Rigg - Make, Bake & Celebrate! : How to create beautifully decorated cakes for every occasion

Senior Designer Iona Hoyle

Commissioning Editor Cline Hughes

Production Gordana Simakovic

Art Director Leslie Harrington

Editorial Director Julia Charles

Prop Stylist Liz Belton

Indexer Hilary Bird

First published in 2012

by Ryland Peters & Small

2021 Jockeys Fields

London WC1R 4BW

and

519 Broadway, 5th Floor

New York, NY 10012

www.rylandpeters.com

Text Annie Rigg 2012

Design and photographs

Ryland Peters & Small 2012

Printed in China

10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2

The authors moral rights have been asserted. All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying or otherwise, without the prior permission of the publisher.

eISBN: 978-1-84975-322-7

ISBN: 978-1-84975-221-3

A CIP record for this book is available from the British Library.

Library of Congress Control Number: 2012932675

notes

All spoon measurements are level, unless otherwise specified.

Ovens should be preheated to the specified temperature. Recipes in this book were tested using a regular oven. If using a fan-assisted/convection oven, follow the manufacturers instructions for adjusting temperatures.

Recipes containing raw or partially cooked egg, or raw fish or shellfish, should not be served to the very young, very old, anyone with a compromised immune system or pregnant women.

All butter is unsalted, unless otherwise specified.

contents

When I think of parties or celebrations, I think of friends, family, good times and of course, cakes, which in truth, feature top of the list. Any excuse birthdays, weddings, Halloween and Christmas and my mind starts racing with thoughts of layer cakes, cupcakes, tantalizing flavours, luscious frostings and myriad decorations.

In this book youll find a collection of recipes that are far from the everyday run-of-the-mill cakes; these are crowd pleasers and cakes with wow factor, cakes that require a special occasion, a party, a celebration! This kind of cake demands that you bring out your best table linen and fancy chinaware to set the table with. These cakes, being something special, shout look at me! and really should be placed centre stage in the middle of the table, served on cake stands and eaten with delicate silver cake forks.

Some of the simpler cakes in this book need nothing more than a crown of candles, while others need a couple of days advance planning and preparation. All of the more elaborate cakes can and should be, in part, prepared in advance.

Most of the recipes are large enough to feed a crowd: a triple-layer cake will happily feed 10 people, and a triple-tier rich chocolate wedding cake will feed around 60 guests.

Its probably not every day that you make cakes for special occasions, so set aside plenty of time to plan and bake your creations they are definitely not to be rushed and knocked out in an afternoon. Some triple-tier cakes can be baked over a couple of days, so plan backwards from the day you plan to serve it. For example, you can make any gum-paste decorations up to a week before you finally decorate the cake; this gives them plenty of time to dry. The brandied cherries in The Ultimate Black Forest Cake can be made a few days before the cake in fact their flavour will improve over time.

There are a few simple rules to follow with cake baking, and as most of these cakes can take time, it will help to take note.

I always use good-quality cake pans. It really does pay to spend a little extra for better quality theyll last longer, bake evenly and wont misshape or buckle in the oven.

If youre making multi-layered cakes, I would recommend that you make sure all the baking pans you use are the same brand and exactly the same size. This way the layers will stack up perfectly.

As always with baking, you really must use the best and freshest ingredients that you can afford: free-range, happy eggs, pure vanilla extract, unsalted butter and good, pure chocolate. Dried fruit and nuts should be fresh old nuts can give your cakes a rancid and bitter taste. Wash and dry citrus fruit before grating the zest and always use fresh, firm fruit. If you dont, it will be hard to grate, and the zest and juice will lack punch.

I always keep an oven thermometer in my oven. Its very difficult to be accurate without one, and it helps to determine where your oven is the hottest.

So, from now on, you have no excuse to let an event or celebration pass without cake. Take your best frilliest apron, get creative with the frosting and pull out all the stops with the piping bag. In my mind, a party is not a party without cake!

basic cake recipes

For the best results when embarking on any baking, there are a few golden rules that youd be wise to follow.

Make sure that you weigh and measure the ingredients accurately. Use measuring spoons where necessary as regular cutlery can vary enormously in size the teaspoon that I use to stir my tea is not necessarily the same size as yours.

Prepare your cake pans according to the recipe before you even start to mix the cake ingredients. I use unsalted butter and nonstick baking parchment to grease and line my pans and sometimes a light dusting of flour if necessary.

If you are using moulded or kugelhopf pans, which are harder to grease, I suggest that you pop the empty pans into the fridge for 15 minutes before brushing the insides with melted butter and dusting with flour. This will help you to be certain that every corner and fold has been thoroughly greased.

When making traditional fruit cakes, I recommend that you wrap the outside of the cake pan in a collar of a double thickness of either brown paper or baking parchment and tie it securely with kitchen twine. This will prevent the outside of the cake browning too quickly during the longer cooking time.

Preheat the oven to the correct temperature using an oven thermometer if possible. This will give you greater accuracy and is all the more important if your oven is on the temperamental side. Position the oven shelves at the correct height in the oven for your pans.

Have all your ingredients ready at room temperature this generally applies to any dairy produce such as butter, buttermilk, sour cream, milk and eggs.

I find it easier to make my cakes using a stand mixer. It not only makes light work of creaming butter and sugar together, it also whips up beautiful meringues, and in a fraction of the time than it would take by hand. Failing that, you can also use an electric hand whisk.

Rubber spatulas are also an essential part of a cake bakers kit, making it easy to scrape down bowls and to ensure that every last spoonful of cake mixture makes it into the cake pans, and not onto the fingers and into the mouths of any willing helpers/washer-uppers you may have around.