to decorate the cake and fill it with chocolate ganache.

My Chocolate Chiffon is a 2 layer cake that has a thin chocolate filling in between. Coated with my favorite chocolate ganache and with swirls of buttercream frosting and chunks of dark chocolate on top.

The kids loved it! My siblings  and my parents ate it with their coffee. I was at my mom's house when I baked both the Chocolate Chiffon and Chocolate Mousse. She has a bigger oven and her kitchen is more spacious. It feels good to be able to work in a bigger kitchen, I also noticed that work is done faster.

Chocolate Mousse is one of my favorite desserts, whether it's served as a cake or as plain mousse with some fresh fruits.

My first Triple Chocolate Mousse turned wonky:

1. The cream for the top layer did not turn stiff that I have to just pour it on top and straight in the fridge.
2. Some time in the middle my dad lowered down the temperature of the fridge.

So imagine... the topping problem could have been solved if the cake was refrigerated longer and was in proper temperature. The following day, my mom and I tasted it and well, it's still okay with me. It's ridiculous not to have a slice. Later in the day, the whole cake looked better after setting the right temperature.

This picture was the wonky part. Please bear... Over-all, it was delicious!

The following week, I went for another try this time, in my own kitchen. I made half of the recipe from what I originally prepared and I used my Chewy Brownie recipe as cake base.  The second attempt was way better.

The chewy brownie at the bottom held the whole thing together. I also used a glass baking dish so when refrigerated, it cooled the whole cake easily.

Wonky or not, I'm still proud of myself being able to come up with such treats. Before I spend so much on a box of cake. Now, as long as I have the ingredients around, I can bake more than 1 cake of different types. It's all worth it, especially if it's for the love of seeing my family happy and for the fun of  baking!