Strawberry Cake With Buttercream Frosting | Simple Strawberry Birthday Cake | Strawberry Cake Using Fresh Strawberries

Looking for a lusciously tasting cake? Are you a fan of strawberries then you should definitely try this strawberry cake. Using fresh strawberries gives an intense lovely flavor and makes a wonderful combo with buttercream frosting and whipped cream. The cake is very moist, soft, quite dense and has that awesome strawberry-ness that you'll definitely fall in love with. I made this for a birthday celebration with buttercream frosting, you can simply make the cake alone without frosting if you are not a big fan of buttercream or if it is not for any celebration. I usually do not prefer frosted cakes, but that is what makes it look like a birthday cake right? I have discussed about how to frost a cake with buttercream but am not an expert in giving you a detailed tutorial, I have just given the basics that I know. You can Google and refer some good YouTube videos for ideas on how to design the cake, mine is a bit amateurish so I could not give any detailed tips, but will soon make a better post with much more details. For now lets take a look at the simple cake I made for my husband's birthday. 

INGREDIENTS

Makes approximately one kg cake (or two 500 gram cakes)

1. Maida / All purpose flour - 250 grams
2. Fresh strawberry - 200 grams 
3. Eggs - 4 (Room temperature) 
4. Unsalted butter - 200 grams (Room temperature) 
5. Sugar - 200 grams 
6. Fresh cream - 100 ml 
7. Milk - 3 tablespoons 
8. Vanilla essence - 2 teaspoons 
9. Baking powder - 1 teaspoon 
10. Salt - 1 teaspoon 

Basic Buttercream Recipe

Enough to frost an 1 kg cake

1. Unsalted butter - 200 grams (Room temperature)
2. Icing sugar - 450 to 500 grams 
3. Vanilla essence - 1 tablespoon  
4. Salt - A pinch (Optional) 

PREPARATION METHOD

Oven / OTG Settings

Heater / Rod select - Both
Shelf placement - Center 
Temperature - 175°C 
Baking time - 25 to 30 minutes
Preheat Oven - 10 minutes

Strawberry Cake

• Remove stem and wash strawberries well in water. Then puree it using a blender. Set aside. 

• Preheat an oven to 175°C for 10 minutes with a wire rack/tray in the center rack of the oven.
• Grease two round pans of 6 Inch x 2 Inch dimensions (or use one large pan) Then line with a butter paper or parchment paper. 
• Take flour, salt, baking powder in a bowl, mix well using a hand whisk or sieve twice and set aside. 
• Now take room temperature butter and sugar in a mixing bowl and beat well using an electric beater until fluffy. (You can use a hand whisk too, but beat until the butter is creamy)
• Add one egg at a time to the butter mixture directly and beat well after each addition.
• Now add the essence/extract and beat for a few seconds. 
• Then add the flour mix gradually and fold in (mix) gently using a spatula (do not use a beater here). 
• After adding all the flour pour in the strawberry puree and stir well. 

• You can add food color if you want a pinker cake like mine, I used pink gel color. 
• Now add fresh cream and milk and stir well using a spoon or spatula. 
• Pour the batter into the cake pans and place inside the pre-heated oven. Bake for 25 to 30 minutes or until the cake leaves the sides of the pan. Insert a toothpick or knife into the center of the cake to check if the cake is well baked. If the toothpick comes out clean if the cake has got baked well. 
• Set the pans aside until it cools down a bit. Then tap of the cake from the pans and place on  cooling rack for it and leave until the cakes cool down well. 

