Festive Christmas Tree Cake

by Shiri

(Cincinnati, OH)

This was a chocolate cake with a cherry buttercream filling. The cake recipe was from Rose Levy Beranbaum’s The Cake Bible, as is the basic buttercream recipe.

I added a can of cherries which I first chopped real fine in the food processor to the buttercream (adjusting the buttercream recipe for the extra liquids from the cherries.)

The cake was frosted using white royal icing. The red border was also made of royal icing, as were the yellow loops around it and the red and green hollies. I copied the border design onto the cake plate as well, and added shell borders, using a 199 tip, which creates a much more fine shells.

The Christmas tree design on top of the cake was made by attaching narrow pieces of ribbon and then dotting them with royal icing “ornaments.” The tree itself was finger painted straight onto the top of cake. Finally a star was added on top of the tree. I mixed clear vanilla with the green coloring in order to get it to the right consistency to use for finger painting. I wanted a feel of the tree not being too dark and obvious.

To make the cake even more festive, I sprinkled it with white luster dust. I then added two ribbons around the cake and added hollies on top of them. To attach the ribbons to the cake I used royal icing, with an added pin for added security.