Simple Fare, Fairly Simple

Well...I didn't get one bite of this cake. It went to a customer for his wedding anniversary. It sure smelled good while it was baking though and the tiny nibble that I tried when some "accidentally" fell off the side of the cake, tasted GREAT! I'm going to have to make this again...you know..just to be sure I'm providing quality products!!

Orange Layer Cake 
with Raspberry Filling



3 cups all purpose flour
2 tsp baking powder
1/2 tsp salt
2 cups sugar
1 cup butter, softened
4 large eggs, room temperature
1 tbsp orange zest
2 teaspoons vanilla extract
1/2 cup milk
1/2 cup orange juice

Heat oven to 350F.

Spray two 9” cake pan with cooking spray then place a round of parchment paper in the bottom of each. Spray the parchment paper as well.

Whisk the flour, baking powder and salt together and set aside.

In a large mixing bowl, cream together the sugar and butter until light and fluffy, about 3 – 4 minutes.

Beat in eggs one at a time, beating well after each addition.

In a small bowl or measuring cup, combine the orange zest, vanilla, milk and orange juice.

Add flour mixture alternately with orange juice mixture to butter mixture, beginning and ending with flour.

Pour batter into prepared pans. Bake about 30 minutes or until toothpick inserted in center comes out clean.

Cool on a cooling rack for 20 minutes before removing cake from pans.

After cakes are released from the pans, prick them with a fork. Brush simple syrup (recipe follows) over the cakes before frosting.

Here's the stuff for the cake.

Cream the butter and sugar together until light and fluffy.

Then one at a time, add the eggs, beating well after each addition.

Juice your oranges, remove the seeds. See this juicer? It was my mom's..she gave it to a friend of mine who had it for many years then just recently my friend gave it to me. Anyway..this juicer is probably 50 years old. Fun!

Combine the juice, zest, vanilla and milk.

Add the liquid alternately with the flour mixture (flour, baking powder, salt) to the butter/egg mixture.

Divide into your prepared pans.

After the layers are baked and cooled, pierce with a fork and brush with simple syrup.

At this point I wrapped each layer separately and froze them for a couple of days.

Simple Syrup

½ cup water
½ cup sugar

Combine in a saucepan and boil for 5 minutes. Allow to cool the brush over cake layer.

Filling

1 1/2 cups frozen raspberries
1 tablespoon cornstarch
2 tablespoons lemon juice
1/4 cup sugar

In a small sauce pan, combined all of the ingredients and slowly bring to a boil over medium-high heat (keep stirring until thickened for best results).

Let cool completely before spreading onto cake.

OR:

1 cup seedless raspberry jam warmed in the microwave then seeds removed. Mix with about 1/2 cup of the icing until easily spreadable.

Place bottom layer of cake on a platter.

Using frosting below, pipe a ring around the bottom layer. Fill the center with the raspberry filling. Top with remaining layer then frost the rest of the cake.

For the filling, I used about 1 cup of raspberry jam that I pressed through a fine mesh sieve to remove the seeds.

Then I mixed in about 1/2 cup of the frosting.

I wanted to lighten up the jam. Yummy stuff!

Buttercream Frosting

1 stick (1 cup of Crisco – not butter flavored)
2 sticks butter – room temp
6 cups powdered sugar
½ - ¾ cup milk
1 teaspoon vanilla

Combine Crisco and butter in a large mixing bowl. Add vanilla. Slowly add powdered sugar, adding enough milk to bring it to spreading consistency.

Spread over cake.

Here's the ingredients for the buttercream icing.

Whip the butter and shortening together until light and fluffy then add the vanilla.

Add the powdered sugar.

Add enough milk so the icing is spreadable.

Oops..forgot to take a picture of the raspberry filling between the cake layers. But here's the cake with a crumb coat of icing.

And here's the cake...all frosted and ready to take to the customer!