- Hey everyone, you're
watching Preppy Kitchen,
where I, John Kanell,
teach you how to make
delicious homemade dishes
to share with your family and friends.
Today, it the most decadent and indulgent
caramel cake you could ever imagine.
Homemade caramel with
the perfect hit of salt
infused into a Swiss meringue buttercream,
and it's all wrapped around these moist,
fluffy vanilla cake layers
that you're just gonna love.
Let's get started.
First off, we're gonna make the caramel.
Homemade caramel is one of
my favorite things to eat.
It is delicious.
1 1/2 cups of granulated
sugar into a small pot.
There's that 1/2 cup.
I'm adding in 1/4 cup of water.
When you make caramel, you can stir it
a little bit at the very
beginning, but afterwards,
it has to just hang out
and do its own thing.
That's how it avoids those crystals
that will make it look
kind of crunchy afterwards.
Stir, stir, stir it, just a little bit
so the sugar's dissolved,
and then we're gonna put the heat on.
Now I have a very thick sugar paste.
I'm gonna put this over,
(stove burner clicks)
(stove burner clicks)
whoa.
(stove burner clicks)
It's my first time using everything here.
There we go.
Put it over a medium heat.
As the sugar warms up,
you can brush the sides
with a wet pastry brush,
and that'll help you avoid
any burnt sugar on the edge.
And not too wet, mind you, just damp.
This is medium low,
but the heat's really intense.
I'm also just learning
how to cook with propane.
It's different from
natural gas, I tell ya.
We want this to get to a
nice golden amber color.
In the meantime, we can be prepared
by pouring a cup of cream
and getting five
tablespoons of butter ready.
I'm so tempted to like stir, stir, stir
'cause it looks like it's
different consistencies,
but I'm not gonna do it.
Gonna let it be, let it just
kinda bubble away.
And as it darkens, I'm gonna
keep an eagle eye on it,
because, just like making a custard,
when you're boiling sugar,
it's like nothing
happens, nothing happens,
nothing happens, it's burnt.
(chuckles)
So keep an eagle eye on it
once it gets to a little
bit of a light amber color.
That edge is getting light amber in color
so I know it's
time.
Okay, so, right now this
is a beautiful amber color
and the edge is darker than the middle,
but that's okay,
(stove burning)
it's ready.
So I'm turning it off.
We're gonna carefully whisk
in a full cup of cream.
(cream pouring)
(mixture cooling)
Whoa.
(beep)
After you vigorously whisked
in your cream off heat,
we're gonna add in the
five tablespoons of butter
as well as a healthy
half teaspoon of salt.
It's up to you if you
like a salty caramel,
add in the full teaspoon.
And now we're gonna
stir it in over a medium
(stove burner clicking)
high heat.
Still getting used to this little stove
and we're gonna cook it for
like two to three minutes,
to like thicken things up
and become really lovely.
So it starts bubbling pretty quickly and
just keep whisking,
whisk, whisk, whisk, whisk, whisk.
Serious vigorous bubble.
I have like a minute left.
Okay,
that's good.
Officially off the heat.
Once your caramel's cooked,
we can pour it into a bowl.
Just to cool down.
We're making this first,
so that we can have a nice
room temperature caramel,
to add into our buttercream
which we'll make last.
I'm preparing my pans
by buttering the bottom
just a little bit,
a lot of it on the side,
and then adding a parchment
round, just like that.
Kick around a tablespoon of flour
and then transfer to the next pan.
Set your pans aside and
now let's make the batter.
First off, we're gonna
sift our dry ingredients
into a medium bowl and then whisk them up.
Starting with 330 grams of flour,
that's 2 3/4 cups,
1 and 1/2 teaspoons of salt,
2 1/4 teaspoons of baking powder.
Sift it out.
(fast forwarding)
Whisk it up and set it aside.
First off, I'm adding
1 1/2 cups of milk to a container.
Now I'm gonna sour the milk with
1 1/2 tablespoons of vinegar.
You could also use
lemon juice if you want.
You really just want to have
an acid to curdle the milk.
This will react leavening agents
and give you an even fluffier cake.
It's kind of amazing
and you're not gonna taste the vinegar.
