You Desert the Best...

Derek and I are gearing up for our move back to New Mexico next month. Most people hear we're headed back to Clovis from Florida and think we're insane since we're so happy to get back. What's not to like? The climate is dry, like my humor. The plants are prickly, like my personality. The desert is flat, like my...wait. I guess I'm excited to go back because I am the desert... While there are definitely a few things I'm going to miss (lookin' at you, Whole Foods home delivery), Florida never really felt like home to me. While I can see why people love to vacation here, Florida simply was not all it's cactus to be. Give me those wide expanses, perfect sunsets, and Tex-Mex!!! And cake. Because this is a cake blog. And I made a cake inspired by New Mexico, so naturally, it's a churro cake with a desert scene. 

It's pretty spiketacular.

I've actually made this churro cake recipe before but never blogged about it. Happy to report it is just as delicious as it was the first time around, so you could say cactus makes perfect (stop rolling your eyes, you know this is who I am, unstoppable baker and pun master). The cake itself has a heavenly cinnamon and brown sugar swirl baked in to each layer, and the cream cheese frosting is also cinnamon flavored. Since I can't have gluten, this is probably the closest I'll ever get to being able to scarf down an actual churro, so I'll take it! I'm not saying the amount of churros I ate in my youth directly contributed to the gluten intolerance that hit me in my 30s, but it probably didn't help. In any instance, I'm just happy to be eating something churro-adjacent, and for only 309 calories a slice for 8 slices (a mere 247 calories for 10 slices).

You know, getting my just deserts.

It is a super simple cake recipe, and even the cacti decorating is fun and fast. To make the churro cake, you need:

• 1 box yellow cake mix
• 1/2 cup unsweetened applesauce (111 grams)
  
• 3/4 cup of fat free or skim milk
• 1/4 cup of egg whites (61 grams)
• 1 tsp cinnamon extract
• For the swirl you need 2 tsp of cinnamon and 2 TBS of Lakanto golden monkfruit sweetener or regular brown sugar

Preheat your oven to 350 and line three six-inch round cake pans with Parchment paper, cooking spray, and bake even strips. Combine everything except the cinnamon and brown sugar in your stand mixer, beating on medium-high for two minutes. Evenly distribute the batter in all three pans. Now, take a small bowl and mix together the cinnamon and sugar. 

Then get swirly.

I just dumped a few spoonfuls on top of each cake round, then used a knife to gently swirl around and evenly distribute the mix into the batter. I mixed it in more the first time I made this cake so the swirl was inside the middle of the batter, but this time I wanted to get a good glaze or creme brulee effect on the top of each layer for a crisp bite, so I didn't mix in the cinnamon sugar into the batter completely. I baked my cakes at 350 for 26 minutes.

Churro brulee.

Oh yes, things got super nice and caramelized. You get that amazing churro crunch this way that simply can't be beat. Let the cakes rest on a cooling rack while still in the pans for 10 minutes, then turn out on the cooling rack to cool completely while you make your frosting. I put my cakes in the freezer because I am nothing if not impatient. Who has time to cool cakes when all you want to do is eat them?!
 

Back to that yogurt cream cheese frosting. I'm addicted.

I got to buy new piping tips to make this cake. I haven't had to buy piping tips in like, two years...some still exist out there that I don't already own, which was a surprise to both me and my husband, who has accepted that half of the kitchen storage belongs solely to my baking accoutrements. We don't need cups, we need cake pans!! To make the cinnamon cream cheese frosting, you'll need:

• 8 ounces (220 g) of 1/3 the fat cream cheese at room temp 
• 1 cup (226 g) of Dannon Light + Fit vanilla Greek yogurt, strained overnight to remove excess moisture
  
• 3 cups (360 g) of Lakanto powdered monkfruit or regular powdered sugar
• 1 tsp clear vanilla extract
• 2 tsp cinnamon extract
• Gel dyes in Kelly green, leaf green, lime, brown, pink, yellow, and peach (not pictured)
• Wilton 6B, 4B, 2, and 18 piping tips
• 1/4 cup of Kinnickinick gluten free (or regular) crushed graham cracker crumbs for sand
  

 Beat the cream cheese in your stand mixer until fluffy, about 2 minutes. Then add in the yogurt, half the powdered sugar, and all the extracts. Mix well, then add in the remaining powdered sugar. Now, go grab those cooled cakes before you tint any frosting.

