Monday, June 11, 2012

cookies and cream camouflage petal cake


For my husband Grant's birthday last year, I made him this cake covered with rainbow sprinkles, with a hidden chocolate mousse heart inside.  I had wanted it to be happy and rainbow-themed, but I guess it turned out kind of ... girly?  So this year, I wanted to make him a manly cake.  So I made him a camouflage cake!


For the frosting, I had brainstormed and sketched a few ideas on how I would execute the camouflage design.  One idea would just be a simple piping of swirls of camouflage in two shades of green, brown, and black.  The other idea was to use those same colors, but pipe them in sort of a petal effect, similar to the purple ombre petal cake that I made for Mother's Day.  After sketching it out, I thought the petal effect would be super cool!  So I decided to try it.


Grant's favorite ice cream flavor of all time is cookies and cream.  So I decided on a three-layer chocolate and vanilla cake, filled with cookies and cream whipped cream!  I baked two 6-inch layers of chocolate cake using my favorite homemade chocolate cake recipe (I actually baked three and put one in the freezer, tightly wrapped of course), and one 6-inch layer of vanilla cake using the "hot milk cake" recipe from the book "Miette: Recipes from San Francisco's Most Charming Pastry Shop".


For the whipped cream filling, I chopped up some oreo cookies (actually, I used "Joe's Os" cookies from Trader Joe's), and mixed it into freshly whipped cream, flavored with a hint of vanilla.  I wanted a thick layer of the cookies-n-cream filling, so at this point I also made a cream cheese buttercream frosting so that I could pipe a border of it on each cake layer, to keep the filling from squishing out from the weight of the cakes above it.


I wanted the inside of the cake to look like an oreo cookie itself, so the bottom layer was chocolate cake, followed by a layer of vanilla cake, and then a final layer of chocolate cake, all separated by the cookies-n-cream whipped cream filling.  This created quite a tall cake!


With the remainder of the cream cheese buttercream, I divided them into four portions, the amount varying by how much of each color I would be needing: brown, black, green, and light green.  For the black icing, I added dark chocolate cocoa powder, as I try to avoid coloring as much as possible, so I only had to add a tiny bit of black coloring.  For the brown icing I simply added cocoa powder, but for the greens I had to use coloring (although for the light green, I added a bit of cocoa powder to give it more a "dirty" light green effect).

First I did a quick crumb coat with the chocolate frosting, and after letting that set in the fridge for a bit I was ready to start camouflaging!



Using the method described in this tutorial from The Hungry Housewife, I piped my petals one vertical row at a time, creating patches of different colors to create the camouflage effect.


Then I piped the top of the cake using the same technique (although in my opinion, it came out kind of squished, and resembled M&Ms on the top of the cake).


And then I was done!  One very tall camouflage cake.  (I won't call it a "petal cake", to keep with the "manly" theme of the cake!)


I hope you enjoyed your cake, my love!  Happy Birthday!



46 comments:

  1. Very nicely done, Michele! I love that technique and actually featured a cake frosted that way before back around Thanksgiving. Looks like I should have done a tutorial as those who have have gotten a lot of attention for it hehe. Surprisingly easy and so cute. Your idea of making a camouflage design with is so fresh and turned out wonderful. Way to think outside the box!

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    1. @XL @ 6 Bittersweets - thanks xiaolu! it means a lot coming from you!

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  2. You're just super talented! Good job!

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  3. wow, this look delicious and amazing! how could he not have loved it??
    xoamy
    www.cupcakesncouture.com

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  4. Great job.

    Are you saying an Ina cake recipe can be converted to 3-six inch cake pans? I would like to downsize my baking, but I am a little intimidated by scaling. Does Miette's recipes scale for us? Would you share the brand of cake pan you are using?

