Note from Jamie: I used a white cake mix instead of making the cake from scratch, but I am sure this was great too!
Notes from Ruth: All other notes in the recipe are from Ruth. I wonder if I can still call her Ruthie...
Cake (from America’s test kitchen cookbook)--
¾ cup whole milk at room temperature
6 large eggs, room temp.
1 Tbl. Vanilla extract
2 2/3 cup cake flour
2 ¼ cup sugar
1 Tbl. Baking powder
1 tsp. salt
3 sticks, unsalted butter, cut into chunks and softened.
(This is from the “Wedding Cake” section, so it’s designed to put into 1 6in. pan, 1 9in. pan and 1 12in. pan. I didn’t have a 12 inch, so I did the 6in. pan and 2 9in. pans. If all you have is 9in. pans, you’ll probably be fine – just make a couple of cupcakes to go with it.)
Preheat oven to 325 degrees. Prep your cake pans (I used parchment paper on the bottom and then sprayed PAM on all of it).
Whisk together eggs, milk, and vanilla in a large bowl. Reserve out ¾ of a cup of liquid.
In your mixing bowl, whisk together flour, sugar, baking powder, and salt. Beat in the butter one chunk at a time, with your mixer on low. Continue 1-3 minutes until the mixture resembles coarse crumbs. (My butter wasn’t quite soft enough at this point, so I had to do a little mixing by hand).
Add liquid into mixing bowl (all except the ¾ cup) and beat on medium till smooth and fluffy, 2-4 minutes.
Add the last ¾ cup gradually until combined; the batter will look slightly curdled.
Put 2 ½ cups of batter into each 9in. pan (or if you’re using 3 different pan sizes: 1 cup in the 6in. pan, 2 ½ cups into the 9in. and “the remainder” into the 12in. pan).
Smooth the tops gently and place in your oven. Check cakes after 25 minutes and remove when a toothpick comes out with just a few crumbs. Let the cakes cool in pans for 10 minutes then remove to a cooling rack. Let them cool completely before assembling and frosting.
--This recipe is good. I think the density issue was my execution, so maybe you’ll have better luck with it. My eggs were not at room temperature, so I’m blaming them until I have a better idea. Of what went wrong. Over-mixing? I do mix things too long sometimes…
Filling (modified from America’s test Kitchen Cookbook)
1 cup maraschino cherries, drained
¼ cup hot maraschino juice
1 tsp unflavored gelatin
1 jar cherry jam (approximately 1 ¼ cup)
The original recipe calls for dried fruit that you reconstitute in orange juice. Since I was starting with the maraschino cherries, I just drained them and skipped that step. I vote if you can use a canned fruit, choose that over a dried one any day. But maybe that’s just me.
Microwave the juice till bubbly (you may use water instead) and add gelatin. Combine cherries, gelatin, and jam and process in food processor (I used a hand blender) for about 5 seconds, till fruit is finely chopped. Put mixture in fridge and let set at least 8 hours and up to 1 week (I used mine within an hour or two and it was fine.
I don’t know what the deal was but the cherries ended up kind of rubbery. I’m not sure what I’d do to improve this though. Mix chopped maraschino cherries into a can of cherry frosting maybe?
Frosting: Lime Butter Icing (from Betty Crocker’s Cooky Book)
2 ½ Tbls soft butter
1 ½ cups confectioner’s sugar
1 ½ Tbl lime juice
2 tsp. grated lime rind (zest!)
Mix all ingredients together until smooth. If you like your frosting stiffer or more liquid-y, add milk or sugar accordingly. This recipe is really for lemon, but it’s so good I just switched out the limes for lemons. Also, it’s a “cooky” frosting, but I doubled it and it covered my 2.5 layer cake with some to spare.
