cake | salt & pepper

First of all, the Bakesale for Japan was an unbelievable success! So far we have raised $130,321.17, and that’s not the final number! Can you believe it? I have to say I’m shocked (in a very good way) at how much we have raised… it’s incredible what people can do when they come together!!

On the baking front, I’m really pleased with how my cakes in jam jars turned out… they’re really adorable, and a bit more festive and fun than regular cupcakes. I first read about these on the kitchn - I guess they’re the latest craze in all things cool and hip in the baking world… even Oprah featured them in her O magazine… where have I been?! I had never even heard of these!

So, there are a few different ways you can make them… you can either crumble cake into each jam jar and layer with frosting or whipped cream, or half a cupcake and do the same, or you can bake the cake in the jar. I chose the last method, but I must say I was a bit nervous to bake a jam jar in the oven so I did a bit more online research. Word on the street is that it’s okay to bake the jam jars in the oven, though quite a few different websites suggested using a water bath and lowering the oven temperature to 325 degrees.

I still wasn’t one hundred percent sold, so I performed a test run… one big water bath, one jam jar filled halfway with cake batter (Ina Garten’s Yellow Cake recipe is a great one to use), one 325 degree oven. I figured I could handle it if one jam jar cracked, but not the whole lot! But my worries were for nothing… it worked! So in the rest went and they turned out beautiful. The only problem was I overfilled them as the batter really puffs up… next time I’ll use one spoonful only, and then you’ll be able to see the lovely frosting from the side. Oh, and BTW, a water bath is just a large ovenproof basin filled with very hot water (I used my tap water bc it’s scalding!) that you then put whatever it is you’re baking into before putting in the oven. They are used a lot with cheesecakes so they don’t crack due to the hot temperature and provide a steady even temperature for cooking. My turkey roasting pan proved to be the perfect water bath, especially since it has handles which made it much easier to move around without sloshing water everywhere.

To make room for the frosting I ended up cutting a bit off from the top and then also hallowing out a small hole down the middle so I could pipe frosting the length of the jar. That way you’ll have a little bit of frosting with every bite! I used my version of Ina’s cream cheese frosting – it’s my go-to icing… not too sweet, but creamy and buttery.

Of course you need to decorate with sprinkles.

And then the lids went on. Since these are jam jars, you could always seal them so they become airtight and last longer, sans frosting. And then you’d hear a fun little pop when you opened them. If you look online you’ll see that people have been sending sealed cakes to soldiers in Iraq or elsewhere overseas… what a great idea if you want to send someone something sweet but don’t want it to spoil en route!

Make sure to attach a spoon with some pretty ribbon tied around each jar!

My friend Dani has asked me to help her make these for her wedding in December. I think they’ll be perfect! Plus, they’d be great for picnics, road trips, school lunches, airplane trips, care packages… you can always experiment with different sizes and shapes of jam jars!