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    1. @Madonna - actually the ina cake recipe can be converted to four 6-inch pans, but since one of my 6-inch pans was taller than the rest, i made one really tall cake layer with it, thinking i could slice it in half horizontally to make 2 cake layers. also i believe miette's recipe is meant for two 6-inch layers.

      here are the cake pans that i used:
      http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B0000CFMLH/ref=as_li_qf_sp_asin_il_tl?ie=UTF8&tag=iheartbaking-20&linkCode=as2&camp=1789&creative=9325&creativeASIN=B0000CFMLH

      and this is the taller one:
      http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B0012Q5QQ4/ref=as_li_qf_sp_asin_il_tl?ie=UTF8&tag=iheartbaking-20&linkCode=as2&camp=1789&creative=9325&creativeASIN=B0012Q5QQ4

      hope that helps! good luck! :)

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  5. Gorgeous cake!! I love the pattern. And, well, the fact that it's three layers. That doesn't hurt its cause either.

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    1. thanks @Alison ! and thanks for stopping by! :)

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    1. @Ribbon Clown - thanks for the sweet comment! :)

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  7. look very good and your instruction is very clear for beginner like me.

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  8. wow this is really impressive and inspiring - thanks!

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    1. @vic@cakebook - thank you for the lovely comment! :)

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  9. Very impressive! Check out my baking blog: http://bakingcraze.blogspot.ie/

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    1. @Donna - haha, yay! yes i do try to avoid fondant, just because who wants to have to peel stuff off your cake before you eat it? although i have heard that chocolate fondant tastes pretty good. but still. i prefer to be fondant free :) thanks for the comment and for stopping by!

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  11. i'm really impressed, nice technic !! , have you posted the receipt befor ?
    i should be delighted if you take also a look to my blog :-)
    I'm from Austria (europe) there you will find another style :-)

    greatings
    Claudia

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    1. @Clausa Things - thank you! also i just checked our your blog, it's wonderful! i love the pictures and the goodies that you make!

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  12. I came across your blog while searching on google for Cookies 'n' Cream cake filling....I love your cakes and I am a new follower.

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    1. @ Bibi - thank you! so glad you are a new follower! :)

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  13. @Jenn - thanks for continuing to read the blog and for the info on your website!

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  14. Really beautiful cake, love it :)

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  15. Super awesome! My fiancé would love this as a grooms cake ;)

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    1. thanks @Donna ! oh it would be a cool grooms cake!

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  16. That's awesome! You're the best chef :)

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  17. Would it be Ok if I used this design for my hubbys 30th cake? Jess miles from Jessie lee cakes in Melbourne Australia :)

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    1. @Anonymous - hi jess! sure you can use this design, thank so much for asking first! :) and if you have a blog, i would love it you linked to my post as well. thanks! :) can't wait to see your camoflauge cake!

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  18. Thank you :). And here is my (attempt) at your cake :P https://www.facebook.com/photo.php?fbid=438082092951660&set=a.322302297862974.69359.322212017872002&type=1&theater

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  19. I don't know which is cuter - the cake itself or your little cake sketchbook! It's so neat! I'd love to flip through that and see all your cool ideas! : )

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  20. This is the daintiest, prettiest camo cake I've ever seen!
    Love the icing - artistic.

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  22. where did you find this cake stand?
    is it also 6 inch?

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    1. @eva - it's an 8-inch cake stand, and you can find it here! http://amzn.to/1obF6ak

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  23. Hi Michele, does the frosting have to be really firm for this petal technique? Also, did you pipeyour frosting one day before the celebration or on the day itself?

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    1. @umairah - it doesn't have to be super firm, but at the same time it can't be goopy. you can test out your frosting by piping on a plate and if it's too soft, either pop the frosting in the fridge for 30 minutes, or whip in more butter (i find that a straight cream cheese frosting can be kind of goopy to pipe with on the sides of a cake).

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    2. @umairah - and yes you can pipe the frosting the day before, although in this case i piped it the day of.

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  24. Hi Michele. The chocolate frosting you used for the crumb coat looks sooo good. Is there a recipe for this? Mine never comes out that fluffy looking. My little one loves chocolate. I'm going to attempt this for his birthday this month. Amazing blog btw.

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