Looking for halloween baking ideas? With spooky season in full swing, Esther Sánchez shares her recipe for a colourful Halloween swirl cake.
Halloween is the perfect fun with your baking! This colourful swirl cake starts with a simple vanilla cake batter, divided into three striking Halloween colours: orange, purple and black. A little cocoa powder is added to the black batter, giving the cake a subtle chocolate flavour too.
The beautiful pattern might look complicated, but it is actually very easy to create. By adding each coloured batter into the centre of the tin, one after another, the mixture naturally spreads out to create those eye-catching swirls.
I recommend using gel or paste food colouring for vibrant colours without changing the consistency of the batter. Make them nice and bright, as the colours will darken slightly during baking.
Plenty of spooky treats will also be available at my Cake Shed in Cherry Hinton (CB1 8BN) this month!
Halloween swirl cake recipe
Serves 6-8
INGREDIENTS
For the cake
- 2 medium eggs, at room temperature
- 180g icing sugar
- 125g unsalted butter, melted and lukewarm
- 190g double cream, at room temperature
- 1 tbsp vanilla extract
- 220g plain flour
- 20g cornflour
- 5g baking powder
- 15g cocoa powder
- Orange gel or paste food colouring
- Purple gel or paste food colouring
- Black gel or paste food colouring
For the milk syrup
- 130g milk
- 40g sugar
METHOD
- Prepare a 15cm round cake tin.
- Whisk the eggs and icing sugar together. Add the melted butter, double cream and vanilla and mix until combined.
- Sift together the flour, cornflour and baking powder. Add to the wet ingredients and mix until you have a smooth batter.
- Divide the batter equally between three bowls. Colour one orange and one purple. Add the cocoa powder to the third and colour it black. Gel or paste colours work best; add around 1/8 teaspoon at a time until the colours are bright and vibrant.
- Spoon a little orange batter into the centre of the tin, then add purple directly into its centre, followed by black. Let each spoonful spread slightly and continue alternating the colours, always adding into the centre, until all the batter is used.
- Bake at 170°C fan for 35-45 minutes, or until a skewer inserted into the centre comes out clean.
- Meanwhile, gently warm the milk and sugar until dissolved. Spoon or brush the warm syrup over the cake as soon as it comes out of the oven. Leave to cool before removing from the tin.
Esther Sánchez is a Spanish pastry chef with more than 20 years of experience and the founder of Chocolatisimo Shop, now in Cambridge @chocolatisimo_shop
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