Watchmen Cake - Fondant vs Buttercream

Left to my own devices, I'll inevitably do something geeky. So when it comes time for my own birthday cake, I went straight to my comic book collection for inspiration and came out with one of my all-time favourites: Watchmen.

It's not polished or professional looking, but it makes me smile every time I look at the picture (and it doesn't hurt that it reminds me of one of the best parties I've ever had!)

I'm a self-taught baker who's frankly still learning to make things pretty; but despite my desire to improve in this area, I absolutely hate working with fondant icing. Why? For a very basic reason: it tastes terrible. And the first rule in the Kitchen at the End of the Universe is that you never sacrifice taste for aesthetics.

So my current goal is to become a buttercream artist. And there is plenty of room for art. See all these stunning cakes? All buttercream. There's no reason to subject people to the plasticky awfulness that is fondant.

Traditional Mennonite Zwieback

My grandmother, up before dawn whenever we visited, making enough breakfast to feed a small army; me at three years old, helping my father roll out the sticky brown dough to make the tiny peppernut cookies (pfeffernesse) we left out for Santa Claus; big church potlucks with eight different kinds of sheet cake made by my mother and her friends...

While I only started baking in my late 20s, it's a tradition that goes way back in my family and one that pervades many of my happiest childhood memories. Now that I live so far from them, I enjoy making traditional recipes in order to feel closer to the people I love.

One of my absolute favourites is zwieback. A simple Russian Mennonite bread roll, these were a breakfast staple my sister and I always looked forward to. Our job was to roll out the dough into balls and shape them into tiny snowmen; then to argue about whether jam, butter, or cheese was the best filling.

This is my grandmother's recipe, or the closest thing to it. A totally intuitive baker, she never had a recipe for anything (other than 'a pinch of this and a bit of that'), and we're only able to pass on her delicious treats thanks to my determined aunt, who was there to forcibly hold measuring cups over the bowl!

Zwieback

Ingredients:

4 teaspoons salt
30g yeast
1/2 cup sugar
1 cup evaporated milk
3 cups water
9 cups all-purpose flour
1 cup melted butter
1 extra-large egg

Mix salt, yeast, and sugar in a large bowl. Add evaporated milk and water and stir. In a separate bowl, beat butter and egg together.

Alternate adding flour and butter, beginning and ending with flour. Beat until smooth.

Put on a floured surface and knead for 15 minutes, adding flour as necessary. Put in an oiled bowl, cover, and keep in a warm spot until doubled in size (you can leave it overnight to bake fresh in the morning).

With greased hands, form round egg-sized balls and place on an ungreased cookie sheet. Make a dent in the middle and put a smaller ball on top (try to centre it as much as possible so it doesn't slide off). Cover with a tea towel and let double in size.

Bake at 190°C for 10-12 minutes, or until tops are nicely golden.

Red Velvet Cupcakes

Photo by Sarah Schafer

Every baker should have a red velvet cupcake recipe in her arsenal. That rich, tangy chocolate flavour is a definite crowd-pleaser, and the bright red colour really pops against the white cream cheese icing!

These cupcakes were made for a coworker's wedding, which was a last-minute event with a very 'homemade' feel. So rather than piping the icing in delicate swirls or the popular little stars, I spooned it onto each cupcake and sprinkled just a few bits of silver sugar crystals over the top.

When it comes to cupcakes, I don't use muffin pans. The liners I use for Live and Let Pie are just a bit larger and don't tend to fit in most pans, but luckily they're strong enough to stand up on their own so I can crowd them onto a cookie sheet, sometimes cutting down the number of batches I have to do!

Red Velvet Cupcakes

Ingredients (for 18 large cupcakes):

2 1/2 cups cake flour
1 1/2 cups sugar
1 teaspoon salt
1 teaspoon baking soda
3 tablespoons cocoa powder
2 extra-large eggs
1 1/4 cup vegetable oil
1 cup buttermilk
1 teaspoon white vinegar
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
3 tablespoons red food colouring

Preheat the oven to 175°C, and prepare 18 cupcake liners.

Sift together flour, sugar, salt, baking soda and cocoa powder and set aside. In a large mixing bowl, beat the eggs, oil, buttermilk, vinegar, vanilla and food colouring. Fold in the flour mixture in three additions, and stir until just combined.

Fill the cupcake liners with the batter (to about 2/3 full), and bake for 20-25 minutes, or until a toothpick comes out clean. Set on a wire rack and allow to cool before frosting.

Cream Cheese Frosting:

450g cream cheese, softened (try not to use low fat)
250g butter, room temperature
1 teaspoon vanilla
4-5 cups sifted icing sugar

Beat the cream cheese, butter and vanilla until combined. Slowly add in the icing sugar while beating on low speed, and increase the speed until the frosting is light and fluffy, but stiff.

Frankie's Root Beer Float Cake

Root beer hasn't been around too long in South Africa, but I have many fond memories of root beer floats from my childhood. In fact, I was rather sad to realise it wasn't available when I first moved to Durban in 2004.

However, a few years later I was horseback riding in the Drakensberg, and started chatting to the lovely people at the stables. Lo and behold, they were brewing their own root beer! Now, years later, Frankie's sodas are available pretty much everywhere in South Africa... root beer floats for all!

This cake was a fun experiment, and the first time I had ever used my bundt pan. Chocolate root beer cake is dense and rich, with a slight hint of that 'good old-fashioned' root beer flavour to cut the sugaryness (which is, according to spellcheck, a word I just invented). I made this a little while ago for my Games Club, and it was an immediate hit!

Root Beer Float Cake

Ingredients:

2 cups Frankie's Root Beer
1/2 cup unsalted butter
1 cup unsweetened cocoa powder
1 1/4 cup white sugar
1/2 cup brown sugar
2 cups cake flour
1 teaspoon salt
1 1/4 teaspoons baking soda
2 extra-large eggs
2 teaspoons root beer extract (optional)

Preheat your oven to 175°C, and spray the inside of a bundt pan generously with non-stick spray. And I mean generously!

Add the root beer, cocoa powder, and butter to a medium saucepan and melt over medium heat until combined. Whisk in sugars until dissolved and set aside.

Combine flour, salt and baking soda in a bowl.

In another bowl, beat the eggs, then add to root beer mixture. (At this point you can add the root beer extract for a more intense root beer flavour, but I know it's hard to come by in South Africa and it's not totally necessary.)

Fold the flour into the root beer mixture and beat gently (I prefer using a whisk). The batter should be slightly lumpy, make sure you don't overmix it!

Pour the batter into the bundt pan and bake for 40-45 minutes, or until a toothpick comes out clean.

*IMPORTANT*

The secret to unmoulding a bundt cake is to allow it to cool completely before turning it over. If it's still hot, the whole thing can easily fall apart! Be very patient and let it cool completely before inverting onto a plate. Once unmoulded, refrigerate while you make the icing.

Whipped Cream Frosting

250ml whipping cream
2 teaspoons vanilla extract
6 cups icing sugar, sifted

Combine the whipping cream and vanilla in a bowl, and slowly beat in the icing sugar. I'll be honest, I never measure this very closely, and just keep adding until it's the right consistency (which is stiff enough to hold its shape and not run down the sides of the cake!)

I just glopped the icing around the top of the cake with a spoon to get a lovely, foamy 'root beer float' look, but you could be more artistic if you like.