Vanilla Butter Cake

 

 

 

This is a larger amount of batter for those of you who have the good fortune to be able to work with a 20 quart mixer.

1 lb unsalted butter at room temperature

8 ounces vegetable oil

12 whole eggs

6 cups sugar

1 Tablespoon plus 1 1/2 teaspoons pure vanilla extract

3 lbs plus 6 2/3 ounces cake flour

2 Tablespoons baking powder

2 1/4 teaspoons salt

4 1/2 cups milk

You will need a 20 quart mixer for this recipe.  If you have smaller mixers, reduce the batch by a half and bake a few cake pans at a time.  You can also bake the cake on sheet pans and cut the rounds with cake rings that look something like this:

Preheat oven to 350 degrees and prepare 3 – 12″ cake pans, 3 – 9″ cake pans and 3 – 6″ cake pans with plenty of pan release and rounds of parchment paper.

Cream the butter, vegetable oil and sugar together until light and fluffy and I should tell you that this butter/oil/sugar mixture will be

very light and fluffy.  The oil will create a very nice soft crumb.

Add the vanilla extract and the eggs, one at a time.

Sift the flour with the baking powder and the salt.

Alternate the dry ingredients with the whole milk in three rounds, scraping the bowl well and blending until just smooth.  Do not over mix this batter or you will create tunnels.  Divide the batter between the cake pans so that there is about an inch of batter in each cake pan.  Try to find the perfect amount of batter for each cake pan that you like for the height of your cakes.  If you like tall cakes, you will need more batter in each cake pan if you like shorter cake tiers, use less batter per cake pan.  Jot down the weights of batter that you prefer for the kinds of cakes that you like to make.

Bake at 350 degrees f for approximately 25 minutes.  If the center springs back when touched then the cakes are well baked.  You can also test with a toothpick if you wish.  Whenever your fingers leave marks in the top of a baked cake, leave that cake in the oven for about 5 more minutes to finish baking.

Remove from the oven and cool in the pans for at least 20 minutes before removing the cakes from the pans.  Invert the cake pans and place the cakes on their parchment rounds on the inverted pans to finish cooling before chilling thoroughly.  Cakes must be well chilled before filling.

Vanilla Butter Cake

Pretty little wedding cake in pale pink with cornelli lace and sugar flowers. This is one of my earliest wedding cakes for my student, Carmen who has recently had a baby! Congratulations dear Carmen!!

Vanilla butter cake is more delicate if you substitute a portion of the unsalted butter with vegetable oil.   The crumb will be tighter and the cake will be softer.  Tweaking recipes for artisan cakes comes with practice, time and understanding the fundamentals of baking.  Buttercream decorating also takes time to learn and master.

Prepare 2 8″ cake pans and preheat the oven to 350 degrees F.

4 ounces unsalted butter softened to room temperature

2 ounces vegetable oil

12 ounces granulated sugar

1 teaspoon pure vanilla extract

3 whole eggs

2 2/3 cups cake flour

1 1/2 teaspoons baking powder

1/2 teaspoon salt

1 1/4 cups whole milk

Cream the butter, oil and sugar together until light and fluffy…approximately 10  minutes.  Add the vanilla and the eggs one at a time.

Sift the flour, baking powder and salt together and alternate the incorporation of the dry ingredients with the milk in thirds.

Divide equally among the two cake pans and bake for about 25 to 30 minutes until golden.  The cake should spring back when you touch it.

Cool in the pans before removing the cakes and chill well before filling.

Because butter cakes are a bit more dense than a Vanilla Chiffon cake, fillings that are on the sturdy side are good but mousses are good as well.  Just cut your layers of cake thinly..so two layers of cake would become four layers of cake with three layers of filling.