A Three-Tiered Wedding Cake with Martha Stewart, Part 2

Boom!

Hello, I'm Julia Child.

Welcome to my house.

What fun we're going to have baking all kinds of incredible cakes, pies and breads right here in my own kitchen.

In today's show, Martha Stewart returns to my kitchen to complete this stunning almond buttercream wedding cake.

See how it turns out on: Julia: In the previous episode, Martha demonstrated how any of us-- with enough perseverance-- could get started on this glorious wedding cake that will serve 50 people.

After mixing a batter of almond paste butter, sugar, eggs and flour and pouring it into these diamond-shaped cake forms each layer is baked an hour and a half to two hours.

And while the cake layers baked Martha created these charming little marzipan fruits... right down to the little stems and leaves.

She also made a huge amount of rum-flavored buttercream... enough to ice the entire cake.

And now... Martha's now going to do this white layer.

This is the dacquoise of beaten egg whites, sugar and almonds.

Very nice-- it gives that crunch that I love very much.

So, first, take your cake pan.

Now, this is the stack that we've used for that wedding cake.

17, 13, ten.

And trace on a piece of parchment paper your shape.

So now we have our shape.

Very clear.

Yeah.

Then we'll prepare the mixture which is one cup of blanched almonds.

These are those nice plump, moist almonds.

You don't want dried-out ones.

And, uh, you grind these up in the food processor till they're fine, like a coarse meal.

And that gives you 1½ cups of ground almonds.

Then you grind them with the sugar?

With the sugar, yes.

Because if you don't they turn oily.

Right, one cup of sugar.

And then on top of this just sift two tablespoons of cornstarch.

This will add a... it'll help it stay a little dry-- you want that dryness.

Two tablespoons.

And sift that all over the top and fold the cornstarch right in.

Now, I have beaten eight egg whites until almost stiff with one quarter of a teaspoon of cream of tartar.

And then one-third cup of sugar.

Now, the dacquoise can be made in advance as the dense almond cake is made in advance.

And if they're well wrapped with a plastic wrap and then put into a plastic bag and put delicately into your freezer you can make all parts of this cake way in advance of any celebration.

I can pour that in.

That's the nice thing about having extra help, I think.

We like that.

And then, I'm just gently folding... Say when.

Yeah, now.

Gently folding the almonds into the egg whites trying not to deflate.

And all the little hints about making a meringue: never, never use a greasy bowl.

That's so true.

And your spatulas must not have any butter on them, or oil.

Because that deflates them, yeah.

Yeah, you won't get that volume that you really want... that lightness.

Dump the rest in, thank you.

And then we're going to pipe this mixture onto our parchment paper with a pastry bag and half-inch tube.

This is a 16-inch pastry bag and I always fold down the top.

And this is plastic, isn't it?

Plastic-lined fabric.

I'm holding under the collar of the bag.

Just spoon in some of your dacquoise mixture.

I don't like to put too much in-- just enough for what I'm doing.

Now twist the top of the bag... that'll create a seal... and then pipe all around... your tracing... inside, staying inside.

And you can make it, really... as thick or as thin as you desire.

But this is a half-inch deep.

It'll be a very nice thickness for this particular creation that we're making.

And any little spaces...

I'll just add a little bit over here... where I was a little low.

But see how easy?

And with your offset spatula, just... just very lightly even this out.

It already smells good, doesn't it?

Oh, this whole cake smells good.

Yeah, it does.

And, uh, now you put this in a 200-degree, preheated oven for eight hours.

So if you make this late at night just stick it in the oven and when you get up in the morning, it's done.

Now the great moment has come-- assembling the cake.

This is the difficult part.

And the part that takes the most patience, Julia.

The cake has been baked and cooled and then wrapped very, very well with a plastic wrap.

This can be stored in the refrigerator for up to a week.

In the freezer for... a month or so.

Mm-hmm.

Now, if it's been frozen, always thaw the cake wrapped.

If you unwrap it, your cake might get soggy.

It's a good hint-- whenever you're thawing anything thaw it in the wrapping.

Mm-hmm, that's good to know.

Yes.

You learn all these tricks catering because you have to know all these things.

Now, the cake was also put on top of a piece of cardboard that was cut to the shape of the cake.