Basic Buttercream Recipe (Confectioners frosting)

• Take a mixing bowl and add unsalted butter, using an electric beater beat on a medium speed (2 speed) until smooth and creamy. (If you have a stand mixer it would be great) 

• Add vanilla essence and beat again for a few minutes. Scrape the sides and beat again. 
• While still beating add icing sugar tablespoon by tablespoon and increase the speed after adding all of the icing sugar, keep beating until it is very light and fluffy. It should stand in peaks and not easily fall down. If you don't get the correct consistency add some more icing sugar. Or if it is too thick add some milk or fresh cream and adjust the consistency likewise. 
• If you want to color the buttercream, just add the food color you need (I used gel colors, you can even use kesari colors) and beat again for a few seconds or until the cream is well tinted. (Inbetween stop and scrape the sides using a rubber spatula or spoon and beat again so that it is evenly tinted/colored)
• Use for frosting the cake or store it for future use. 
• Buttercream Icing or frosting consistency - The icing should be in the right consistency, it should be firm that when you scoop some icing with the spoon peaks should remain. 
• How to store buttercream icing - If you want to store the frosting, then fill the prepared buttercream in airtight containers or plastic bags, close it tight and place in refrigerator. Before using the butter cream bring it to room temperature and beat it again, add some more icing sugar if the consistency is not thick/stiff enough. 

Frosting The Cake With Buttercream (How to make a simple birthday cake) 

• Place a cake board on a turntable or any stand. (using a turntable will be easy to frost or decorate a cake) 
• Then place a spoon of buttercream over the cake board and place the prepared cake over it. This helps you to fix the cake to the board and avoids the cake from slipping away while frosting. 
• Now place some buttercream over the cake and spread using a knife or a spatula and spread it well and evenly. You can add a thick or thin layer according to your wish. 

• Place the other cake over this buttercream layer and press gently. 

• Now place a large scoop of buttercream over the top of the cake and using a spatula or a flat knife spread a thin layer of buttercream on all top and sides of the cake. Rotate the turntable and scrap off the extra buttercream from the cake using the spatula. This is called a dirty coating or crumb coating. This will prevent the crumbs from the cake interfering while frosting the final layer of buttercream. 
• When done place another bigger scoop of buttercream and evenly spread the buttercream on all sides. 

• Smoothen the buttercream with the spatula or a long flat knife. Wipe off the excess icing from the spatula or knife using a cloth and continue until it is smooth and even. (If your buttercream is not in the right stiff consistency it will not get spread well) 

• Then fit the icing nozzle to a piping bag and fill it with buttercream to pipe designs on the cake. 
• Filling the bag with buttercream for decorating the cake - Fold down top of the icing bag approximately 2 to 3 inches forming a cuff. Place the buttercream inside and push it with a spoon to the nozzle end of the bag. Do not fill more than half of the bag. Now squeeze the bag to let the air escape and twist the top of the bag to shut it close. 
• Hold the twisted end tightly between your thumb and forefinger gap and force the icing out of the nozzle by squeezing the bag. Pipe out designs as you wish. 
•  I used icing nozzle no. 42 for the below design. (I just piped this design around the cake edges both top and bottom. But before designing the bottom edge, wipe off the extra icing from the cake board using any cloth and then pipe the design to give a neat look)

• I used a plain nozzle for small dots kind of design in the second pic and I used the same plain nozzle to pipe a "Happy Bday" message on the top of the cake. (Instead of a plain nozzle you can even use a plastic bag or ziplock bag. Just fill the bag with buttercream, and cut a small opening at the tip of the bag, squeeze and use to pipe out designs) 

• You can pipe any designs its all about your creativity.
• I used two different colors of buttercream, you can use colored or even plain white buttercream as you wish. 

Finally a simple (amateurish yet tasty) Birthday cake is ready!!

TIP 1: This cake stays well for 2 days in a cool place. If you want to store the cake longer then refrigerate it. 

TIP 2: You can even frost the cake with whipped cream or ice-cream. It will taste heavenly!

TIP 3: Making buttercream frosting is an easy but tricky job, there is no perfect measurements or standards, just adjusting the consistency with icing sugar or milk is the basic trick to get perfect buttercream, just see that the frosting is thick enough to be frosted around the cake. 

TIP 4: Before frosting the cake see that the cake has cooled down completely. 

TIP 5: Using a cake board will help you easily transfer the cake after frosting without disturbing the frosting. If you do not have a cake board just use a normal waterproof thick cardboard. 

Super tasty Strawberry cake is now ready!! Frost or serve plain either way it tastes soooo yum!!