If you ever wanted to know what a chai latte in a cake was like, this is pretty close.
First off, pardon the weird photos. I went to take a picture first thing in the morning after spending most of the night baking, forgetting that it’s winter now and the sun doesn’t really rise as early as it used to. I’ve taken some nicer afternoon snaps of a leftover slice of cake, but the photos of cake in its entirety are weird yellow from the fluorescent lighting at work.
Anyway, enough excuses. Story time!
It’s my work buddy Ness’ birthday tomorrow so I made her a cake! That’s basically the whole story. Ness loves chai. I love chai. Everybody loves cake. So cake and chai just seemed like a perfect marriage of deliciousness.
The cake recipe is actually from Beaty and the Feast Beast and is vegan! The cake itself is super dense and delicious and not too much oil which I really liked. The frosting is another beast entirely. It’s super sweet and rich and totally decandent. I made a buttercream frosting using just butter, icing mix, vanilla essence and the seeds scraped out of a vanilla bean. Mmm.
I love the way vanilla pod seeds look inside of stuff. So cute!
I wanted to try a different technique with the frosting too, by piping roses all over the cake. I didn’t make enough frosting to cover the cake entirely so I just did the top, and I think it went okay. I had a little trouble piping because I made the buttercream quite thick and dry I guess. Next time I’ll make it so it’s easier to pipe.
(Weird yellow photos. Sad.)
Overall I’m really pleased with how it turned out. I think I’m getting more confident with my big cake baking! I think next I’ll attempt doing layers maybe.
Kim Makes Things 