Bespoke cakes, cupcakes, macarons, cake pops & cookies in Hull

Rainbow Candy Cake by Juniper Cakery

Rainbow Candy Cake in Partnership with The Happy Egg Co.

Welcome to our fourth cake, recipe and cake decorating tutorial in partnership with The Happy Egg Co.! In our development post we blogged about creating an exciting candy themed cake which would fit right in at children’s parties and picnics. To recreate that sense of fun we chose a rainbow cake filled with our toasted raspberry marshmallow fluff and piled it high with colourful handmade sweets, candies, stripes and spots. To add a textured finish to the board, and to add a little sparkle, we added liberal amounts of purple glitter for the three-tier candy cake to sit atop. After the following images you’ll find the recipe and a tutorial on how to make this cake and the decorative sweets. Why not try it for yourself?

Rainbow Candy Cake by Juniper Cakery

Raspberry Marshmallow Fluff Recipe

3 egg whites at room temperature
256g icing sugar
256g light corn syrup (easily found on Amazon or online American food stores)
1/2 tea spoon of salt
Natural raspberry essence

Weigh the icing sugar and corn syrup in preparation and leave them to one side. Separate three egg whites into a bowl.

Place the egg whites, corn syrup and salt into your mixer and leave on high speed for 5 minutes. This will be done when it turns white in colour.

Now add the icing sugar little by little as you continue to mix your ingredients on a low speed. Once the icing sugar has been integrated it is time to pour in your chosen flavouring (this can be adjusted according to taste). Once your ‘Fluff’ has gained volume it is done.

Rainbow Candy Cake by Juniper Cakery

Cake recipe

To create this cake (a 9 inch circle) you will need the following…

7-8 free range eggs by The Happy Egg Co. depending on egg size
1 lb self raising flour
1lb caster sugar
1lb butter
Gel paste food colour in a range of rainbow colours (purple, blue, green, yellow and pink)

To make the cake cream your butter in a mixer then add the caster sugar. Add in the flour along with half of the happy eggs for around one minute. Once half of the happy eggs are combined add the remaining and mix for about 5 minutes.

Pour each colour into separate greased cake pans and place on the top shelf of a pre-heated oven at Gas Mark 3/325F/170C. Bake for around 30 minutes.

Note: Repeat this recipe for your second tier and half it for the cupcake tier.

Leave to cool and in the meantime prepare your buttercream.

Rainbow Candy Cake by Juniper Cakery

Buttercream recipe

For the buttercream you will need…

453g butter (don’t use margarine as the water content is higher and not suitable for buttercream)
453g - 553g icing sugar (choose your own consistency and taste)
3 vanilla pods

For the buttercream add half of the 1lb of butter diced into pieces. Cream the butter in a mixer. Then gradually add icing sugar and the remaining butter (cut into cubes). Once the buttercream is of a smooth consistency add some the inside of your vanilla pods and mix well.

Rainbow Candy Cake by Juniper Cakery

As this cake is stacked with five multi-coloured layers the cake batter needs to be split accordingly. We aimed for reasonably thin layers which meant splitting each 1lb of batter into five.

Rainbow Candy Cake by Juniper Cakery

How to Make the Fondant Sweets

What you will need:

White sugarpaste/fondant
Gel paste food colour in a range of rainbow colours (purple, blue, green, yellow and pink)
Edible glue
Cocktail sticks

How to make fondant candy cake toppers by Juniper Cakery

Step one: Custom colour your white sugarpaste

Step two: Begin rolling to make two long ‘sausage’ or ‘snake’ shapes.

Step three: Pinch the two strips of fondant together and gently twist to create the entwined colours and pinch the other end.

Step four: Begin rolling to create a swirl.

Step five: Cut a cocktail stick down and stick into opposite sides of the swirl and set to one side. Cut one two triangles and use the small Tala cutter to create a scalloped edge.

Step six: Place a small amount of edible glue on each piece of cocktail stick and press the triangles in place.

Rainbow Candy Cake by Juniper Cakery

This cake is easily customisable and would be great in any season; changing the colours to reds, greens and golds would make for a fantastic Christmas cake!

If you are feeling less daring why not create cups of bright rainbow batter add the colours together in cupcake cases, bake, and then top with the fondant candy decor featured in this post!

The Happy Egg Co. Cake - Candy!

As the days get longer and the months get warmer ice cold drinks and fruity snacks become all the more appealing. With this in mind our third cake in partnership with The Happy Egg Co. will incorporate some key somertime flavours, colours and styles.

The first thing we gathered ideas and inspiration for was the all-important flavour. We discussed the typical summer tastes of sweet marshmallows, fresh fruit, sour jellies, floral hints, herbal undertones and bitter treats. Our attention then turned towards colours that were associated with picnics, confectionery, traditional treats, ice creams and fizzy drinks. From the above ideas we decided upon a rainbow layer cake filled with sticky, homemade raspberry fluff.

With summer being such a convenience fueled season we were happy to have settled on a sweet marshmallow fluff with hints of raspberry as our flavour. Being inspired by fun seasonal colours and traditional sweets we looked to other spring and summer time traditions. We envisioned fun days spent in the garden, visits to the park and holidays at the beach in which the idea of our cake fit perfectly. Though full blown summer is not quite here the warmer weather spurred us in to thinking about textures and materials and how we could use them when we decorated the actual cake.

From our rather fun (and tasty) research we put together our design board utilising childrens’ cupcakes, sprinkles, party bows, and bright confections. From this we developed and decided upon a simple rainbow-like palette of yellow, apple green green, sky blue, raspberry pink and a slightly dusky violet. We also incorporating several shape and texture ideas such as pleats, swirls, loops, ruffles and curls.

While taking the photographs for our design boards we looked at the vibrant tones used in sweets, the swirls and appeal of sugar fuelled snacks and the textures of jellies, marshmallows and boiled candies. The lure of the energetic hue of the jelly beans evolved into looking at how we might translate these fun aspects of summer onto the finished cake!

Above and below are a couple of quick watercolour sketches pulling together a few design details we felt would create a fun and lively candy inspired cake! Aside from the vibrant, playful colours we loved the idea of graphic stripe and dot patterns taken from the pleats of cupcake wrappers and scattered sprinkles and Rainbow Drops; swirled lollipops, candy dots, tiny wrapped sweets and the possible inclusion of a cupcake topper.

Keep posted to see this month’s cake, recipe and cake decorating tutorial in partnership with The Happy Egg Co.!