New Classic Wedding Cake + How To

Heat oven to 325 degrees F. Coat 3 9-inch cake pans with nonstick spray and line the bottoms with a fitted circle of parchment paper.

Melt butter in a deep skillet or wide saucepan over medium/medium-high heat. Once melted, keep cooking the butter, stirring, until faint golden specks of brown appear at the edges and in the pan, then add the powdered milk. Remove from heat as it begins browning; butter will continue to toast in the hot pan. Pour into a bowl and let cool to lukewarm or room temperature.

Place sugar, flour, salt, baking powder, and baking soda in the bowl of a stand mixer and combine with the paddle attachment on low for 30 seconds. Pour in the browned butter and continue to mix on a low-medium speed for 2 minutes. Scrape the bowl and paddle down, raise the speed to medium, and beat for another minute. With machine running, add buttermilk and mix until combined; scrape down bowl. Add the eggs and vanilla and beat until thoroughly combined.

Divide batter between three cake pans. Bake cake layers for 17 to 20 minutes, until a toothpick inserted into the center of each cake comes out batter-free. Rotate your cake pans during the baking time. Let cool in pans for 5 minutes, before flipping out onto a cooling rack, removing the parchment paper, and flipping back onto another. Let cool completely.

Have everything ready (chopped butter, cream) and reachable because this will go quickly. Pour sugar in a large skillet over medium-high heat and cook, without stirring, until sugar is partially liquefied, about 4 minutes. Whisk until all unmelted sugar disappears into the caramel and nudge the heat down to low. Cook until the sugar is deep amber, 1 to 2 minutes. Add butter, 1 tablespoon at a time, whisking until each piece melts before adding the next. Slowly drizzle in cream, whisking the whole time. Return heat to medium-high and cook until caramel reaches 245 degrees F, about another 5 to 7 minutes. Remove from heat and pour into a bowl and cool to room temperature.

In a medium saucepan, off the heat, combine sugar, cornstarch, and salt with a whisk. Add eggs, one at a time, whisk thoroughly between each addition. Slowly pour in milk, whisking the whole time, followed by the vanilla bean paste. Bring saucepan to stove and cook over medium heat, whisking the whole time, until mixture begins to bubble. As soon as it does, set a timer for 1 minute and continue whisking the entire time. The custard will take on a yellow color and be very thick. Remove from heat and whisk in vanilla extract. Scrape custard into a small bowl to cool completely, or the bowl of an electric mixer. Press a piece of plastic wrap against the surface to keep a skin from forming.

When you’re ready to finish the frosting, scoop custard into the bowl of a stand mixer and use the whisk attachment to beat the custard for 2 to 3 minutes at medium-high, until pulverized and a little fluffy. Keeping the machine running, add the softened butter a few tablespoons at a time, whipping it thoroughly into the custard between each addition. Continue until you’ve used all of the butter and whip for 3 to 4 minutes after that, so the frosting is as fluffy as can be. Finally, run the machine at a lower speed for half a minute.

If your cake layers are frozen, you can use them right away — no need to defrost first. If they’re at room temperature but difficult to work with because they’re so soft, you might want to briefly semi-freeze them before getting to work. Cold cakes are easier to trim, frost, and move around.

Assess your three cake layers for how much they match each other in size by stacking them. If the sides are very uneven and will require a lot of trimming to make them stack neatly, do this now. Place your first layer on a cake plate.

Cover the top and sides of the cake with a thin layer of frosting — it’s fine if you can see the cake through it. This is called a crumb coat and its goal is to keep the crumbs out of the final frosting. Briefly chill your cake until this frosting is firm to the touch.

Cover the top and sides of the cake with a more generous layer of frosting, your final coat.