Retro: Basket of Flowers ? AWW Birthday Cake Book

It all started when I discovered old photos of all the cakes my Mum had lovingly decorated for our birthdays from the Australian Women’s Weekly Birthday Cake Book. Digging out the daggy old cake decorating book, I began a mission to post the how to guides for each one. When I posted the Beautiful Butterfly Cake, the pretty Ballerinas, the Piano Cake and the Racing Track cakes, I received so many stories from you all describing treasured childhood memories: thumbing through the book, painstakingly choosing your favourite and the joy of sharing them with your friends on your special birthday. I can’t wait to post a few more and bring back a little more nostalgia.

The Age newspaper also just listed the Australian Women’s Weekly Birthday Cake Book as one of the 10 most influential cookbooks. As Marion Grasby said:

“There aren’t many Australian cookbooks that just about the whole population’s had a cake out of, but I think most Australians would have had one of these cakes… While the cakes in here are a bit fancy and fiddly, they’re not trendy, and that’s what makes the book timeless. It’s never going to go out of fashion because kids will always love these fun sorts of cakes.”

And I totally agree. There seems to be a nostalgic resurgence for these cakes among Australian children who grew up in the 80s and 90s like me.  The book has gone full-circle: birthday cakes that our Mums once made for us are now being baked for our kids, which I think is so rad. Check out the amazing recreations on the book’s Facebook fan page.

The flowers on this cake are made from marshmallows, which totally blew my mind as a kid. With that memory I thought they would be quite tricky to put together, but it’s really as simple as chopping a marshmallow into quarters and pressing a smartie or M&M into the middle. I hope this cake brings as much joy to someone as it brought me on my sixth birthday.

You Will Need:

1 packet of butter cake mix (or use your own favourite recipe from scratch)

Green food colouring

2 cups green-tinted dessicated coconut

1 bag of white marshmallows

20 green Smarties or M&Ms

10 Red jube rings, cut in half

40 cm square of Aluminium foil

Red ribbon

Vienna Cream:

125g butter, room temperature

1 1/2 cups icing sugar

2 tablespoons milk

Directions:

Preheat the oven to 180 degrees Celsius. Grease a deep 23cm round cake tin. Bake the cake according to the packet directions. Leave to cool completely. Meanwhile, prepare the vienna cream. Place butter in small bowl of electric mixer, beat until butter is as white as possible. Gradually add about half the sifted icing sugar, beating constantly. Add milk gradually then gradually beat in the remaining icing sugar, mixture should be smooth and easy to spread with a spatula. Tint the frosting green with a few drops of green food colouring.

While the cake is cooling, prepare the marshmallow flowers. These are really simple to make. Cut a marshmallow in half horizontally using sharp kitchen scissors.

Then cut each half in half again horizontally to give you four rounds. Pinch the tips of each round to give a petal shape.

Overlay the rounds onto each other to make a flower and press an M&M or Smartie into the centre to cover the join. If the petals are really sticky, dip them in caster sugar to make them easier to handle.

When the cake is cool, spread the frosting evenly all over the top and sides of the cake. Sprinkle the tinted coconut over the frosting until it’s completely covered. Place marshmallow flowers around the outside of the cake. Give the flowers a border on the inside by pressing the jube rings into a circle shape. Roll the square of foil into a strip and twist it to tighten. Insert the handle into the cake as pictured, then tie the ribbon to the handle.

Retro: Basket of Flowers ? AWW Birthday Cake Book is a post from: The Cake Mistress