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This year, I really wanted to bake and decorate a Christmas-themed cake! So, I put together this recipe to create a light coconut sponge, sandwiched with swiss meringue buttercream, coloured to create an ombré effect! And voilà, I present you my Christmas Snow Cake!
The cake is very quick and easy to make, but it´s the decorating that takes a while to do. However, I was happy with the end result, and as cake decorating is an area I am wanting to work on, I thought I´d give it a go! Hope you like the look of my Christmas Snow Cake and also want to give it a try!
The Coconut Sponge Cake
The first component for this Christmas cake is the coconut sponge. The recipe is very simply to follow and the end result is a super light and fluffy sponge! I will definitely be using this recipe again in future for other cakes!
Perhaps somewhat uniquely, in this cake recipe I decided to add some tinned coconut milk. The thick, creamy stuff you use to make curry, not the more liquid version you can buy as a dairy-free milk substitute. I used light coconut milk, but full-fat would work fine as well. If your kitchen is quite cold (which my one in Aberdeen certainly is!), you may find that the coconut milk solidifies in the tin, separating into a liquid and solid phase. If this is the case, the best thing to do is to place it in a warm place (e.g. on top of the heater/radiator) to melt the solid bit slightly. Shake the tin before opening, and stir well once opened to combine completely before using. You won´t need the full tin of coconut milk, but you can use the rest to make the icing for these Coconut Star Biscuits, or to make a curry (e.g. my favourite Thai Green Curry or Sweet Potato, Chicken and Spinach Curry).
The Swiss Meringue Buttercream Frosting
Swiss meringue buttercream is something I have wanted to try for a while. Swiss meringue is made by first dissolving sugar in the egg white over a water bath, before whisking on high speed until thick, white and glossy! The egg-sugar mixture should be about 70°C before you start whisking it, but you don´t necessarily have to have a sugar thermometer to make Swiss Meringue buttercream. The most important thing is to ensure that the sugar has completely dissolved. You can do this by simply rubbing some of the mixture between your fingers (careful, as it may be hot!) and make sure you cannot feel any sugar granules!
Once the meringue has been whipped to stiff peaks and cooled to room temperature (important!) you can start adding the butter. Add the cool butter in small chunks, mixing well before adding the next bit. This is important to make sure the butter gets fully incorporated, and it has to be cold (as well as the meringue) to stop it from melting and make the meringue go soft/runny. If it does, you can save it by placing your bowl into the fridge for 20 minutes to harden the butter a little, but not too long or it will solidify completely.
If it looks like it has curdled slightly after adding the butter, there luckily is a quick-fix! Place the bowl back over the water bath and leave (without stirring) for about 2 minutes to re-liquify the sides of the meringue. Remove from the heat and whisk again for a few minutes until the icing is smooth and creamy!
Decorating the Christmas Snow Cake
When it comes to decorating this Christmas Snow Cake, there are two main components: One, colouring and decorating with the Swiss Meringue Buttercream and two, creating fondant icing decorations.
To decorate this cake, I decided I wanted to create a candy-cane like red and white striped interior, and a blue ombré design on the outside to make it look a bit like snow. To do the inside of the cake, I used about a quarter of the buttercream and coloured it red, using raspberry jam (for flavour) and food colouring. Next, I filled it into a piping bag and piped alternating circles of red and white Swiss Meringue Buttercream to sandwich the cake layers together.
Step-by-step picture guide
Step-by-step picture guide
For the outside of the cake, I coloured a third of the remaining buttercream a dark blue, and another third a light blue colour. Make sure to use gel food colouring to not alter the consistency of the buttercream! Pipe the darker blue buttercream around the bottom of the cake, the light blue around the middle and white over the top third and top of the cake! You can then use a palette knife to smooth out the buttercream around the sides, carefully blending the different colours together where they meet. Finally, smooth off the top and cover with desiccated coconut to make it look like snow! As a picture says more than a thousand words, check out the pictures above!
Finally, I used some shop-bought ready-to-roll icing to create some fondant decorations. I used some gel food colouring to colour it and make snowmen, as well as cut out some fondant snowflakes for the sides of the cake! The decoration is obviously completely up to you, so go wild!
More Christmas Baking Recipes
If you are looking for more Christmas baking recipes, why not check out some of my other recipes below?
