Brain-y Fault Line Cake
We’re making the trendy Fault Line Cake, but stuffing it with brains because…it’s Halloween! This is a chocolate chip Nutella swirl cake, topped with a jumbo brain cake pop!
Ingredients
Cake Batter:
- 1 cup unsalted butter room temperature
- 2 cups sugar
- 3 tsp vanilla extract
- 6 large eggs
- 3 cups all-purpose flour
- 1 tsp baking soda
- 1 tsp salt
- 1 1/2 cups sour cream
- red food coloring
- ½ tsp activated charcoal powder or black food coloring
- 1 cup chocolate chips
- 1 ½ cups Nutella
Buttercream:
- 2 cups unsalted butter room temperature
- 2 tsp vanilla extract
- 5 cups confectioner’s sugar
- brown yellow, pink and red food coloring
Blood:
- ½ cup white chocolate chips
- ¼ cup whipping cream
Instructions
Bake the cake:
- Beat the butter and sugar with an electric mixer until pale and smooth. Add the vanilla extract and eggs one at a time, mixing with each addition.
- In a separate bowl, combine the flour, baking soda and salt. Add this to the batter in 2 additions, alternating with the sour cream.
- Divide the batter into 2 bowls. Dye one bowl red and add the chocolate chips. To the other bowl, add the charcoal powder and nutella.
- Dollop both colors of batter into 3 greased and floured 6” round cake pans. Bake at 350F for 30-40 minutes, or until a skewer inserted into the centers comes out clean. Cool completely.
Make the buttercream:
- Beat the butter with an electric mixer until pale and fluffy. Add the vanilla extract and confectioner’s sugar one cup at a time, beating with each addition.
- Dye 1/3 of the buttercream pale pink. Dye the remaining buttercream a flesh color – use both brown and yellow food coloring to create your desired shade. Adding a bit of yellow food coloring adds a warm, peachy touch when mixed with the brown.
Assembly:
- Slice the tops and bottoms off the cakes to smooth the surface and remove any excess browning. Use a 4 inch round cookie cutter to cut the center out of one of the cakes. We’ll use the smaller circle for the base cake, but save the cake scraps for later in this recipe.
- Place one of the larger cakes onto your work surface and cover it in a generous coating of flesh buttercream. Place it in the fridge for chill for 20 minutes. Place the smaller cake on top and coat in a thin layer of pink buttercream. Place the remaining large cake on top and coat in a thin layer of flesh buttercream. Stick 3 bubble tea straws into the center of the cake. Trim them so that they’re flush with the top of the cake. Place the cake in the fridge to chill for 20 minutes. Then carefully cover the top layer in a generous coating of flesh buttercream.
- Use a food-safe paintbrush and red food coloring to paint vertical stripes onto the inside of a piping bag. Spoon the pink buttercream into the bag and snip a hole at the end to create a large, round piping tip. Pipe the brain into the middle space of the cake.
- Place some of the cake scraps and a couple dollops of buttercream into a bowl and mix with an electric mixer. The electric mixer breaks apart cake so well! Shape the cake mixture into a dome and place on the top of the cake. Pipe on a brain pattern with the remaining pink buttercream. Start with 2 long stripes down the center, then squiggles on each side of the brain.
- Use the same food-safe paintbrush to dap red food coloring directly onto the cake. This will look like cuts and bruises.
- And finally, the ganache! Place the white chocolate in a microwave-safe bowl and microwave for 30 second intervals, until fully melted. Add some red food coloring and mix well. Place the ganache into a piping bag or a syringe with a medium-size piping tip. Pipe blood all over the cake! Then serve and enjoy your edible brains!
Video
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Hi everyone! My name is Cayla Gallagher and I’m the creator of pankobunny!
@pankobunny
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