Spiced Caramel Cake

1. Preheat oven to 325. Properly grease and line (3) 6” baking pans with parchment paper. Place prepared baking pans on a large baking sheet and set aside.
2. In a medium-sized mixing bowl, add the flour, rising agents (baking powder and soda), spices and salt. Whisk to combine and set aside.
3. Add the butter and sugar into the bowl of a stand mixer and beat at medium-low speed (4 on stand mixer) until mixture becomes thick and fluffy and takes on a pale-yellow color. With a spatula, scrape down the sides and bottom of the bowl.
4. Mix caramel sauce and vanilla extract into butter-sugar mixture until thoroughly incorporated, about 1-2 minutes.
5. One at a time, mix in the eggs into batter. Make sure that the previous egg is completely mixed into batter before adding the next egg.
6. With the mixer running at medium-low speed, slowly pour and mix in oil into wet batter. Once all the oil has been added, batter will have the appearance of a hollandaise or custard sauce.
7. Turn down the speed of mixer to low (2 on stand mixer). Alternating between dry and liquid, add and mix in the flour mixture and buttermilk into wet batter, beginning and ending with the flour. Take care not to overmix cake batter. Mix just until a uniform batter is reached with any streaks or clumps of flour.
8. Scrape down the sides and bottom of mixing bowl and give a quick mix before equally dividing cake batter into prepared baking pans.
9. Bake cakes for 22-25 minutes rotating the baking sheet with pans halfway through baking time. Cakes are ready when a toothpick inserted into the center comes out clean.
10. Allow cakes to cool in pan for 5 minutes before transferring to a cooling rack to cool completely.

Caramel Swiss Meringue Buttercream

1. Thoroughly clean all tools that will be used for making the meringue ensuring there is no presence of residual grease; this includes the mixing bowl, whisk and paddle attachments of a stand mixer.
2. Into the bowl of a stand mixer, add egg whites, sugar, and sea salt and whisk to combine. Place bowl over a pot of simmering water ensuring the base of the bowl is not touching the water. Cook egg white-sugar mixture until it registers 160F on a kitchen thermometer and there is no presence of sugar granules.
3. Whisk warm egg white-sugar mixture at high speed (8-10) on stand mixer until the base of mixing bowl is cool to touch, about 10-15 minutes and meringue has reach stiff peak stage.
4. Switch to paddle attachment and slowly add cubed pieces of room temperature but semi-firm butter to meringue at medium speed (4-6) on stand mixer. Once all the butter is incorporated into meringue, add the vanilla extract and caramel sauce and increase speed on mixer back to high. Mix buttercream for an addition 3-4 minutes until a fluffy and smooth consistency is reached.

Assembly

1. With a serrated knife or cake leveler, remove the domed tops of cooled cakes.
2. Place a clean surface on top of a turntable i.e. cake stand/cake board. Use an offset spatula to spread a small amount of buttercream onto the center chosen surface. This will ensure that cake stay steady while buttercream is being applied.
3. Put the first cake layer in the center of prepared surface. Spoon some of the buttercream onto cake and spread into an even layer using an offset spatula. Drizzle some caramel sauce over buttercream and generously sprinkle chocolate curls. Repeat once more with second cake layer before topping with the final cake layer.
4. Using an offset spatula, fill in the gaps between cake layers with buttercream and smooth out with bench scrapper. Add a small amount of buttercream on top layer of cake – just enough to spread into a thin layer with offset spatula.
5. Place cake in the refrigerator for at least 30 minutes to an hour to allow crumb coat to firm up before applying final layer of buttercream.
6. With an offset spatula, apply a thick layer of buttercream around the sides of cake. Spoon a good amount buttercream onto the top cake, about 2-3 serving spoons.
7. To smooth the top of cake, spread out spooned buttercream into an even layer with an offset spatula – this will cause some of the buttercream to go over the edge of the top layer which is fine since it will get smooth out in next step.
8. To smooth the sides of cake, switch to a bench scrapper. With dominant hand, hold bench scrapper at a 45-degree angle against the side of cake and apply light pressure while rotating turntable with non-dominant hand. Repeat action until the sides of the cake are perfectly smooth.
9. Use an offset spatula, to bring in buttercream over the edge of top cake layer and smooth out while turning turntable with non-dominant hand. This will allow for a cake with sharp edges.
10. Pipe desired border around edge of the top of cake. I went with a rope design using a Wilton 6B pastry tip. Spoon remaining caramel sauce into center of border. You may not use all of the caramel sauce.
11. For an extra special touch, decorate the base of cake and border with chocolate curls or shavings.