- Christmas Light Cookies with Royal Icing
- Chocolate Yule Log
- Gingerbread Men
- German Stollen with Marzipan
- Chocolate Orange Crescent Biscuits
- Hazelnut Shortbread with Dark Chocolate | “Haselnussbrot”
- Mary Berry´s Meringue Roulade with Strawberries and Cream
- “Baumkuchen” with Rum | German Christmas Baking Classic
Christmas Snow Cake with Swiss Meringue Buttercream
Recipe
Ingredients:
FOR THE COCONUT SPONGE CAKE:
- 300g butter, softened
- 300g caster sugar
- 4 large eggs
- 150ml tinned coconut milk (I used a light version)
- 1 tsp vanilla extract
- 300g self-raising flour
- ½ tsp baking powder
- 60g desiccated coconut
FOR THE SWISS MERINGUE BUTTERCREAM:
- 6 large eggs, whites only
- 400g caster sugar
- 350g butter
- 2 tsp vanilla extract
- ½ tsp salt
- Red gel food colouring
- 3 tbsp seedless raspberry jam
- Blue gel food colouring
TO DECORATE:
- 60g desiccated coconut
- Ready-to-roll fondant icing
- Gel food colouring (red, black and orange, or any other colour you like)
YOU WILL ALSO NEED:
- 3x 20cm round sandwich tins
- Heatproof bowl
- Sugar thermometer (optional)
- Hand-held or free-standing electric whisk
- Piping bags
- Angled palette knife
- Snowflake fondant cutters (optional)
Method:
- Preheat the oven to 180°C and lightly grease the sandwich tins with melted butter. Line the bottom of the tin with a circle of baking paper.
- Start by preparing the batter for the coconut sponge cake. First, cream together the butter, sugar and eggs until smooth and creamy. Whisk together the tinned coconut milk and vanilla extract, before adding to the bowl and beating until well incorporated.
- Mix together the self-raising flour, baking powder and desiccated coconut. Add to the mixing bowl and briefly mix until fully combined.
- Evenly distribute the cake batter between the three prepared tins. Bake in the preheated oven for 20-25 minutes, until golden brown and starting to shrink away from the sides of the tin. Leave to cool in the tins for a few minutes, before turning out onto a wire rack and allow them to cool completely.
- To make the swiss meringue buttercream, put the egg whites and the caster sugar into a heatproof bowl. Set over a pan of simmering water, making sure the bowl isn´t touching the water. Gently heat the mixture, whisking occasionally, until it reaches a temperature of ~70°C on a sugar thermometer and the sugar has dissolved completely. You can check this by rubbing a little of the mixture between your finger tips and making sure you can no longer feel any sugar granules (do just this if you don´t have a sugar thermometer).
- Remove from the heat and start mixing with your hand-held or free-standing electric whisk. Continue to do so for about 10-15 minutes until the swiss meringue is thick, glossy and has cooled to room temperature.
- Next, gradually add in the butter in small chunks, whisking well in between each addition and only adding the next bit once fully incorporated. Make sure the meringue has cooled to room temperature, and the butter is still fairly cool, so that it doesn´t melt and make the buttercream runny. Check out the information above for what to look out for when making Swiss Meringue buttercream!
- Finally, quickly whisk in the vanilla extract and salt to finish the buttercream icing!
- To ice and decorate your cake, put about ½ of the icing into a piping bag. Take another ¼ of the icing and stir in the raspberry jam and enough red food colouring to colour it a deep red colour. Evenly divide the final quarter of the icing into two bowls and colour them to different shades of blue with the blue gel food colouring, making one lighter and one darker.
- Fill the icing into piping bags and cut off a corner on the bags containing white and red icing that is roughly 1cm in diameter. Place the first sponge onto your serving plate, using a little of the white icing underneath to hold the cake in place. Next, pipe alternating circles of white and red icing onto the cake, starting with white and working your way into the middle. Place the next sponge on top, repeat the icing and top with the third layer of cake.
- Use the dark blue Swiss Meringue buttercream around the bottom of the cake, then pipe the lighter blue icing around the middle. Use the remaining white icing to pipe around the top and upper sides of the cake. Smooth the buttercream around the sides of the cake with a palette knife, carefully blending the different colours together where they meet.
- Smooth out the buttercream on the top of the cake and decorate the top with desiccated coconut to make it look like snow!
- Finally, you can use the fondant icing if you like to create any decorations for the top of the cake that you like! I made two snowmen for the top of my cake, as well as cut out some snowflakes to decorate the sides of the cake!
