Sprinkle Sprinkle Cake in the Pioneer Press

First... there were these Rainbow Half-Cakes.

Then, the Pink with Sprinkles Cake.

And now we have the sprinkle/sprinkle cake. Sprinkles on the inside, sprinkles on the outside! Awesome!

Photo Courtesy TwinCities.com

You may have seen this cake with me in the Eat Section of today's St. Paul Pioneer Press. No? Well, go check out the short article. I'll wait right here for you to come back! ;-)

What You Need:
White Cake Mix or Vanilla Cake Recipe
1/3-2/3 cup jimmies sprinkles*
Buttercream Icing
1-2 small bottles of rainbow nonpareils sprinkles
Optional:
Piping Bag
Tip #21

*Note on the sprinkles: Do not try to use nonpareils (ball-shaped) sprinkles in batter. It doesn't work out. They all just lose their color, turn white, and turn your batter a highly disgusting shade of grey. To make a sprinkle cake, you need to use jimmies or another "shaped" sprinkle like the dots or the flower-shaped ones. I like jimmies best.

Prepare your cake batter as usual, adding the sprinkles in at the end- just fold them in with a spatula, rather than using the mixer... the mixer breaks them up too much.

Bake the cake according to your pan's directions. I used a 8"x3" round pan, so that usually takes about an hour.

Once the cake is cool, level it and torte it (cut it in half to make layers)- if you want.
(Click the link to see how to use a cake leveler to make leveling and torting SO much easier.)

Spread about 1/4-1/2 cup of icing in the middle, and add the other layer. (Remember that you always decorate your cake upside down. The bottom of the cake should be the top. And if you're using two layers from two pans, it should be the bottom on the bottom... and the bottom on the tops, so that the two leveled "tops" of the cakes are in the middle together.)

Cover the sides of the cake with icing first - in order to coat them with sprinkles. You want to keep it a relatively thin coating of icing so that it doesn't smoosh too much when you roll/dip it in the sprinkles. (I learned this lesson the hard way with those rainbow cakes! Sheesh! What a mess!)

Dump a bottle or two of your favorite sprinkles on to a paper plate. (I recommend the paper plate because you can fold up the sides a little to make the sprinkles congregate in the middle of the plate. Try that with a dinner plate!)

Then dip/roll the sides of the cake into the sprinkles. I highly recommend ALWAYS keeping two hands on the cake (unlike the photo above). I also recommend having a partner nearby to help shake the sprinkles back into the middle of the plate. Pretty much after every dip, I have to re-center the sprinkles so that the icing doesn't stick to the plate.

When the sides are covered, place the cake on a serving plate, and cover the top with icing. Be extra careful along the "seam" where your plain icing will meet the sprinkles. I usually try to spread the icing close to the edge, without actually touching the side/sprinkle icing, and then go very slowly around and spread it out to the edge. The first few times I tried this, I ended up with lots of sprinkles in the top icing.

Voila!

If you want, add a little star border with tip #21 along the top and bottom to mask any rogue sprinkles.

Click the Links Below to See:
How to Make Cake Mix Taste Like Homemade
How to Ice a Cake
Cake Decorating Basics

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