Cake That Looks Like Pie: Blueberry Chocolate PiCake Tutorial

Photos: Cake Gumshoe SetiaCakeSpy Note: This is a guest post from Cake Gumshoe Setia, who just started blogging at cakesbysetia.blogspot.com.

I love cake. I bake cakes for many people and many occassions, and am constantly brainstorming my next cake project and an occassion to make it for. So, imagine my surprise when I happily tell my husband that I have a wonderful cake idea in store for his birthday, and he responds "I was actually thinking I might want pie". (Insert gasp of horror here). Pie? Seriously? You are asking a lover of cakes - a cake-artist-in-the-making, if I may be so bold, to make you a PIE?

Don't get me wrong, I have nothing against pie. In fact, on occassion, I quiet fancy a slice; heated, served with a side of vanilla ice cream. I can even make a decent pie when I put my mind to it. Yet that is not the point, is it? The point, if not already apparent, was that I was desperately excited to come up with some wonderful cake creation for my husband's birthday. Sure, I knew he was probably teasing about the whole pie thing...right? However, I was now bound and determined to make something a bit tongue-in-cheek that would teach him a lesson, and yet give him what he wanted at the same time.

A cake that looks like a pie seemed like a pretty obvious solution! Why not? I'd never made one - it sounded like good fun! He'd get a good laugh! Perfect. Hmmm...yet it didn't seem quite perfect enough. More brainstorming required... Then I remember hearing of a place in Philidelphia that serves a dessert called "Pumpple Cake". It looks like a regular cake from the outside, but has an entire pie - two in fact - (apple inside vanilla cake, pumpkin inside chocolate cake, double stacked) on the inside. Now this got me thinking...What if I took that a step further? A cake disguised as a pie is great fun. But a PIE, disguised as a CAKE, further disguised as a PIE...well that is just genius!! (At least in my muddled little mind!)

My husband loves blueberries; fresh blueberries, blueberry pancakes, blueberries on cereal, and yes, of course, blueberry pie. And what goes swimmingly with blueberries - or any kind of berry for that matter, I asked myself? Why, chocolate of course! And so, I went forth and baked...And the results, in my opinion, were both pleasing to the eye and to the palate! Voila! A deep-dish blueberry-looking pie!

Here's how you make it happen.

Blueberry Chocolate PiCake Instructions

1. Make favorite never-fail chocolate cake recipe.
2. Pour enough batter into the cake pan to just cover the bottom.
3. Insert pie onto batter.
4. Pour remaining batter on top and around sides of pie.
5. Bake the cake/pie as directed- takes considerably longer than regular cake-baking time. It seems like the top will never cook, but be patient, it will! Just keep watching it!
6. Turn pie over onto work surface so it is upside down.
7. Smother with a delicious chocolate ganache. Smooth ganache with hot knife to ready it for the fondant.
8. Decorate to look like a deep-dish pie, using fondant. (I decided to do a lattice "crust" on the top).
9. Use a little brown food colouring and vodka mixed together to 'paint' more colour onto the fondant, giving it a more "baked" look.
10. Add fresh blueberries as desired.

Comments

[Kocchan]

LOVE IT!
Got to try and post back what mine will look like for sure :)

[Amber]

Hi! I think this is a GREAT idea! So many possibilites...I'm thinking peach pie in vanilla, yum! I do have a few q's. I might say DUH! after but would just like to be sure ;) Is the pie already baked before you add it? What size of cake did you make? Thanks for your help!

[Crash]

looks crazy amazingiy delicious!!! But, was the pie baked or unbaked when you inserted it into the cake batter? And what size cake tin did you use...looks like a 12" by 3" cake with a 9" pie inside??

Can't wait to have a reason to try this!

[Jessi]

Did you put the pie in upside down, so that when you flip the cake, it's right side up? :) Can you imagine an apple pie inside of a spice cake? YUM!

[Setia]

Thank you!

Sorry, yes, use a COOKED pie. The pie dough won't cook inside the cake batter, so you definitely need to bake a pie ahead of time (or just go buy one, which I did!) I believe I used a 10" cake pan and a 7"-ish pie. As long as your pie has a 1-2" space around it once in the pan, you are good. You want to make sure your cake batter goes around it without your pie poking out the sides. So, choose which pan you want and then find a pie that works with that! (or vice versa!)

I put the pie in right-side-up. Once cooked, I turned the cake (with pie inside) upside down so that I was looking at a flat surface. Then once covered in chocolate ganache, I covered in fondant like you would a regular round cake and THEN flipped it over again.

So think of it like you are covering the bottom and sides of your "pie" with fondant. Then you'll flip that over to cover the top with lattice etc- which brings your pie hiding inside right-side-up again! If that makes sense (??)

You could simply leave it right side up and only do the sides and top leaving the bottom alone...I hope that helps! If not, let me know and I'll do my best to clarify! :-)

Thanks again for your kind comments!

Setia

[Setia]

Also meant to say...while this was great fun, I would also LOVE to try a pie in an ICED cake (i.e. without fondant, and not meant to look like pie on the outside - just something that looks like a pretty cake dessert, but has the yumminess of pie inside).

I think apple pie inside vanilla with a nice vanilla buttercream icing, or a cream cheese icing would be amazing!!

Blueberry pie inside chocolate was nice, but had it been for me rather than my hsuband, I'd have chosen something spiced or peach , like Amber said or apple-ish, like Jessi mention, inside vanilla cake!! YUM!!!!

Lots of fun possibilities!!