Give it a quick stir
and I actually want a microwave mine
for like 30 seconds just to warm it up
and it'll help kinda like
congeal things in a good way.
Okay, now for the butter
sugar combination.
Into my stand mixer fitted
with a paddle attachment.
I'm adding one cup plus one
tablespoon of unsalted butter
at room temperature.
Add that puddle on.
(metal clicking)
Let's cream it up just a little bit.
Then add the sugar,
(hand mixer stirring)
one and a half cups of granulated sugar.
That is 300 grams.
(hand mixer stirring)
(hand mixer stirring)
I was scraping that bowl down
and with any cake you want to have
a nice homogenous batter,
not little, you know,
hidden pockets of ingredients anywhere.
So you know, scrape, scrape, scrape.
Mix, mix, mix.
(hand mixer stirring)
While it's mixing up.
I'm gonna crack some eggs,
(hand mixer stirring)
tip the eggs in one at a time
(hand mixer stirring)
and let them mix in
before adding the next.
(hand mixer stirring)
And you might need to
scrape that bowl down.
(hand mixer stirring)
Last egg,
(hand mixer stirring)
We're gonna add the flour and
milk mixtures in alternating batches.
Probably three batches for the dry
and two for the wet.
Starting and ending with the dry.
You know the drill.
Alright, so let's add in
a little less than a cup
mix on low
(hand mixer stirring)
and add in some of the wet.
(hand mixer stirring)
Repeat the process.
(hand mixer stirring)
You be careful when you do that.
(hand mixer stirring)
Yeah.
Now that in the new kitchen.
I'm really trying to keep
things a bit cleaner,
trying my extra extra hardest,
mix that up.
(hand mixer stirring)
Batter looks good,
but I'm just gonna mix it
by hand to finish it off,
scrape it down
and make sure there's nothing
floating around in
there that I don't want.
I forgot the vanilla.
This is a very important
1 1/2 tablespoons of a nice vanilla.
And here's a little secret.
You can forget to do
things when you make a cake
and it is normally fine,
especially on a cake like this
where you're not folding in egg whites,
egg white cakes,
really a little bit more finicky.
This one, it's not a big deal.
So the vanilla should have gone in
either with the milk
or to the butter sugar mixture,
but it's going at the end and it's fine.
Really getting that
bottom all scraped down
and now I have my batter.
Add the batter into your prepared pans
and try and get it basically the same.
Also try and get the batter in the pan.
That's helpful too.
I'm adding some careworn
cake strips onto my pans.
Now they're so ratty,
but I just don't want
to like stop using them
and get new ones until
they don't work anymore.
You can watch my how to get
perfect flat cake layers video
to see how to make your own
as well as how these work.
They are lifesavers and game
changers for flat cakes.
These are gonna go into the oven at 350
for about 30 minutes
or until the centers are nice and springy.
If you have a hot stove, be careful.
For the frosting,
I'm separating out five egg whites.
Those yolks will be amazing to make a Flon
or some pastry cream, whatever you desire.
I like to use my clean hands to do this,
but any method you like
that works is fine,
but I'm definitely living on the edge
because I should be separating these out
into separate bowls in case
one of the yolks breaks
and use room temperature eggs if you can.
It just does better.
Now we're gonna add
1 1/2 cups of granulated sugar
and we're just gonna
whisk it up really quick
(whisking)
to get it started and then transfer it
onto a pot of simmering water.
Alright, that's good.
You're not mixing it
up till it's dissolved.
You're just getting it started
before it goes onto that double boiler.
Place your sugar, egg white mixture
onto that pot of simmering water
and of course the water
is not touching the bowl.
It's a gentle steam heat.
Whisk it up occasionally at the beginning
and once it gets warm,
you're gonna whisk or squiz,
but for now you can just like
whisk every once in a while
and come back to it.
It just has to heat up a bit first.
I'm using a candy thermometer to see when
this gets to 160 Fahrenheit.
(stove burning)
But, if you don't have one,
(stove burning)
you don't really need one.
(stove burning)
What you can do is use your clean finger,
(stove burning)
dip it in.
How does it feel?
This feels very tepid.
(stove burning)
You want it to feel hot and
(stove burning)
shouldn't be any sugar granules.
