Tag: Cake

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Blackberry Cream Shortbread Cake (GF)

This will give you a good reason to go blackberry picking!!

I made this for my friend’s birthday, BBQ and dance party! There’s nothing like fresh cream and locally picked blackberries on a shortbread cake to top a perfect summer afternoon!

I used Gluten Free flour and coconut sugar to create a more shortbread style cake that wasn’t too sweet, but regular flour and sugar are fine, too!

Ingredients for the Shortbread Cake:

  • 2 Cups Organic Brown Coconut Sugar (Big Tree Farms)
  • 1 Cup Butter (2 sticks at room temp)
  • 4 Eggs
  • 3 teaspoons Vanilla extract

Grease and flour 2 x 9″ pans. Mix the coconut sugar and butter together until creamy. Beat in the eggs, ONE at a TIME, and add the vanilla extract.

  • 3 Cups Flour (Bob’s Red Mill GF 1 to 1 baking flour)
  • 3 teaspoons Baking powder
  • 1 cup Half & Half or whole Milk
  • 2 tablespoons Apple sauce

Mix the baking powder into the flour and fold into the creamed mixture. Add the milk and apple sauce. Keep mixing until smooth and creamy! Pour into pans and bake at 350 for 30 mins! Let cool.

  • one egg at a time
  • fold flour into mixture
  • Add cream or milk
  • Blend until creamy

Ingredients for the frosting & filling:

  • 1 tablespoon lemon juice
  • 2 cups blackberries
  • 1.5 tablespoons maple syrup if the blackberries are too tart

Heat the blackberries in a pan until simmering, keep stirring until you have a nice thick reduction. Cool in the fridge and strain into a bowl.

  • 1 pint heavy whipping cream
  • 1 cup organic seedless blackberry fruit spread / jam


Whip cream until fluffy. Set aside 1/4 cup reduction. Add remaining COLD reduction to the cream and stir. Keep the blackberry cream in the fridge.

  • Heat blackberries
  • Strain
  • Reduction
  • Add reduction to fresh cream

Filling: Tap the COLD cakes out of their pans. Spread a very generous amount of seedless blackberry fruit jam over the bottom cake and a layer of blackberry cream. Then spread a generous amount of blackberry fruit spread on the BOTTOM of the top cake before you place the layers together.

Frosting: Cover the cake with fresh whipped blackberry cream and drizzle the 1/4 cup of reduction over it. Cover it all all with fresh blackberries; et Voila! Delicious Blackberry Shortbread Cake ~

Recipe by Sooz at Melinas Garden! Please let me know how yours turns out! 🙂

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Raspberry Butter Cream Cake

I love making birthday cakes for friends when I have the time! Last weekend was one of those days when the ingredients were in the cupboard and I had a couple of hours to spare! I decided to make a gluten free cake as the birthday boy doesn’t eat gluten! It turned out very well and was a huge hit!

You’ll need 2 x 9″ cake tins or glass dishes for this! Preheat the oven to 350….. Here are the ingredients:

Sponge Cake:

  • 2 cups flour (gluten free or all purpose)
  • 4 egg whites (room temperature)
  • 1 tspn baking powder
  • 1/2 tspn baking soda
  • 1/8 tspn salt
  • 1/2 cup + 1 tbspn unsalted butter
  • 1 + 3/4 cups sugar
  • 1 tspn vanilla
  • 1 1/3 cups buttermilk

If you don’t have buttermilk just make some!
Measure 1 cup of milk with 1 tbspn lemon juice, stir and let stand for 5 mins. That’s it!

  • Lightly grease and flour the pans
  • Mix flour, baking powder, baking soda and salt together
  • Mix butter until creamy
  • Add sugar, vanilla, lemon juice and stir well
  • Add egg whites
  • Add flour mix and stir until smooth and creamy
  • Divide mixture between the two baking pans
  • Bake at 350 for 30 mins (poke with a chopstick to check it’s done. If chopstick comes out wet, it needs a few more minutes. Keep checking)

Cream cheese frosting:

  • 8 oz cream cheese (room temperature)
  • 1/2 cup unsalted butter (room temperature)
  • 1 tspn vanilla extract
  • 1 tspn lemon juice
  • 1/4 tspn salt
  • 1.5 cups fine baking sugar
  • 1/2 cup apple sauce
  • Mix the butter and cream cheese together until smooth
  • Add vanilla extract and salt
  • Gradually add sugar and apple sauce to sweeten. Stir as you go. If you want it sweeter just keep adding sugar! You can use up to 4 cups of sugar for this recipe and omit the apple sauce if you don’t have it!

Filling:

I used Organic Raspberry fruit spread because it’s made with all fruit and juice with no added sugar, and it’s delicious!

  • Let the cakes cool while you make the frosting
  • Tap the cakes out of the tins once cool
  • Place frosting and cakes in fridge until ready to frost
  • Generously spread raspberry jam over one sponge
  • Stack the second sponge on top of the first and spread thickly with dollops of frosting
  • Decorate with crushed cacao nibs or grated chocolate and fresh raspberries

Why did I cut the cake like this? If there are more people than you bargained for that want a piece of this delicious cake, simply cut a big circle into the cake and make small pieces of the outside circle followed by slices of the inner circle. You’ll gain at least 4 and sometimes 6 extra pieces!

I hope you love this as much as we did!

Sooz xo