New Year Cake with Edible Cake Topper – Lemon Curd Buttercream

27. December 2020

Prep time: 2 hours 30 minutes

Serves: 16

A party without cake is just a meeting. I totally agree! With this New Year cake with cake topper it is the best way to start fresh into the new year! Besides the beautiful new year theme cake with chocolate drip and gold leaves and the custom cake topper in gold as well! It is not gold on the outside, but also on the inside! A rich vanilla cake with refreshing lemon curd filling and cream cheese frosting. Gold is the color of this New Year’s Day Cake.

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New Year Cake Recipe

Let me tell you from the beginning, that this is an easy lemon curd cake recipe and perfect New Year’s cake flavors! For this homemade lemon curd cake we need three essential parts: the vanilla cake, the homemade lemon curd and the cream cheese frosting.

Vanilla Cake
It is a rich vanilla lemon curd cake, thus we start with whipping butter until light and fluffy. We add the sugar, salt and vanilla and whip it for another couple of minutes. Then, every egg is added individually and incorporated into the cake batter for about half a minute. In order to obtain a perfect cake better, use eggs on room temperature. Last but not least, we add the flour and baking powder to the cake mix. I fill the cake batter in four cake pans and bake them for a short time to maintain the softness.

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Easy Lemon Curd Cake Recipe

Lemon Curd
Baking with lemon curd is fairly simple in this lemon curd cake recipe, because we add it to the cake once cooled down. How do you make lemon curd? We heat up the lemon juice, we set a bit of the lemon juice aside and mix it with the sugar, eggs and cornstarch. Once the lemon juice is almost boiling we add the sugar mixture and keep stirring gently until it thickens, now it needs to cool down and it should become firm like a pudding. We add the butter to it so it becomes a nice lemon curd buttercream.

Cream Cheese Frosting
For the best New Year Cake recipe a refreshing cream cheese frosting is a must, and it is the simplest part. We only need to mix cream cheese, butter and powdered sugar and vanilla. Important that butter and cream cheese are on room temperature, to avoid having butter pieces in the frosting.

Happy New Year’s Cake Design

When I was gathering New Year Cake ideas, I wanted a classic cake and came up with this lemon curd cake easy recipe. How to make lemon curd cake is fairly simple, once all three parts are ready we just need it stack it. For that we spread cream cheese frosting on the cake layers and then spread the lemon curd on it, but importantly leaving about a thumb thick space to the edges. To complete the Happy New Year Cake design we cover the best lemon curd cake in the remaining cream cheese frosting.

Chocolate Drip
For an elegant New Year Cake decoration we are using dark chocolate drip. This is made within a couple of minutes by heating up heavy cream and pouring it over finely chopped dark chocolate. Let sit for a minute and then gently stir until it becomes perfect chocolate ganache. Once this is done, it is important for the New Year’s Cake design to have the cake cooled. Then dropping the chocolate ganache carefully on the edges of the cake and then cover the top. When the cake is cooled it prevents the cream cheese frosting to melt when the warm chocolate ganache is poured over it.

Custom Cake Topper Personalised

For the final touch we create an edible cake topper ourselves. I’ll show you how to make a cake topper DIY:

  1. Print out the personalised cake topper design; here a 2021 in 2.3×5 inch / 6x13cm
  2. Carefully melt white chocolate
  3. In a piping bag, write out the number on parchment paper and cover with sprinkles
  4. Let cool down, turn, add a wooden stick to it and cover with chocolate and cover in sprinkles again

Now we have made the topper and can stick it on top of the cake!

Print Recipe

New Year Cake

  • Preparation time: 2 hours 30 minutes
  • Servings: 16

Ingredients

Cake Topper

  • 1/2 cup (100g) White chocolate
  • 4x Wooden sticks
  • sprinkles

Vanilla Cake

  • 1 + 1/4 cup (160g) butter, (room temperature)
  • 1 + 1/3 cup (170g) sugar
  • 1 tsp vanilla (sugar)
  • 1 pinch salt
  • 3 eggs, (room temperature)
  • 1 + 1/2 cup (200g) flour
  • 3 tsp baking powder

Lemon Curd

  • 1/2 + 1/3 cup (200ml) lemon juice
  • 1 + 1/2 cup (300g) sugar
  • 3 eggs
  • 1/3 cup (40g) cornstarch
  • 2x 1/3 cup (150g) butter, (room temperature)

Cream Cheese Frosting

  • 4 cup (1kg) cream cheese, (room temperature)
  • 1/2 cup (100g) butter, (room temperature)
  • 1/2 + 1/3 cup (100g) powdered sugar

Chocolate Drip

  • 1/4 cup (60ml) heavy cream
  • 1/2 cup (100g) dark chocolate

Method

New Year Cake

    1. Print out the 2021 in 2.3×5 inch / 6x13cm, cover with parchment paper. Carefully melt white chocolate, fill in a piping bag, write out the numbers and cover with sprinkles. Let cool down, turn, add a wooden stick to it with the white chocolate and cover the entire side with chocolate as well. Again cover with sprinkles. Let cool and stick into the cake!
    2. Whip the butter (room temperature) until it becomes light and fluffy, add the sugar, salt and vanilla and beat until the butter mixture becomes a bit lighter. Whip in the eggs (room temperature) one by one and mix until well combined. Mix together the flour and baking powder and add to the cake batter. Fill all cake batters in four different cake pans with a 17cm (6.5 inch) diameter and bake at 160°C (320°F) for about 15 minutes. Let cool down and then cool in the fridge so the cakes become chilled and firm.
    3. Heat up ¾ of the lemon juice in a saucepan. Mix the remaining lemon juice with the sugar, eggs and cornstarch. Once the lemon juice is almost boiling, add the sugar mixture and keep stirring gently until it thickens. Let cool down to room temperature. Whip the lemon curd and add the butter (room temperature) spoon by spoon until it becomes a smooth lemon curd buttercream. Cool for about 15 minutes.
    4. Mix together cream cheese and butter (room temperature) with powdered sugar and vanilla. Cool for about 15 minutes.
    5. Spread a thin layer of the cream cheese frosting on three cake layers and adding a circle on the edges. Within this circle spread the lemon curd. Stack. Cover the entire cake with the cream cheese frosting. Cool
    6. Chop the dark chocolate into small pieces, heat up heavy cream and pour over it. Let sit for a minute then gently stir. With a piping bag or a teaspoon pour on the edges of the cake so that it looks like perfect chocolate drip. Then cover the top with the chocolate ganache. Decorate with gold leaves.

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