Tastes Like Freedom

I knew I had to try this the minute I saw the post of it on 17 and baking. Elissa made it sound so easy. I was more than excited to create this beautiful piece of food-art, but it did give me a small bit of anxiety.

The night before the 4th, I had a dream where I was trying to use my new cake leveler to cut the cakes in half and everything was falling apart. I was sure that this was a very real possibility of happening in real life.

Luckily, it was only a dream and the real thing turned out better than I could have hoped for. It looks difficult, but the steps are surprisingly easy.

The first thing is just to bake 3 round cakes. One blue, one white, and one red. I just used box cakes and food coloring. it's quick and easy. I would suggest using 8 inch pans. I used 9 inch pans and the cakes were shorter than I wanted.

Once the cakes have chilled in the fridge (I put them in overnight), level off the top of all three cakes. This is important for not only how the cakes fit together, but also for when spreading your frosting. Then using a serrated knife or a cake leveler (only about 3 or 4 bucks at Michael's), cut the white and red cakes in half so you have 5 round cakes.

Then take a bowl or other round object, I used a large mug, to cut a circle in a stack of one red level, one white level, and the blue cake. Then all you have to do is assemble! It's easy as pie...or cake. From bottom to top: whole white, frost, whole red, frost, outer circle of blue, frost (inside of blue), then the inner circles of white and red go inside the blue ring. Frost a crumb layer, chill, and top it off with a nice layer of frosting. It's that easy!

To see Elissa, from 17 and baking, assemble this cake, watch this video. It helps tremendously to see it first hand before you do it on your own!

The cream cheese frosting for this cake could not be any easier. This was my first time making homemade frosting and it turned out spectacular! I just used the recipe on 17 and baking, and it is magical!

16 oz cream cheese

10 Tbsp unsalted butter, softened

4 tsp vanilla extract

4 cups powdered sugar, sifted.

Beat the cream cheese, butter, and extract together until combined. Gradually beat in the powdered sugar until the desired consistency is reached.

My tip for this frosting (that I learned from my mother): You do not have to actually sift the powdered sugar. Just measure out your powdered sugar into a separate bowl, and whisk. Same result without having to go out and buy a sifter.