Vanilla Latte Cake

My hubs LOVES vanilla lattes. I think he tries to convince me to go walk and get one with him at least 3 times a week. So I decided that his birthday cake had to reflect this obsession.

So I made a vanilla bean cake (the vanilla)

with toasted marshmallow filling (the foam)

and an espresso frosting (the espresso)

It could have used a little more coffee flavor but it was still super tasty and Joshua was very excited about it.

It was a good thing I had enough batter left over to make the mini versions because Joshua really really wanted to have enough left ofver for breakfast

(yes we eat cake for breakfast- my mom always said we could)

It was my first time using real vanilla bean! I love it! I can't believe how many seeds it holds

Vanilla Bean Cake Recipe:

Adapted from this recipe

I only made 2 layers and then made the rest of the batter into mini cupcakes

1 1/2 cups of butter; room temperature

 2 2/3 cup sugar

9 egg whites; room temperature

4 1/2 cups of flour

2 tbs. baking powder

1 tsp. salt

2 cups of buttermilk

1 vanilla bean- seeds

1 tsp ground vanilla

1 tbs espresso powder

preheat oven to 350 degrees F

1   mix the butter and sugar for a few minutes until it is light and fluffy

2   then on a low speed mix in the egg whites, one at a time

3   in another bowl mix the flour, powder, salt

4   then mix the vanillas and espresso powder into the buttermilk

5   rotate mixing in 1/4 - 1/2 cup of dry mixture with the buttermilk mixture into the butter and sugar

6   mix gently towards the end and possibly even end with hand mixing, don't over

     mix! It will make your cake have tunnels

7   then pour the batter into the cake pans

     (grease, flour and put parchment paper on the bottom of the pans first)

Note- this cake doesn't rise very much so be more generous with the batter than you would with normal cakes or you could end up with really thin layers

8   bake for 30 minutes or until a toothpick comes out clean

9   let cool and then begin your filling and icing

Toasting the marshmallows for the toasted marshmallow  filling

It was so gooey, luckily warm water melts it all off and you don't even really have to scrub

Marshmallow Filling Recipe:

adapted from this recipe

1 bag of mini marshmallows

1 cup of butter; room temperature

1 1/2 cup of powdered sugar

2 tbs. milk

1 tbs. espresso powder

1 tsp. ground vanilla

pinch of salt

1   toast marshmallows in oven on 350 degrees F until they start to turn brown

2   let them cool for a little while

3   mix the the rest of the ingredients sans marshmallows together until well incorporated

4   then dump in the marshmallows and mix for a few minutes

I then pulled out any large chunks of toasted marshmallow so that the only solid marshmallow pieces left were small

5   spread onto cake layer

6   then I spread marshmallow fluff onto the other layer and sandwiched them together.

for the mini cupcakes I just put a dolop of the marshmallow fluff on top of each and then added the icing over it!

The mashing of the marshmallow fluff against the toasted marshmallow filling

the white chocolate writing doesn't work as well as regular chocolate.The white chocolate never really hardens back up fully. If you lay it down on the cake it would work fine, but mine standing up started to wilt.

Espresso Frosting:

it is the same as THIS frosting

that I've previously made but with 1 tbs. more espresso! and a little less almond extract

espresso beans and a few white chocolate details!