Prince Battenburg and Frosty the Hulk

Way back in 1884, Princess Victoria, granddaughter of Queen Victoria, wed Prince Louise of Battenburg. In celebration of their wedding, a cake was created and named after the prince. Traditionally, battenburg was an almond flavoured sponge cake dyed two different colors glued together with apricot jam and then wrapped in marzipan. Due to anti-German sentiments at the time, Prince Batternburg eventually changed his name, but the cake stayed the same.

Our battenburgs were a little bit fancier than the ones of old. Instead of apricot jam, we used whipped cream and raspberry jam. A tastier option if you ask me.

First we started with the pink sponge and spread on a layer of raspberry jam followed by a layer of whipped cream. Due to a mix up in the cakes, I ended up using an unclaimed pink sponge. But not only was this layer too thin and over baked (crispy instead of spongy), it tasted like some major yuck in the mouth! I used it anyway to gain the experience of making one, but two things went down with my cakes 1) I halved the pink sponge and sandwiched them together with jam to make the pink layer thicker and 2) these cakes weren't sold. :(

Stick the yellow and pink layers together and slice into strips.

The two outer strips get some whipped cream "glue".

Flip the middle one and squish them all together.

Repeat and stack the layers.

Color some marzipan and wrap those cakes up!

When you slice a piece, you get a nice cross section like these!

All packaged and pretty

We had so many scraps left the class filled a 50L bucket!

Buttercream rose on top of a pile of cake trimmings

Today we made red velvet cakes and cupcakes. The amount of food coloring we used was ridiculous! We didn't decorate them today so I didn't have a chance to taste them, but I wonder if I would be able to taste the food coloring....they smelled delish though. :P

The cupcakes are going to get chocolate butterfly decorations. The Chef said to make the wings red and green for Christmas but I can't agree that the colors we ended up with were very Christmas-y. Plus, butterflies creep me the heck out. Up close they're just like flies - all hairy, slimy, and buggy. Yuck!

Flood the outlines with colored white chocolate

The leftover chocolate pieces looked like chocolate chip and mint chips. So disappointing when they didn't actually tasty minty.

The full sized red velvet cakes will be decorated with chocolate snow flakes and snowmen. Once again, the colors. Why red? Probably because we have lots of red colored marzipan.

If they weren't smiling, I would imagine something along the lines of "Angry Snowman SMASH!" in the voice of the Hulk. :P

I am finding it hard to believe I only have two more weeks left in this semester! This week will the be the last of the new material and all of next week will be examinations. Five days of baking and decorating cakes, pies, and making marzipan fruits with no help or guidance. It's going to be dead quiet in the lab room. I will not lie, it sounds intimidating. But, one day at a time. Tomorrow is marzipan fruit!