I live in a house with four little girls. Four little crazy, creative, fun, annoyingly cute girls. In fact, as I write this, Charli is walking around sweeping the floor with the broom. Pretty sure she’s actually making a bigger mess, but whatever, she’s concentrating so hard right now on her task, why would I want to disturb that? The other three are cleaning their room with capes tied around their necks, because even Captain America has to keep his home clean, am I right?? They are my little superheroes and so I made them the best damn pinata cake ever. Fo realz. Dessert is life.
This cake was a lot of fun to make and assemble, and honestly, it’s far easier than it looks. I definitely recommend using more than two layers to make this cake, because you need the room to hollow out; using only two layers weakens the integrity of the cake and could cause it to collapse. For my cake, I used four 6-inch rounds and hollowed out three layers, leaving the fourth layer whole to place on top.
The recipe for this cake may seem a little bit crazy, but it’s one I’ve worked on for a very long time and among my favorites. White cake can be finicky, dry out easily, or become dense, so follow the directions and you will have success for sure! Then you just let it cool down completely, cut out the centers, frost, layer, fill with M&M’s, crumb coat, frost and voila! Ha ha ha, that sounds like a lot of work, doesn’t it? I promise it’s worth it, especially to see the look on someone’s face when you cut it open and let the contents spill out!
I went with the patriotic theme inspired by the new Captain America movie that was released on DVD on September 9th, and my mini-superheroes, of course. Notice the red, white and blue, yes? Too much fun, I swear. I separated my frosting into three bowls and colored two of them to create the ombre effect and then used a slanted spatula to smooth it out and blend the edges. You want to be sure and not press down too hard when smoothing, or you’ll end up taking all the frosting off.
Serve this cake to your favorite superhero, it’s so worth it!
Ingredients
- 4 Large Egg Whites at room temperature
- 2 Whole Eggs
- 1 C Whole Milk at room temperature
- 2 tsp Vanilla
- 3 C Cake Flour sifted
- 2 ½ C Sugar
- 1 Tbsp Baking Powder
- ¾ tsp Salt
- 1 ½ Sticks Unsalted Butter
Instructions
- Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Prepare three 6-inch round cake pans with nonstick baking spray or coat well with shortening and flour, removing all excess flour.
- Cream together butter until light and fluffy with an electric mixer on medium speed. Slowly add sugar one cup at a time, making sure to fully incorporate each cup before adding the next.
- Add the egg whites, mixing thoroughly, then add the whole eggs one at a time until fully incorporated.
- Sift together flour, baking powder, and salt. Pour the milk and vanilla into a measuring cup and gently stir together.
- Begin adding the dry ingredients to the sugar/butter mixture alternately with milk mixture, beginning and ending with the dry ingredients.
- Gently stir all ingredients until well combined. Stop mixer and scrape down sides and bottom of bowl, making sure all ingredients are incorporated.
- Evenly distribute cake batter between cake pans and place pans into the oven. Bake for 25-30 minutes, or until a toothpick or cake tester inserted in the center comes out clean. Remove and allow to cool slightly in the cake pans for about 5 minutes, then cool completely on a wire rack.
- Frost cake as desired.
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Now head on over to Heroes Eat M&M’s site to grab yourself a coupon for $5 off the new Captain America movie, then hit up Walmart to collect the ingredients for this awesome pinata cake and make it for all the superheroes in your life!
Stacey says
Hi,
For your piñata cake, you recommend four 6” round layers, but your recipe has three layers. How do you get the fourth layer? Do you have a recipe for two layers, and just double that?
Kelsey says
Do you have a frosting you recommend is paired with the cake?