Oh, I'd never be able to lift it.

Oh, never, and it would just crumble and break and... That would be horrible, wouldn't it?

Don't want to deal with that.

And the cardboard is cut as closely to the shape of the cake as possible.

Now, we want to use a serrated knife-- like this, a bread knife-- to cut this layer in half because we're going to divide it in half and then put our dacquoise between.

Fine.

Now, using a turntable, and your eye you want to cut through the cake.

And you keep turning the table.

Keep turning the table.

That's very clever, yeah.

And that way, you're not going to get a crooked layer.

Now we're going to lift this layer off onto another piece of cardboard.

And using as big a spatula as you can find... lift this cake up... and flip it over.

One, two, three!

Ah!

Yes, you did it!

And it looks pretty good.

But look at the texture of the cake.

It is very well cooked... but feel how moist?

Mm-hmm, it's lovely.

There's no sugar syrup.

You don't have to add anything else to this cake.

And now, we're going to just put a spoon or two of the apricot filling.

And that gives a nice flavor, doesn't it?

Yes, it does.

We have taken a very high-quality apricot jam heated it, and then put it through a strainer.

And now we can spread that.

And now, here is our dacquoise.

Which has also been cooled after it was baked and wrapped in plastic wrap.

And even if there were a crack in it it wouldn't make too much difference it would never show.

Now what we're going to do is cut it to size on the cake.

Oh, yes.

Okay, so I'm putting it on the cake.

It's a little bit larger.

The cake seems to have shrunken a little bit.

So what we're going to do is take our serrated knife and we're just going to trim, like a saw.

See how it just saws nicely?

And a little bit more... See, it trims nicely, doesn't it?

Yeah, it does.

And now, I always keep on hand some very nice soft brushes to de-crumb this whole area.

We want to get rid of the crumbs... we don't want that in our frosting at all.

And now, another little layer of apricot.

I thought the apricot would taste very well with the almond.

Oh, yes, I think that would give kind of a classic combo.

This is going to make a really big layer, isn't it?

Very big.

These are just a little over a three inches.

Three inches, and this, I think you said holds 16 cups.

16 cups.

of the batter.

We measured all of that for the recipe.

It is a big cake, and because this is such a dense cake and such a rich cake the servings don't have to be very large.

I mean, these are not big wedges that we're going to serve the guests.

So, this layer alone would probably serve, oh, 20 people.

Mm-hmm.

So this cake altogether will serve about 50 people.

Generously?

Oh, I think so.

Yeah, I think so.

Okay, so we have that.

And now we want to get this layer back on.

So I'm going to... Go "whoom."

( chuckling ): Go "whoom" is right... You did it beautifully.

You can't be too careful, but you can also not be... too shy about handling a cake like this.

But notice, it didn't crack, it didn't break-- very lucky.

But even if it had cracked, you would... Again, because it's going to be inside we're not going to worry, okay?

I see a touch more of the dacquoise sticking out here.

I'm just going to trim that.

That might be a little problem when we're trying to ice.

So again, clean up your work area.

Get rid of all these crumbs.

And if you would like I think it's also a good idea at this point to put the cake on a large round so that as you crumb coat you put it right into the refrigerator.

Here, maybe you could put this on top of our turntable as I lift the cake.

It's weighing a lot, Julia.

( chuckling ): I'm sure it is.

That's a good idea.

See, then this is easily lifted and transferred and you don't hit the cake on anything in the refrigerator.

And take everything out of the refrigerator?

Well, you know what?

You have to measure your refrigerator when you start to make a cake.

This is another thing I had to tell you because you can make a cake like this and then find that you can't fit into your refrigerator.

And that is a disaster.

Because this must be chilled, it must always stay chilled.

Now this is our last step before we do the crumb coating.

Brush the cake free of any crumbs whatsoever.

Yes, you certainly don't want to get them in the final icing.

Okay, look, Julia.

The buttercream is a very nice consistency... Beautiful!

It is smooth... and we want to do this funny little thing we do called "crumb coating."

Okay?

So I put a little... dollop on every corner of the cake.

And I start to spread it.

Now, working quickly because this is what you do not want to melt you don't want this frosting to melt.

And this is just to keep the crumbs down?

Yes, this is the first thin layer.

