everyday lovely: Vintage Bridal Shower: The Cakes

So today at last I'll finish up my posts on the Vintage Bridal Shower with a talk about the food. I've said before how much I adore tall layered cakes - there's something so decadent, fun, and kind-of vintage about them - they always make me think of the cakes at the Fair in Pollyanna.

So I knew I wanted to do three big cakes: Pink Strawberry, Kahlua Icebox, and Coconut. It's ridiculous I don't have a better picture of all three of them together than this.

The Pink Strawberry was the most fun for me. Pink is my favorite color for life.

WHAT I DID

1. Made 1 Pillsbury Strawberry Cake Mix

2. Made 1 Pillsbury White Cake Mix and added a little red dye (this was the lighter pink of the two)

3. Doubled a recipe of Basic Butter Cream (so yes, I used 4 sticks of butter ;) Can't have enough icing in my book. It is so good.

Basic Butter Cream - Yum

1 cup (2 sticks) butter (room temperature)
1 teaspoon pure vanilla extract
1 1b. 10X powdered sugar
1-3 teaspoons milk, half and half or cream

Kahlua Icebox Cake. I've posted about this favorite before.

WHAT I DID:

1. Made 2 Boxes of Pillsbury Yellow Cake Mix in 8" pans, but only used 3 of the cakes

2. Slice Cakes in Half using this method or serrated knife - making for a total of six layers (again, ridiculous I don't have picture of the inside - the six layers looked so fun)

3. For Frosting: Whip two pints of whipping cream - whip in about 1/2 cup dry Nestle Quick and fold in Kahlua to taste.

4. Chill for at least 3 hours - the longer the better.

The Coconut Cake. This is the only cake where I didn't cheat and use a box. Box mix coconut cake is against the rules, pretty sure.

WHAT I DID

1. Made cake using Barefoot Contessa's recipe in this book, doubling the recipe, but again only using three of the four layers (freeze the forth for a treat later!)

2. Instead of her coconut cream cheese frosting that I don't like very much I used a great one Sister got from Emeril. Unfortunately I didn't exactly measure the powdered sugar and didn't use enough so it turned out too runny - see the frosting puddling? Don't let this happen to you! : )

Emeril's Coconut Frosting

2 sticks butter at room temp

8 cups powdered sugar

1/4 cup Cruzan coconut rum or coconut milk

1/4 tsp salt

1 tsp vanilla

flaked Sweetened Coconut to sprinkle on top

(no need to double this recipe - it makes loads)

For drinks, I bought 1/2 pint size mason jars at Wal-Marts (12 for about $7) and filled half of them with Pink Lemonade mixed up with sparkling water and the rest with milk.

Now I'm using these jars as glasses for my little people - love this size.