Rainbow in the Clouds Cake
Happy St. Patrick’s Day! We’ve done the green foods thing. We’ve done the other green foods thing. We don’t mess with corned beef, potatoes, or cabbage of any sort around here, so the only thing left to do to get us in the St. Paddy’s Day spirit must be a rainbow dessert!
Okay, fine, if I must. Twist my arm already. It’s not like I’m obsessed with rainbow desserts or anything….oh wait.
This time around, I’m leaving the cake alone—no more bazillion layers of multi-colored cake for me. Instead, this is a “Rainbow in the Clouds” cake, with swirls of cloud-like vanilla meringue frosting, layers of fluffy yellow cake, and a surprise rainbow of gorgeous multi-colored buttercream frosting hiding between each cake layer.
The rainbow frosting effect is ridiculously easy! Well, ridiculously easy after you’ve gone to the trouble of dividing the frosting into 6 different bowls, coloring them separately, and putting them into 6 different piping bags. Annoying. But all that fiddly work is worth it, once you pipe those bright rings of buttercream and see your rainbow start to take shape. I loved this cake even before I cut into it—how could anyone not love that cheery rainbow bulls-eye?
It wasn’t enough to have a super stealthy rainbow hidden in the clouds—I wanted a big honkin’ in-your-face rainbow, too. So I made one out of fondant and set it on top of the cake for the perfect topper. The decoration has to be made several days in advance, so it has time to dry and harden and be stable enough to stand up on its own.
Wondering how to make a fondant rainbow of your own? Of course you are. I’ve got your back! For this rainbow, and for almost all of my fondant work, I’m using homemade marshmallow fondant. I sometimes buy red or black fondant, because those colors can be hard to make at home, but for almost everything else, I keep a stash of the DIY stuff handy. It’s a dream to work with, and the flavor is better than many store brands.
And those coins at the bottom of the cake? Chocolate coins, of course! The gold foil-wrapped ones that you buy would be perfect for this. I didn’t have any of those around except for a few very old Hanukkah coins that are probably no longer edible. (Note to self: clean out candy cupboard.) I did have a chocolate coin candy mold from another project, so I made my own chocolate coins (using this mold) and sprayed them with gold Wilton Color Mist. The coins are optional, but I do think they give the cake a bit of that leprechaun je ne sais quoi.
Can we talk about eggs? Let’s talk about eggs. You will need a lot of them….like, over a dozen. When you’re making a meringue-based buttercream AND a separate meringue frosting, you’re going to have to crack a few eggs! (Ba-dum-ching.) I tried to balance things out by using a yellow cake recipe that only uses yolks, so it doesn’t feel as wasteful. And you will be able to feed a LOT of people with this mega cake, so all of those eggs are going to a good cause.
But because I know that some people don’t like recipes that require so many egg whites, I will say that you can use any buttercream recipe in the center, so feel free to swap my Swiss meringue one with a traditional American buttercream instead. You could even use a different cake recipe if you’d like. The meringue’s not negotiable, though—the fluffy cloud frosting must stay. This is me putting my foot down.
And after all that, how does it taste? Like the best dang homemade cake you’ve ever had! How could it not, with all of those layers of cake and frosting? I chose to keep things simple and used lemon flavoring in the cake and buttercream, but you could use plain vanilla, or almond, or coconut, or orange, or even mix and match… you get the idea. It’s not about the recipes so much as the technique and presentation, so I hope you take this idea and run with it. And please, show me what you make if you give it a try!
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