I hated having to hide that churro brulee topping, but a level cake is a must.

Use a bit of white frosting to layer in between each cake round. I always place my cake rounds face-down as it typically allows for a more level cake. Now, once you've filled your layers, take a small amount of white frosting, and load it into a piping bag with the #2 round tip. This will be for the cactus spines. Take the remaining frosting and divide it into 5 bowls:

• One dyed yellow
• One dyed pink
• One dyed peach
• One dyed light green, using half leaf green and half lime gel dyes
• One dyed dark green, using half Kelly green or leaf green and half brown gel dyes
  

About to get that sunset on.

I put my yellow, pink, and peach into piping bags to make my sunset background super simple to create. I didn't use any piping tips for this, just snipped the ends of the bags. My pink bag has a coupler on it for later.

Abstract cake art.

Now, as you can see above, this does not take any form of precision or accuracy to make happen, or I wouldn't be able to decorate a single cake. Simply pipe yellow around the bottom cake round, pink on the middle cake round, and peach around the top layer. You will need to save some pink for the cactus flowers. I ended up combining my leftover pink and peach together for this.

See? Not a catastrophe!

Now, take a bench scraper and make several passes around the cake and smooth out the top layer. You want the colors to start to bleed together to give off that sunset vibe.

I truly can't wait to see these again in person, but I'll take a New Mexico sunset on a cake because that means I have cake.

Now, load up the green frostings--one with the 4B tip (these will be the taller, skinnier cacti), and the other with the 6B tip (these will be the round, squatty cacti...look, we can't all be tall, skinny cacti). Put the #18 star tip on the pink frosting bag.

Now, sans cacti, this is a Florida sunrise cake. It just needs a little drink umbrella on top, and then you can call it a day.

I then used a spoon to dust graham cracker sand around the edge of the cake. Now comes the fun part!

Cacti either look like they're in a stick up or about to give you the world's most painful bear hug.

If you have only ever seen a cactus once in your life, you can pipe them. You just take the piping bag and pipe straight up to create the middle/trunk, then pipe another line in a half U shape on one side, and repeat on the other. I did this all over the cake in varying heights with the 4B tip.

Those little squatty ones are cute though.

The I took the frosting with the 6B tip and just piped little mounds around the sides of the cake.

The cactus flower is this cake's equivalent to sprinkles. It's simply a must.

Using the #18 star tip, I piped dots of little flowers on some of the cacti. Then I used my white frosting with the #2 round tip to pipe teeny little dots on the edges of some of the cacti to make spikes.

Don't forget the top!

Then I came in with my remaining frosting to pipe a little field of cacti on top of the cake. If you apply pressure to the piping bag while pulling straight up, you can make some pretty tall mounds with the 6B tip. I added flowers and spikes before grabbing more sand.

The desert, the beach, there's always sand in everything I own...

I used my spoon to smooth out the graham cracker crumbs and carefully place it anywhere there was a gap between a cactus or two. That's it! It took me about 10 minutes to frost and decorate the whole cake. It takes longer to dye all the frosting than it does to use it, so truly, this is a really fun, quick, easy way to decorate a cake.

I mean, these little guys are so cute I could just eat them right up (and did).

As far as the cacti can see, this is a nice homage to New Mexico.

Should it have been a prickly pear flavored cake? Probably. But you can pry my churros out of my cold, dead hands.

I have to say it because it's both true and a pun: this cake has the most succulent flavor. It is moist, it is cinnamony, it has that churro brulee crunch, and that cinnamon cream cheese frosting is the right amount of sweet to compliment it all. I wish I could eat this cake every day for the rest of my life (like how I used to be able to eat actual churros. Thanks, body.). I had so much fun making it, and even more fun eating it, as it should be. I'm not sure I'll have time to blog again before the move next month, so this is quite possibly the last time Kate ever bakes cakes in Florida. Never fear, Kate most definitely knows how to bake cakes at high altitude in New Mexico. It'll take us a minute to get used to high elevation and that smell (Eau de Cow) again in Clovis, but I'm looking forward to our adventure back to the Southwest..away from insane humidity and the evil sun from Mario 3 that follows you around and tries to kill you (he retired in Florida, naturally). 'Til next time, my fellow eaters!

I'll be far less sweaty and upsetty the next time we meet here. It's hard to be unhappy when you're full of salsa and enchiladas like God intended. Now, how to make gluten free sopapillas...