This feels a grainy right
now so that's not good.
You want it to be super smooth
and like hot to the touch basically.
(whisking)
Okay.
so my meringue just reached 160
and now we're gonna dump it
into the clean bowl of
our stand mixer in you go.
Careful, cause it is hot.
Add your whisk attachments
and it's gonna mix and mix and mix.
You can pack the bowl with ice
to get it to cool down slower
but its gonna a form of beautiful,
amazing meringue.
But before you add that batter,
it has to be room temperature.
(hand mixer stirring)
So already, I want you to see
it's getting nice and meringue like.
Happens quickly but it
has to just keep whipping,
whipping, whipping and
this is full of steam
so it's gonna cool down considerably.
Let it run.
(hand mixer stirring)
(upbeat music)
(hand mixer stirring)
Just checking on my meringue.
Much more marshmallowy but tish bit warm.
So good though.
I am gonna add in like a
quarter teaspoon of salt
right now.
You could have been at the beginning,
you could skip it altogether.
It's up to you.
(hand mixer stirring)
Batter is room temperature enough.
it can be, I will say a little
bit warm like a tiny bit.
If your batter's on the cooler side and
it's about as cool as I
would want it we have it .
Switch, the paddle attachment
and now this batter is gonna go in
about a tablespoon at a time
(hand mixer stirring)
In you go
(hand mixer stirring)
as you add the butter,
(hand mixer stirring)
the meringue will become
(hand mixer stirring)
soupy and disappointing,
(hand mixer stirring)
but once you add in
(hand mixer stirring)
that final piece
(hand mixer stirring)
and keep whipping
(hand mixer stirring)
it'll come together.
(hand mixer stirring)
So don't go crazy
(hand mixer stirring)
and be impatient and think,
(hand mixer stirring)
Oh my gosh,
(hand mixer stirring)
I got to keep whipping it
(hand mixer stirring)
but not add more butter in.
(hand mixer stirring)
Alright, this isn't a whip up a bit more,
but, and you can see right now,
it's so soupy.
What happened?
I added all the butter and I'm sad.
Don't be sad.
Just keep whipping.
It'll be fine.
If things are a little bit out of control
and is not working.
Pop it into the fridge for five minutes
and it'll be totally fine
after you whip it again.
(hand mixer stirring)
That's how you want
your buttercream to look
really fluffy and cloudy and delicious.
We're gonna split this into two batches.
One gets some caramel.
The other one gets some more caramel.
(laughing)
It's gonna be amazing.
This is kind of up to you
like how much do you want to add?
I suggest you start off
with a third of a cup
into the whole batch.
Then we're gonna reserve
some incentive aside
and add even more caramel to that
because we're making a
two-tone color scheme.
Now, one third of a cup in
it is so gratifying
seeing homemade caramel
and it's a million times better
than the store bought stuff.
Just trust me on this one.
Okay.
(hand mixer stirring)
Mix it in.
(hand mixer stirring)
That looks great to me.
This, gets set aside.
I'm gonna reserve for
my stripes like a cup.
I probably don't need that much,
but I'm reserving it nonetheless.
Right for my darker batch.
I'm just gonna keep adding caramel
until it gets to a color that I like.
Don't add too much though.
Cause then it's just gonna be caramel,
its gonna ooze all out.
So maybe add a tablespoons
at a time until you're happy.
Not as a person but with
the color of the caramel.
There we go.
That has a nice contrast.
I might add a little bit more caramel,
but the nice thing is
it's gonna taste amazing.
So, if you don't want to
do this decoration scheme,
you want it to be like
an easy delicious cake.
Just mixing on a ton of
caramel to this frosting
and you will be just in heaven.
I'm in heaven making it
'cause I'm gonna be
licking this bowl clean,
(laughs)off camera.
Trust and believe.
Alright, it's time to assemble the cake.
And by the by, first layer,
look how pretty that is.
So flat,
perfectly baked.
Ready to accept some caramel into its life
and move off into the future.
Alright, gonna transfer
this to a piping bag
and get to work.
Alright, so we're starting off
with a nice swirl of caramel.
Whoa.
So relaxing and amazing.
