This year the girls and I decided to make a Twelfth Night Cake. It is my understanding that a Twelfth Night cake differs from an Epiphany cake. Epiphany (January 6) begins the season for king cake (those pretty little cakes with a plastic baby Jesus baked inside) and we will certain have a king cake some time before Ash Wednesday (this year, it is a long time until Ash Wednesday, so we have time). Twelfth Night is January 5--the eve of Epiphany--and, similar to Halloween (the eve of All Saints Day), it has a trick-playing, topsy-turvy aspect to it. Hence the reason Shakespeare's play Twelfth Night involves characters in disguise and a trick being played upon Malvolio. (Aside: Oh, how I wish I could see Stephen Fry play the part of Malvolio on Broadway right now.) So, a Twelfth Night cake should be a little fun and have some disorder to it. Ours certainly embraced disorder.
I found a recipe in a favorite recipe book of mine. I won't share the name of the book because honestly I didn't like the cake. Or better put, I didn't like the texture of the cake mixed with the icing and sweets that were supposed to go on the cake. It would have been a great coffee cake accented with raisins and nuts, but it was not a great iced, three-layer cake. While one could argue this texture made for great disorder, next year I will make a three-layer cake from a mix and focus only on the decoration. Still, the girls and I made the cake together and there is always a great deal of fun in that.
I found a recipe in a favorite recipe book of mine. I won't share the name of the book because honestly I didn't like the cake. Or better put, I didn't like the texture of the cake mixed with the icing and sweets that were supposed to go on the cake. It would have been a great coffee cake accented with raisins and nuts, but it was not a great iced, three-layer cake. While one could argue this texture made for great disorder, next year I will make a three-layer cake from a mix and focus only on the decoration. Still, the girls and I made the cake together and there is always a great deal of fun in that.
Truly the Twelfth Night cake is all about the decorating. We covered our three-layer cake in white icing. Then I gave the girls red heart gum drops (in the stores for Valentine's Day already), Christmas M&Ms, and blue sprinkles. As you can see from the picture, they really went to work. At the end they added a birthday candle and were quite satisfied with the result. The crazy Twelfth Night cake is definitely a tradition we will keep--we'll just do it with a mix next year.
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