London Fog Vanilla Cake x Caramelized Potato Chips

London Fog Vanilla Cake x Caramelized Potato Chips

makes one four-layer 6-inch cake

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A couple of weeks ago, we celebrated my dear friend Betty’s birthday. I love any excuse to make a cake, but a birthday is the best! I wanted to make a cake that was something that she liked, but was also unexpected. When prompted, she requested a London Fog – earl grey tea with vanilla – cake. Luckily, there was a recipe for earl grey buttercream in Tessa’s new book, Layered, so that was, well, a piece of cake.

The unexpected part, however, took quite a bit of brainstorming. I knew I wanted to do a drippy cake but I also wanted to add a bit of crunch. Mike and were chatting while driving, trying to brainstorm something fun to put on top. We thought about mini donuts, churros, cookies…the list goes on, but I wasn’t feeling any of them. After a couple of red lights of deep thought, I said, “but what does Betty love?”

Mike’s answer was immediate: chips. And it’s absolutely true, Betty is a chip fiend. Betty’s been known to eat entire family size bags of chips, for dinner. She regularly goes on all chip diets where she actually manages to lose weight. And once, when she was feeling particularly down, I left a surprise care package at her door, full of – you got it – chips.

So, this is the London fog, caramelized kettle chip (kinda like caramel corn) birthday cake I made for Betty. It was a hit. This cake was so, so Betty. Happy 30th Betts ;)

London Fog Vanilla Cakemakes one four-layer 6-inch cake

• 2 1/4 cups (295 g) cake flour
• 2 teaspoons baking powder
• 1/2 teaspoon salt
• 3/4 cup ( 1 1/2 sticks) unsalted butter, at room temp
• 1 1/2 cups (300 grams) sugar
• 2 teaspoons vanilla
• 4 large egg yolks
• 1 cup whole milk

via Tessa Huff’s Layered: Baking, Building, and Styling Spectacular Cakes

prep time: 15 minutes
bake time: 25 minutes
total time: 40 minutes

Preheat the oven to 350°F. Lightly grease and line four 6-inch round cake pans and set aside.

Sift the flour, baking powder and salt. Set aside.

In the bowl of a stand mixer, with the paddle attachment, beat the butter on medium until smooth. Add the sugar and vanilla. Mix on medium-high until light and fluffy, 3-5 minutes. Stop and scrape down the bowl.

On medium-low, add the egg yolks one at a time, mixing well and scraping down the bowl after each addition.

Turn the mixer to low and add int the flour in three batches, alternating with the milk – start with the flour so you end on flour. Mix for no more than 30 seconds after the last streaks of the dry mix are incorporated.

Evenly divide the batter among the prepared pans. Bake for 22-25 minutes or until a toothpick inserted in the centre of the cake comes out clean. Let cool on a wire rack for 15 minutes before removing from the pan to cool completely.

Note: I made a very tall 3 layer 5 inch cake, as well as a 2 layer 5 inch cake – my layers were just taller and smaller than Tessa’s.