Brown Butter Caramel Cake (fancily decorated)

I’ve talked about baking cakes for different birthdays and celebrations at work. One of my coworkers was having a baby boy and we decided to have a little celebration for her. This was her third baby boy and while it isn’t traditional to have a formal shower for the third baby, we figured that no one would mind having a little celebration!

We’d planned this as a surprise for her, her last day of work and about a week before she was going to have the baby. Well, she ended up having the baby early, so we weren’t able to celebrate with her before the baby came. That teaches us to plan a party on the last day! We’d just have to wait to celebrate.

She came to visit with the new baby and her two older sons and I made the cake for that day. I had bought M&Ms in two shades of blue (thank you party store for having these wonderful things) and found cute “It’s a Boy” ribbon. You could make any cake you’d like, even a cake mix, but I had made this excellent browned butter caramel cake. I frosted it with a simple chocolate frosting. This cake looks so impressive, but really isn’t too hard to put together. The ribbon helped keep everything together on the trip to work. Everyone enjoyed this cake and we had a great time meeting the new baby. Welcome to the world little one!

3/4 cup butter

1 cup brown sugar, packed

3 eggs

1 teaspoon vanilla

2 1/2 cups + 2 tablespoons cake flour

2 teaspoons baking powder

3/4 teaspoon salt

1 cup buttermilk

6 tablespoons butter, room temperature

2-2/3 cups powdered sugar

½ cup cocoa powder

1/3 cup milk

1 teaspoon vanilla

M&Ms

KitKat Bars

In a small saucepan, heat the butter over medium heat. Heat the butter until it is light golden brown, about 8-10 minutes. Watch it carefully so it doesn’t burn. Remove the pan from the heat and pour the browned butter into a small bowl. Allow to cool to room temperature.

Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Butter and flour two 8-inch round cake pans.

In a large mixer bowl, beat the cooled browned butter and brown sugar until fluffy, about 5 minutes. Add in eggs, one at a time, beating for one minute after each addition. Stir in the vanilla.

In a small bowl, combine the flour, baking powder and salt. Add to the butter mixture in three additions, alternating with the buttermilk.

Divide the batter evenly between the prepared pans and bake for 25-30 minutes, until a toothpick inserted in the center of the cake comes out clean. Cool in the pans for 10 minutes and then remove from the pans and cool completely on a wire rack.

Make the frosting: in a large mixer bowl, beat the butter, powdered sugar, cocoa, milk and vanilla until smooth. If the frosting is too thick, add additional milk. If too thin, add additional powdered sugar.

Assemble the cake: place one cake layer on a cake plate. Frost the top of this cake. Add the second cake later and frost the second layer. Frost the sides of the cake. While the frosting is still soft, press KitKat bars around the sides of the cake. Top the cake with M&Ms.

Cake recipe from Guilty Kitchen  . Frosting recipe from Hersheys. Decorating idea from Pinterest