things

so for Mother’s Day this year, I decided to make a cake. not just any cake, a chocolate-covered strawberry themed cake. I found a couple recipes on Pinterest and ended up combining a few together into one I knew I could pull off.

I liked how easy this Betty Crocker one looked and the idea of using strawberry jam as filling, but I liked the look of the strawberry buttercream on this one from Sweet Tarte.

so, hybrid cake was born! I opted to use a box mix for the cake since I had a million other things to do that day. I decided to do chocolate cake to go with the strawberry buttercream, which makes it not really true to the whole chocolate-covered strawberry thing, but whatever.

(I also opted for box mix since I don’t own a stand mixer, which means I’d be making the buttercream by hand. there’s only so much kitchen hardship I’m willing to endure in one day. I used this for helpful hints.)

I started by baking two 9-inch cakes and let them cool. then came the buttercream. I’m not sure whether my kitchen was just too hot or I put too much strawberry puree in, but it was less fluffy than I had wanted. but I was sure as hell not going to beat up another batch by hand.

cakes baked, buttercream started. strawberry puree in the blender.

it took ages but suddenly butter and sugar started to look like frosting! magic!

I also didn’t slice quite enough off of my base cake to make it nice and flat for the second layer, so the cake isn’t as pretty as it could be. but I put down one cake, then added a light coat of strawberry preserves. then the whole thing got a crumb coat of frosting and popped in the fridge for about 20 minutes.

I put the frosting in the fridge as well, which helped it firm up a little, but towards the end of icing, it was getting runny again. but, whatever. as long as it tastes good, right?

the finishing step? add some real chocolate-covered strawberries. several weeks ago I’d found this easy Baker’s dipping chocolate thing and bought it for fun.

truly a godsend for terrible chocolatiers like myself.

tip: if you make chocolate-covered strawberries, it’s best to do it as late as possible. the longer they stay refrigerated, they accumulate more condensation. they were dripping down the cake the next day. luckily everyone enjoyed it anyway.

my family loved the cake and were super impressed by my buttercream and the strawberries. I would definitely make this again, although I’d try to get the buttercream to be a little less runny and I’d work on my decorating. the best part? it really tasted like a chocolate-covered strawberry at the end. success!