Hello [its] gemma here, and I'm at home and it [is] chucking it down outside It is really miserable and dreary and so I thought that [today] I would bake something really cute and colorful To brighten up my day and hopefully brighten up your day as well regardless of the rain And it is going to be mini ombre cakes So let's go these little ombre cakes are really really good for things like weddings or parties Just a bit different [if] you wanted to have a cake rather than have one big cake making little individual ones for your guests It's really really cute, and it's very simple, and it's basically a vanilla sponge And I should say also that you can make [this] any color you like I'm going to do blue because I think that has a really good impact and as usual I'm gonna be using color paste, and this is ice blue and it's by sugar flare It's a really good brand and it's very very concentrated Which is why [I] like to use it so I'm going to get my colors ready I'm going to do four colors my four sponges layers is going to be Blank and [then] light [blue] slightly Darker blue, and then slightly Darker blue from that, so I've got my four bowls here And I'm going to start by putting two teaspoons of whole milk which I've already put about a teaspoon of vanilla extract in and I'm going to get a little chopstick, and I'm going to start coloring and I'm going to go for the lightest blue first So I'm just going to dip the end of my chopstick in hardly at all to get a really nice light blue So once I've done the first lightest blue I'm going to move on to the next ones just Increasing the amount of food coloring that put in so that I've got a nice kind of gradient now I'm going to get on with making the cake better, and I'm going to start with 250 grams of soft unsalted butter and to that I'm going to add 250 grams of caster sugar and I'm just going [to] beat that together on a medium to high speed for about 5 minutes until it's gone really pale and fluffy So my butter and sugar is nice and creamy and fluffy and I've just turned my mixer down to the minimum speed because I'm going To add the [eggs], [I] don't want it all flying all over the place. I've got four large free-range eggs Which I'm going to add one at a time And I'm going to crack them into a bowl first. Just because it's a lot easier to put them in that way okay, so that's all of my eggs in just get rid of this paddle and As you can see the consistency is really sort of silky and light and whipped So now it's ready to have the [flower] put in and I'm going to sieve that Directly into the bowl just to give it a bit of extra lightness, and I've got 250 grams of self-raising flour So I'm just going to put that back on my mixer and fold that in really slowly And my mixer has a really handy low setting to do this folding But if you don't have a mixer or your mixer doesn't have a low setting you can do this by hand Just using a big metal spoon or even just a spatula spine So now that that's all mixed through. I'm just going to give it [one] last round with my spatula just to make sure Everything's thoroughly mixed and it is so now it's time to distribute it between these four bowls And I want to do that as evenly as possible because I'm using the same size tins And so I've got [the] fails here And I'm going to just start with the blank color sponge And I'm going to put about 200 grams in I think Roughly overall I've probably got about 900 grams to [a] kilo of batter, so I'm just going to Roughly eyeball it for now, and then adjust each bowl accordingly So I'll end up with the same amount on each one Now I've got 200 grams in each of my bowls, and I've only got a very small amount of batter left So it's gonna be a lot easier for me to distribute that evenly between the four bowls So now my [glock] and an even amount and each of my balls And I just need to mix the milk through the batter being very very careful not to be any of the air out So I'm going to use a small spoon and just gently fold it Now all my colors are really nicely mixed in so it's time to put them into tins And I've got 7 inch round tins here Which I've greased and lined the bottoms of this amount will work for [6-inch] tins there Just be a little bit of fatter But if you've got anything bigger than 7 inch like an 8 inch or 10 inch it's going to be far too thin so you might want to bump up your quantity I'm just going to dump all [my] batter into each of my tins and level it out with a palette knife So my tins are ready, so now it's time to bake them And I'm going to bake them all at 180 degrees C for 20 to 25 minutes or until a skewer comes out clean when you poke [the] [niche] in the middle My cakes are out the oven and they're going to just cool [down] in their tins. [they're] Meanwhile I'm going to get on with making some vanilla buttercream, and I have 200 grams of soft unsalted butter Which I'm [just] going to beat until it's pale and Once the butters ready, it's time to add the sugar and I've got 450 grams of icing sugar which I've already sifted I'm going to put it in in two stages beating really well after each stage All right, that's had a few minutes beating with the sugar in it so I'm going to add some milk now And I've got three tablespoons of milk, and [I've] put half a teaspoon of vanilla extract And I'm just going to pull that in and add a little bit [more] if I need to if I feel like it's a bit stiff All right, that's ready. It didn't need any more milk It's looking really yummy, but I'm just gonna put that to one side and get my cakes ready And I'm gonna just take the cakes out of the cake turns and just wait until they're completely cool And then [we] going to get on with an exit now because of the caramelization that happens on cake we've got a Slightly brown top and size which is not the kind of looking for we want my bright colors so [I'm] going to start off by Just trimming the tops off these guys And to first of all to make sure that they're level and second will to get rid of that murky color Look at that color. It's so much brighter than that So definitely worth taking that off and as you saw I just used a bread knife for that Just a regular serrated knife quite often when I'm at work. I use a cake leveler Which are really really handy, but just use whatever you have and if you are using knife be really careful your fingers So just make sure you do all of those four and then we're getting with the next bit and Now it's time [to] make them Midi, and I'm going to be using a cookie cutter Just a nice round cookie cutter, and I reckon I can get about four circles out of each of these layers And I'm just going to put them onto this tray and getting ready for decoration So the bottoms of my rounds are a little bit caramel, so I'm just going to take that off just quickly with my knife Now the secret to a really really pretty ombre cake is to keep it nice and clean So many brown bits like that is really important to get them off if you can see them now I'm going to clear the decks a little bit get rid of my scraps if you want to keep those To make cake [pops] with or something just whack them in a bag and stick them in the freezer And then you can bring them out when you need them But I'm just going to clear them up for now so I can have a nice clean surface for decorating now I've got my buttercream all ready to go in a piping bag and the reason I'm using a piping bag rather than spreading it on with a Palette knife is because these are so small and delicate if you could stop trying to be heavy-handed with a palette knife It's likely that they're going to fall apart, so this way minimal contact and maximum awesomeness, so I'm going to start with the brightest color on the bottom put that on a little plate and I'm going to I put a small round tip and I'm just going [to] go around the whole [thing] with little blobs Once I've gone around the edge. I'm going to fill in the hole as well And then started with the next layer. I'm just going to keep going until I reach the top And once you put the top layer [on] you then need to finish it and I'm just going to put little pretty little globs all Over the top, and then it's done And they're done and don't they look adorable So cute perfect [for] weddings and parties and things or just you know as a treat for your mates for a dinner party Well, thanks so much for watching. I hope you've enjoyed this video I've really enjoyed making it, and I'm gonna really enjoy getting used to [three] or well maybe four lucky people why I kinda want one myself and And if you do make this or make anything for my channel Then please do hashtag cupcake gemma on Twitter and Instagram and speaking of Instagram if you haven't already checked out our crumbs and doilies Instagram feed then go and follow us because it is a wash with amazing cupcake and cake pictures and things you get up to in the shop and also You can follow me at cupcake gemma and there you will find pictures of things that I'm up to Things I'm eating and maybe the odd selfie or picture of my dog So if you want to do that give us a follow, and I'll be back next week with another recipe videos So I'll see you then. Bye