Now we're gonnap that with
a little bit more of the caramel frosting.
Layer number two on top.
Look at this, next layer.
this is my first major cake
in the new kitchen and I'm pretty excited.
Pop that on top.
You can do a crumb coat
and I probably would do a
crumb coat for this cake
because we don't want anything
moving around in part two.
A crumb coat is just where you take
a little bit of frosting
and smooth it out on top.
And this will give you a coating
which will prevent crumbs
from forming on your final cake layer.
And the other thing that I
really love about a crumb coat is
it stabilizes the cake.
So you cover it up.
And I'm using a bench scraper
for this cake right now.
Oh my God, this is like
so much easier to do
than if I was doing it for Instagram.
This is my Instagram video position
in case you're wondering.
(chuckles) Like.
(laughing)
So if you ever follow @preppy kitchen,
and I was like doing some like
crazy off camera situation
to get the angle right
and not block it for you.
This is a crumb coat.
What we can do is pop this
into the fridge or freezer
for just a few minutes
and the outside will harden up
and I think I'm actually gonna do that.
Alright? my cake chilled out in the fridge
for like 10 or 15 minutes
and it's not totally hard yet,
but it's hard-er
and it's not gonna wobble if I push on it,
which is important.
I'm gonna add frosting here at last.
So one thing I will warn you is that
you can't let this frosting
just hang out forever.
If you do that, it won't have this
nice smooth consistency when you're,
moving it around.
Usually I use an offset
spatula for the top,
but today I'm just gonna
use a bench scraper.
So now for the top,
what we want to do is pull in
as we turn
and clean off in between.
And this is all getting
covered with caramel,
so I don't really care
that much about the top.
If you're using one of
these toothed Combs,
this is the tricky part,
so use the toothed comb
and start dragging off
some of this frosting.
Don't worry about it looking perfect.
It's gonna look kind of crazy,
what you do want is to have
little grooves cut up by the tool.
I'm pretty happy with this.
What we're gonna do is
pop it into the fridge,
needs to be rock hard
and then we're gonna come back to it.
So into the fridge you go to chill,
you need a timeout.
Okay once your cake is chilled,
see, nice and hard.
We're gonna just pipe
on a thin layer of that
darker buttercream.
Don't be discouraged by the way,
if it doesn't look perfect,
it doesn't have to look perfect.
Make it look nice.
It's gonna be delicious as well,
but the way.
Okay, so I'm gonna use a flat tool
to kind of spread the love of it.
I know the bottom's not done yet.
Now I'm not piping it anymore.
I'm just pressing it in
with my offset spatula.
Continue smoothing,
so just scrape gently.
You don't want to remove
too much of the buttercream
because then you can erase the pattern
and there might be some spots
that are a little funky,
but don't worry about that
because we'll be doing a caramel drip,
some funky stuff on top here.
I'm just gonna reel that in
and there's a lot of stuff on the bottom.
When you're scraping this,
the scraper is not gonna be like
perpendicular to the edge of the cake.
It's gonna be really hugging it,
so you're pushing that
frosting in as well.
You're not pulling it out.
Not gonna do any more smoothing now
Here I have my caramel, it is
perfectly room temperature.
So it's gonna be nice and flowy.
Right now, I'll add on
a thin layer on top.
So I'm using a small offset spatula.
Now we can add a drip on,
but be very conservative with your drips
because the caramel will
continue to flow down.
So here,
all of this is actually good enough
gonna add just a little bit more.
This is gonna go into
the fridge to hang out.
It'll also slow the caramel from dripping
and when we come back
it's the final touch.
I'm finishing the cake off
with a crown of flaked sea salt.
I just love the way it
contrasts with the caramel
and it actually gives
you a really nice bite.
If you like this recipe,
check out my cake playlist.
All my favorites and a
guaranteed favorite for you too.
Let's see what this tastes like.
(chewing)
Oh my gosh.
I thought its like the
caramel with that buttercream.
It's pure magic, It's pure magic.
The cake is yes, amazing too.
But like the star is
definitely the caramel
and kind of like slaps you in the face
and says, eat more of me.
I'm delicious.
If you liked this video,
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and I'll see you in the next video.
