Wednesday, May 28, 2008

Daring Bakers-May Challenge-Opera Cake


The "Daring Bakers" is an online baking group that sponsors a baking challenge every month. If you're interested in baking and challenging yourself, this is a great group to join. The group is filled with bakers with a range of skills from novices to professional bakers. I'm a newbie to the group and this is my first challenge ever!

May's challenge was to make a "spring" opera cake. Instead of creating a typical chocolate opera cake, the challenge involved having to make it "spring"-like by only using light colors. So as much as I detest white chocolate, I used it for the recipe. My immature view of white chocolate that it's pseudo chocolate that is not doing a good job trying to disguise itself as chocolate.
An opera cake consists of five layers: cake, a simple syrup, buttercream, ganache, and a glaze. This is the first challenge I have participated in and was quite overwhelmed with the challenge. I've consumed an opera cake before, but had never made it.

Here's pictures of my guava opera cake decorated for spring. I was trying to go for a cherry blossom theme to my cake. I made a vanilla simple syrup and added guava paste to the buttercream. The guava taste was quite faint so what I made was really a pink vanilla frosting opera cake.
Also, about the butter cream it was great when I first made it. I stored it in the fridge overnight and then when I tried to whip it back up the next day the emulsion broke a little bit. So for this recipe I'd suggest making and using the buttercream on the same day you're assembling the cake.



Well, I completed my very first challenge. I will be looking to these other Daring Bakers for inspiration: Clumbsy Cookie's Mango Coconut Cake, No Recipes' Fire and Ice Cake, The Feast Within's Cake , and Pretty Tasty Cakes' Apricot Pistachio cake. There are so many creative bakers there that make beautiful cakes! For the next challenge I will work towards creating beautiful pieces too!

26 comments:

Rosa's Yummy Yums said...

Your cake looks great and I love the pretty flower decoration! I trimmed the edges of mine with a sharp knife, that's all...

Cheers,

Rosa

Deeba PAB said...

Oh...this is ever so pretty. Love the pastel colours & the pretty flowers on top. Ties it all together so well...beautiful!

Y said...

Too bad the guava wasn't a stronger flavour. This might be the first guava opera cake I've ever come across.

maybelles mom said...

guava--yum.

Chou said...

I loved the gauva buttercream. Silly breaking emulsions. :) Welcome!!!

Anonymous said...

Cute decorations, and congrats on completing your first challenge with flying colors!

Clumbsy Cookie said...

Guava wow! Sorry if it wasn't strong enough but at least gave you a nice color! Glad you liked mine!

Anonymous said...

Great job on your first challenge! I love the pretty pink colour and your decoration.
About the buttercream, next you might want to warm it slightly when you rewhip it, worked for me :)

Helene said...

Welcome to the DB! You did a fabulous job on your first challenge!

Anonymous said...

Beautiful cake and decorations. I love guava and bet it was good. Very pretty and glad you joined.

Renee said...

Your cake looks wonderful. I couldn't help but read the post before it. Congratulations on your upcoming wedding!!!

toontz said...

Wow, guava! For your first challenge, that is wonderful. I was a wimp and just stuck with orange and vanilla. Great job!

Christine said...

I love how you decorated the top! I'm really not one for pink, but the contrast between the off-white and the pink buttercream looks really good.

Bummer about the lack of guava flavor. I made mine cherry, but it lacked any cherry taste.

Christina ~ She Runs, She Eats

Christine said...

Such pretty flower decorations! Your cake looks delish!

Gabi said...

I love the idea of guava flavouring and your decorations too! Nice job!!!

Shelby said...

Congrats on the challenge! I like the colors!

Shari@Whisk: a food blog said...

The flowers look pretty. Great colors. And guava is one of my favorite flavors.
Shari@Whisk: a food blog

Miss Ifi said...

mmmm guava!!! Congratulations on your first challenge and welcome to the group!
the little flowers are so pretty!!!
did I mention I love guava??

genkitummy said...

thank you to everyone who has stopped by with your sweet comments! these are encouraging words and will definitely help me when i attempt future challenges!

Lunch Buckets said...

Welcome to the Daring Bakers!

Anonymous said...

Fantastic first challenge! Your flowers are adorable!

kellypea said...

I'm not a great fan of white chocolate, either, but this wasn't too bad. The guava paste sounds delicious and the color turned out very nicely! Congrats on your first challenge...

Barbara said...

You cake is so pretty! Great job.

Anonymous said...

Congratulations on your first challenge! Looks delicious.

silverrock said...

I love the decorative sprinkle-flowers on the top of your opera cake... very cute. Congrats on completing your first DB challenge, the cake looks great and I hope to see more awesome bakes in the future!

creampuff said...

That is so pretty!