Day 105: Strawberry Petit Fours

Sometimes you need just a bite of cake!  These cute and delicious petit fours are easy to make, and with the blueberry on top gives it a burst of fruit that goes nicely with the sweet buttercream frosting.  To bake the cake you will need three square eight inch cake pans.  You can use round ones, but you may have excess edges that you can use to make cake pops or enjoy on your own.  The cake is from food.com's recipe for Magnolia Bakery's Vanilla Birthday cake.    I like this recipe versus other vanilla cake recipes because it is super simple and I have most of the ingredients at home.  Even though the original recipe calls for self-rising flour and all purpose flour, I simplified that by adding the baking powder and salt to regular all purpose flour.  They are a wonderful treat for a bridal shower or baby shower this Spring!

To make the cake:

1 cup unsalted butter, softened

2 cups sugar

4 eggs, room temperature

3 3/4 cup all-purpose flour

1 teaspoon baking powder

1/4 teaspoon salt

1 cup milk

1 teaspoon vanilla extract

blueberries (optional)

1.  Preheat oven to 350 F.  Grease and lightly flour three square 8 inch cake pans (or one large cake pan), then line the bottoms with waxed paper.

2.  With an electric mixer, cream the butter until smooth.  Add the sugar gradually until fluffy.

3.  Add the eggs one at a time, beating well after each addition.  

1. 4.  Mix the flour, baking powder and salt in a medium bowl.  Add to the wet mixture, alternating in four cycles with the milk and vanilla.  Beat well after each addition.  
2. 5.  Divide the batter among the cake pans.

6.  Bake for 20-25 minutes or until a toothpick inserted into the center of the cake comes out clean.  Let the cakes cool in the pans for 10 minutes, then remove and cool completely on wire racks.

Strawberry buttercream frosting:

1/2 cup butter, softened

2 cups confectioner's sugar

8-10 strawberries

1.  Rinse and dry the strawberries.  Cut off the stems.  Puree them in a food processor or blender.

2.  In an electric mixer, cream the butter.  Add the confectioner's sugar, mix well.

3.  Add the strawberry mix.  Due to excess water from the strawberries, you may need to add more confectioner's sugar to improve consistency.  It should be soft, but not runny.

Once the cakes are completely cool, you can adde the frosting.  To make the petit fours, cut the cake into 1" - 1.5" cubes.  You make need to trim the edges off to get a nice clean edge.  Add one blueberry to the top for decoration. 

Yields 70 petit fours.