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Christmas Tree Cakes
Traditional Cakes & Pies
Prep time:
15 minutes, plus assemblyBake time:
15 minutes“Grandma always said that these individual star-shaped cakes were “pure elegance.” She served them on her prettiest dessert plates.”
Ingredients
Serves 4
- 1 1/2 cups egg whites (from 10 to 12 large eggs)
- 1 1/2 cups sifted confectioners’ sugar
- 1 cup sifted all-purpose flour
- 1 1/2 teaspoons cream of tartar
- 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
- 1 cup granulated sugar
- Confectioners’ sugar
- 1/4 cup prepared white frosting or whipped cream
- Green or silver dragees
Directions
1
Baking the cakes: Preheat the oven to 350F. In a large bowl, let the egg whites stand at room temperature for 30 minutes. Meanwhile, sift together the confectioners’ sugar and flour two times and set aside.
2
Add the cream of tartar and vanilla to the egg whites. With an electric mixer set on medium speed, beat until soft peaks form, about 2 minutes. Add the granulated sugar, 2 tablespoons at a time, beating until stiff peaks form, about 3 minutes. Sift one-fourth of the flour mixture over the egg-white mixture, then gently fold in. Continue sifting and folding in the remaining flour mixture, one-fourth at a time. Spoon the batter into an ungreased 17x11-inch jelly-roll pan.
3
Bake the cake until the top springs back when pressed, about 15 minutes. Transfer the pan to a wire rack to cool completely.
4
Assembling and decorating the cakes: Cut out 4 stars from the cake with a 4-inch star-shaped cookie cutter. Repeat with 3 1/4-inch, 2 1/2-inch and 1 3/4-inch star cutters for a total of 16 cake stars. Transfer the stars to a wire rack.
5
With kitchen scissors, cut four 3/4-inch squares from the cake scraps left in the pan. Trim the corners to make rounds. Transfer the rounds to the rack. Using a fine mesh sieve, dust the cakes with confectioners’ sugar, then dust 4 serving plates.
6
Holding the cakes by the edges, make a stack of stars on each prepared plate, using 1 cake star of each size and stacking from largest to smallest. Top each cake stack with a cake round.
7
Spoon the frosting into a pastry bag fitted with a small round tip; pipe a dot at each point of each star. Immediately place a dragee on each dot of frosting.
Variations(0)
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Grandma's Secret Tip
Grandma's Secret Tip
Grandma sometimes used a prepared cake mix for the cakes. She found that yellow, white, dark chocolate and strawberry mixes all made lovely trees.
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