Two coats on a wedding cake, I think, is fine because you want that second coat, your last coat to be beautiful.

Okay, so get that top as... pretty smooth.

And this does not have to be ultra-ultra smooth.

It just has to cover that cake.

And I also use this to build up any little slopes in the cake any little indentations.

Okay?

And then, draw the frosting down the sides and take it all around the cake.

Making those points pointy covering over the cardboard layer.

The most important thing, Julia, on this is if you don't work quickly enough your frosting is going to get too soft.

So if you feel it getting too soft do not hesitate to put it right in the refrigerator.

Mm-hmm.

Now the middle and top layers are handled exactly the same way for the undercoat.

Okay, so now this I'm just going to smooth it out a little bit and the second coat will be the more perfect coat.

Just a little bit on that corner...

Yes, right there.

There is our crumb coating.

That is beautiful.

Good.

Okay.

Well, Julia, I put pieces of parchment paper-- you can use wax paper-- around the perimeter of the tray so that when you're finished the cake you can just pull these out.

That's a good idea.

So I'm going to lift this layer underneath the diamond-shaped cardboard.

Now, again, nerves of steel.

You have to... Place it right here.

And now our smooth coat... it's chilly.

It's chilled.

We want it to be chilled.

It's beautifully smooth.

You can see it gets a little bit coarse at the bottom if it's been sitting over the ice water too long.

You have to be very careful.

Usually when I decorate wedding cakes it's in the middle of the night when there is nobody around to bother me.

I got into that habit early on because if you try to work where it's chaotic or a lot of stuff going on you really... it's a nerve-racking business.

Yeah.

Now, this is your opportunity again to make everything look really good.

Pull that frosting down.

Now, here, this corner's a little bit of a problem-- we want that to be much sharper.

Like the prow of a ship.

Yes, exactly right.

The prow might be sticking out a little bit-- this one has to be up and down, perpendicular to the tray.

And now, you can see, the second layer is going on even better than the first layer because the first layer is cold and it is chilling this frosting as I put it on which I'm very happy about.

How long will the whole cake keep after it's been frosted?

Oh, if I were doing it for a party I would definitely make it the day before.

Mm-hmm, at least.

Don't apply your marzipan decoration until right before you're going to serve the cake because you don't want that to get damp in the refrigerator.

So we're getting very close to having this ready to do our final piping.

And stacking the cakes is a another secret that a lot of books, a lot of people do not tell you how important it is to stack correctly.

This has to be three layers.

You want it to be secure, you want to keep a space in between each layer-- not a big space-- but large enough so that you can lift the layers off.

So I'll show you how I do that.

Well, we're ready now to start stacking the cake.

These are the chilled layers-- medium and small.

And this is how I do it, Julia: This cake is about 13 inches so I want to make sure that my straws...

I have found that clear plastic straws are very rigid supports for a cake.

This happens to be a heavy cake.

So I want to support the cake on straws and I'm going to insert the straws right down through the cake.

I wouldn't have thought that because it doesn't feel rigid.

If you try to press a straw this way nothing ever will bend it.

So make sure it gets all the way down to the bottom.

Now cut the straws off.

I only want it to protrude above the cake a little less than a half an inch.

I'm doing this by eye.

Okay, now we have to do it on these points, too so it's going to be... eight inches so we'll make them 7½.

So here we have four rigid straws.

Just feeling the straw I wouldn't believe it was rigid enough but I must believe you.

I'll show you what we're going to do because this is something that Susan came up with-- she didn't trust the straws either.

So what she did was insert a bamboo skewer in here and then cut the bamboo skewer off at the top of the straw.

But you would feel that just the straw would be enough.

It is enough.

I've done it many, many times and it is enough.

But if you want to be really, really secure, do it this way.

These are barbecue skewers.

Notice I'm not using scissors-- I'm using real heavy-duty wire cutters to get through this bamboo because it is tough.

Make sure you don't have any wood splinters anywhere and now I'm going to put my skewers here.

The top layer doesn't need it.

If you have trouble inserting it down you can gently tap on the straw.

Here's a big moment of truth!

How are we going to get that on without touching it?

You just have to very carefully center... That's why you want that little space too.

Exactly... you want your space and you want to make sure it's centered.

Here, Julia, our last layer.

