Juliet Sear's April fools’ day pizza cake
If you want to prank your loved ones tomorrow for April Fools’ Day, Juliet Sear has the hilarious inspiration you need. She’ll be sharing her ultimate trick to help you feed (and fool) your family with her fun April Fools' bake. Her pizza cake looks savoury, but tastes so sweet and the result is a priceless reaction and delicious dessert!
Juliet's pizza cake
Serves 6-8
Ingredients
Base
100g golden caster sugar
100g softened butter
2 eggs
100g self-raising flour
Pinch of baking powder and salt
Vanilla bean paste or seeds from pod (save your pods, dry out for the pepper mill)
Decoration
250g of dough coloured sugarpaste (use yellow and brown food colouring gels)
Apricot jam or golden syrup
Buttercream
Red food colouring (preferably gel)
Strawberry jam
Water (to loosen buttercream)
White chocolate
Liquorice sticks (for olives)
Basil or mint (optional)
Dried vanilla seeds (for pepper grind in a pepper mill), or black sesame seeds (ground in a pestle and mortar)
Any toppings of your choice
Method
1. Preheat your oven to 180°C. Grease and line a 10-inch cake tin with parchment paper.
2. In a mixing bowl, cream together the softened butter and golden caster sugar until light and fluffy. Beat in the eggs one at a time, followed by the vanilla bean paste or seeds.
3. Sift in the self-raising flour, baking powder and salt, and gently fold until just combined. Do not overmix.
4. Pour the batter into the prepared cake tin and smooth out the surface with a spatula. Bake for 15-18 minutes or until a toothpick inserted into the centre of the cake comes out clean.
5. While the cake is baking, prepare the decorations. Roll out the dough-coloured sugar paste into a sausage shape and flatten it using your fingertips. Stick it to the edges of the cake with a little apricot jam or golden syrup.
6. Use a blowtorch to scorch the sugar paste or cover the centre of the cake with foil and then grill.
7. For the filling, dye the buttercream bright red and mix it with strawberry jam until you have equal amounts. Spread the mixture over the centre of the cake.
8. Loosen the uncoloured buttercream with water until dropping consistency. Then use two teaspoons to drop the buttercream onto the cake in small blobs to resemble mozzarella. Smooth with a spoon to create the desired effect.
9. Grate the white chocolate over the buttercream to look like Parmesan.
10. Slice the liquorice sticks to create olives and use a small metal piping nozzle to cut out the centre to look like pitted olives. Top with fresh basil or mint leaves to dress the cake. Grind the dried vanilla pods in a clean pepper mill or sprinkle with the ground black sesame seeds.