Picnic Refreshing Cake

by Mildred Delgado
(Milledgeville, GA)

Picnic Cake

This is a single layer 10" round rum cake. This cake was iced with whipped cream icing. I prepared my regular whipped cream icing recipe and I added an extra 1/2 cup of clear piping gel. I did this so the icing will stay in place even outdoors. It worked. This icing is very thin while applying it. I did give it a good coat of icing while keeping and maintaining a nice even coat too.

I placed it in the fridge for 2 hours. The icing was crusted and firm.

I created the borders using dark blue icing on shell forms with a 18 metal tip on the pastry bag.

For the topping, first I purchased good quality 1 pound of fresh strawberries and about 1/2 pound fresh black berries. I cleaned them and I made some sugary water. I did this with 1 cup of sugar in two cups of water. I mixed them to ensure the sugar was clearly mixed within the water.

I soaked the fresh fruits in it for 5 hours. I kept the soaked fruits in the fridge all the time. I did this the same morning I planned to make this cake. After I soaked the berries, I drained them and I let them dry up on a very absorbent paper towel. I changed the paper towel 3 times until the last one had no water residue on it. If you don't do that it will smear on top of cake, you do not want that for it will look quite unpleasant.

I have a 10" dinner plate which I use as a guide to place the berries as they will look on top of a cake. I placed the berries on top of the plate the way I preferred and cut them accordingly filing the spaces in between.

For instance, some strawberries were sliced in halves and other ones in chunks. I used some chunks to fill gaps on the plate where a entire sliced one won't work. I even use the tip of the strawberries for small places too. Then, I placed the blackberries in the middle and some on the side just to give it a look. Afterwards, I used the pattern on the plate and I placed it on the cake.

One important thing, once you place it on the cake it is very hard to move the fruits around. I had to use a kitchen tweezers to carefully slide one piece of strawberry off. This cake kept the form the entire time. It did not melt outdoors. Because of the fresh fruits and the good taste, it was all gone in less than 15 minutes.