Just gently lifted... and placed, again, by eye... because that's all you have to go by on those.

You need a steady hand and strong arm.

Yes, you do... and lots of nerve.

There...

I'll show you how I prevent slipping and sliding.

Do you have a hammer nearby?

I do...

I do.

Only Julia Child would have a hammer this large for this job!

What we have to do is get this bamboo skewer... Now, make sure it's taller than the cake and this one is-- you can see it's taller.

Slide it down through the center of the cake.

When you get to that cardboard you have to hammer.

Slide it down to the next layer.

That's going right through the cardboard-- it has to be sharp on the end.

That's what you want.

You hit bottom, I think.

And there's always a better side to the cake.

Mm-hmm.

Here, that's going to be fine.

That's the audience side in front now.

And now we're going to pipe a little bead around the entire cake and up and down these points.

I thought that a pretty simple beaded edge made with this number-two tip... requiring a steady hand and a steady eye... but notice I'm only squeezing the bag with my right hand guiding it with my left hand.

Don't squeeze like this-- otherwise you'll have piles of... You've left this on so you can hold onto it.

Hold onto it, yeah.

It gives me a little anchor to hold on to when I have to.

If it gets too soft you put it in the fridge.

Exactly.

There-- so that beaded edge is looking very pretty.

We're also going to do each layer, down the point also.

Any big gaps, any dark spaces will be filled in with our lovely marzipan cherries and raspberries.

Sort of like parsley... to cover things up with.

I think that looks very nice and I like the kind of pristine quality.

It's a very simple cake and that's why I really think anybody can put together this cake.

So, this will take me a little time working patiently to get all these dots along each edge so I can finish this up if you want to go find out where the marzipans are.

That would be great.

Now we're near the end of this cake.

We are, indeed, and these are all the marzipan fruits.

Look at that-- there's leaves...

I'm going to cut away our little support skewer here.

That's a very smart thing to do, isn't it?

I'm going to just take that away.

We're going to remove these papers because we're now going to decorate the bottom of the cake.

Now, look what's coming off here, Julia but we've saved the tray from getting messy.

That's basically what we tried to do with this paper and it really, really does work.

It's a good trick.

Now the fun part of decorating with the marzipan-- the raspberries.

We're just going to place these where we think they're going to look pretty.

What are you going to do about that skewer sticking out?

We're going to cover that over with a beautiful raspberry.

Don't worry about that... right there.

You'd never know anything was in there.

The stems of the cherries are dipped into the Karo syrup.

This does help keep them secure.

And we'll make a little cluster of cherries on the top.

And you just decorate and decorate to your heart's content.

And you'll decorate down the front... We need some leaves.

Add your leaves and these large leaves are very pretty placed along the base of the cake.

And that evens it out a little bit too.

It does.

And remember what I said about filling in dark spaces, imperfections in the icing.

All of that can be done this way.

And again, when the cake gets soft put it in the refrigerator let it chill and continue with your decorations.

I think this is a really beautiful cake and, I don't know, it's so original having these fruits on it.

I think the color scheme is lovely.

It just doesn't look like one of those commercial cakes.

Perfection is also knowing when to stop putting these things on.

I could just keep going and going.

I can see that.

I'm a little afraid of putting too much.

I need one more raspberry.

Where are you going to put it?

Right here.

That is lovely.

And the cake is ready to present to the party.

Julia, this is the top layer that generally would be reserved for the bride but I'd love you to have a taste, so we'll cut you a slice.

It looks so delicious.

Okay.

And just serve this piece.

You'll be able to see how nice it is inside.

Oh, yes, and there's the almond cake.

And the dacquoise-- you see a little bit of the apricot.

While you're serving this cake, always be sure to decorate with one or two of the lovely pieces of marzipan.

Just borrow them from the cake and that's an important feature.

Make sure each guest gets something of the marzipan... and a little leaf or two.

That's very good!

You rarely get a really delicious wedding cake.

I think this is delicious.

I think this is one of those occasions where you will and I think anyone who tries this cake will enjoy it-- I hope.

I think this deserves a little sip of champagne.

Thank you.

( glasses clinking ) Martha, it's been wonderful!

I'm so thrilled to have the chance to do this.

I think we've learned so much.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Julia: Bon appétit!