I did it! I finally made a rose cake! But not just any rose cake – a green ombre rose cake! Yay me! I have been dying to make a rose cake ever since I first laid eyes on it on my favourite site, Pinterest. Unfortunately, the proper occasion to make it never came up until a few weekends ago when I went to visit my dear grandmother to wish her a Happy Birthday!
As long as you’re familiar with the 1M tip and you’ve made roses before, this cake is an absolute breeze to make. Even if you’ve never made roses before, there really is nothing complex to this technique, you’re essentially just making a swirl, and another swirl, and another swirl, until you’ve covered the entire cake! And what’s so great about this cake is even if you mess up on a swirl/rose, you can easily just scrape it off and try again. Of course, this wonderful little fact slipped my mind completely when I was piping as I’m a little bit of a perfectionist and want everything right first time. (Obviously, this isn’t always the case with my bakes!)
This rose cake is really not as hard as it looks, all you need is a few 1M tips and some good gel food colourings. I love that it’s simple to do but stunning to look at – and all edible! Don’t get me wrong, I love producing a cake covered in fondant and sugar paste, making edible sugar modelled toppers and sugar flowers, but I have definitely become obsessed with this simple, yet beautiful cake.
I used a creamy buttercream frosting for the roses on the outside and for the inside it was a standard Victoria sponge with yet more vanilla buttercream. I love working with buttercream, it’s silky smooth and very yummy, it’s a winner on all my cakes! I used Wilton green gel food colouring to colour the icing – green is my grandmother’s favourite colour and although it’s not very rose-like, it worked with the ombre effect of the different shades, starting with the plain vanilla buttercream and topping with a rich green. You definitely want your darkest colour to be quite dark, otherwise there won’t be a decent enough colour gradation!
I think it took me longer to get the lettering right on the small fondant cake topper than it did to do all the roses – it seems I cannot master writing with buttercream or normal icing for that matter. It’s my downfall! I’m a cheat, and I love a good letter cutter – I feel it gives a much more professional edge when your writing looks like a 5 year old! I bet I wrote out those letters and wiped them off 10 times before I decided it was good enough! It’s the personal touch though so it was worth the struggle!
Inside is a 4 layered sponge, a vanilla layer, a green layer, and the same again. My grandmother loved cutting into it and seeing the layered effect. I think she just loved the cake overall in all honesty which is good, because it was her special treat!
I will definitely want to make another one of these cakes again. They really are incredibly simple to make once you get into the swing of the piping, I was actually bobbing along to the songs on the radio by the time I was finished! And it really is a stunning cake with great detail. I’d love to make an even bigger one, with even bigger layers and a greater ombre effect with the graduation of colours. Perhaps this will become next years Mother’s Day bake …
What do you think to the ombre rose cake?
Do you love it’s simple, yet stunning design?
LOVE the little bakery 