Name: Jack-O-Lantern Cake
Cook time: 8 min
Ingredients: 6 egg yolks; 4 Tbsp. sugar; 4 Tbsp. vegetable oil; 4 Tbsp. whole milk; 2 tsp. vanilla extract; 1 cup all purpose flour; 2 Tbsp. cornstarch; 6 egg whites; 1/2 tsp. vinegar; 4 Tbsp. sugar; 2 cups heavy whipping cream; 5-6 Tbsp. confectioners sugar; dash salt; 2 tsp. vanilla

Jump to Recipe Print Recipe

Typically I make my designed sheet cakes on a standard cookie sheet pan. Using a circular pan was the perfect way to capture the Jack-O-Lantern shape. Underneath the designed Jack-O-Lantern cake is layers of whipped cream and more cake.

These designed cakes taste so light and fluffy. They pair perfectly with whipped cream and aren’t overly sweet. You can add fresh fruit, jams, nutella etc. Get creative and have fun with it!

Best Brand Of Food Dye I Recommend

I use Americolor Food Gel to achieve the most saturated, vivid colors without having to use a ton of dye. With this brand, a little goes a long way. You can find this brand on Amazon by clicking here.

I don’t recommend using liquid food gel as it can cause the batter to become too thin. When mixing the food gel into the cake batter, mix as little as possible so that you don’t deflate the egg whites in the batter.

Jack-O-Lantern Cake Batter| The Squeaky Mixer

Whipping Egg Whites

The stiff egg whites are going to be the bulk of what makes this cake batter fluffy and thick enough to be able to pipe designs without the batter being to thin and just spreading. As long as they’ve reached stiff peaks, you’re a-okay. Whipping egg whites should only take 6-8 minutes. You should be using the whisk attachment or an electric mixer at high speed to achieve the perfect stiff peaks.

Piping Your Design

Take your time with this step, and do your best to pipe the batter as close to your traced designs on the parchment paper. If the batter was made correctly, the batter should be thick enough to be able to pipe so that the batter doesn’t spread when piped. If you’ve made this recipe in the past and have had this issue it is most likely because the whipped egg whites mixed into the batter were over mixed and deflated.

Jack-O-Lantern Cake

5 from 5 votes

Recipe by Maddison Koutrouba – thesqueakymixer.com

Servings

8-12

servings

Cooking time

minutes

Cook Mode

Keep the screen of your device on.

Ingredients

6 6 egg yolks
4 Tbsp. 4 sugar
4 Tbsp. 4 vegetable oil
4 Tbsp. 4 whole milk
2 tsp. 2 vanilla extract
1 cup 1 all purpose flour
2 Tbsp. 2 cornstarch
6 6 egg whites
1/2 tsp. 1/2 vinegar
4 Tbsp. 4 sugar
Whipped Cream Filling
2 cups 2 heavy whipping cream
5-6 5-6 Tbsp. confectioners sugar
dash salt
2 tsp. 2 vanilla

Directions

Preheat the oven to 375 degrees and grease an 8″ circular pan with cooking spray and line with parchment paper. Draw or trace a Jack-O-Lantern face onto your parchment paper. It’s best to cut the parchment paper to fit the pan perfectly.
Whisk together the egg yolks and sugar until smooth. Keep the egg whites! We will need them later.
Add the vegetable oil, milk, and vanilla to the egg yolk mixture and continue to whisk until fully combined.
Sift in the flour and cornstarch to the wet ingredients. Then whisk until the batter is nice and smooth. Add in 2-3 drops of orange food gel.
In the bowl of a stand mixer fit with a whisk attachment, whisk the 6 egg whites until frothy. Slowly add in the vinegar and sugar while whipping up the egg whites.
Whisk the egg whites until stiff peaks form. This is very important! Make sure the egg whites have formed stiff peaks before adding it in to the batter in the next step.
Fold the egg whites into the batter until everything is fully combined. Be careful not to over mix at this step. If you over mix, the egg whites will deflate and cause for runny, thin batter. Mix just until the egg whites are evenly distributed throughout.
Remove about 1/4 cup of the batter and place it into a small bowl and dye it black.
Place the black batter in a piping bag.
Pipe the black Jack-O-Lantern face onto the prepared pan. Allow the design to set in the freezer for 5-8 minutes.
Pipe the orange batter on top of the frozen design to cover the entire pan. Then bake for 8-9 minutes or until golden brown on the edges.
Once the designed cake has finished baking flip the cake out of the pan and peel the parchment paper off of the design as soon as it comes out of the pan. Use the remaining batter to bake two more layers of cake. Allow the cakes to cool completely. While the cakes cool, prepare the whipped cream.
In the bowl of a stand mixer fit with the whisk attachment, whisk the cream, sugar and vanilla until stiff peaks have formed and you have reached a whipped cream consistency.
Assemble the cake by placing a layer of cake (the undesigned cake) on the bottom, then pipe a layer of whipped cream. On top of the whipped cream place another layer of undesigned cake. Repeat this step then top the entire cake with the Jack-O-Lantern designed cake.
Serve in the fridge until serving, enjoy!
This cake can be made ahead of time but is best enjoyed fresh. If you plan to make this ahead of time, be sure too seal the cake tightly in plastic wrap to keep it fresh.