Candy Corn Tuxedo Cake

It's been brought to my attention that I'm a candy girl in the truest sense. Meaning, I like all candy. Meaning, I like candy that most people don't like. Just last weekend I was getting major side-eye from the Mr. for eating candy corn and black licorice at a party. Turns out, that candy was meant to be table decoration, but hey - decorate with candy and expect to come up a few pieces short. Am I right or am I right?

This cake is for both candy corn fanatics and detractors. The only prerequisite is - you have to like cake. I used a tried -and-true white cake recipe and manipulated the flavor with extracts. It's pretty hard to nail down the flavor of candy corn (it's mostly just one note - sweet), so I decided to make the cake layers little more interesting. From top to bottom, the white layer is vanilla, the yellow layer is butter rum (I used LorAnn flavoring), the orange layer is flavored with orange extract, and the bottom layer is chocolate, made with dark chocolate cocoa powder. I really love how all the layers taste together - it's kind of like a citrus-y butter candy with a chocolate wallop at the end.

The chocolate elements of this cake were inspired by the new flavors of candy corn available. I mean, have seen S'mores Candy Corn

yet? I'd reckon even the most candy corn-eschewing person would have trouble turning that down.

As for the drippy ganache, it's quite spooky looking, don't you think? I didn't realize how spooky until I saw Kristan's Scary Cherry Cake. Like Kristan, I tend to lean toward cakes that look cute-spooky instead of scary-spooky, and the ganache is right on point for cute.

Continued, click to read more...