Chocolate Matcha Cake + Layered Cookbook Giveaway!

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As a self-taught baker, I read a lot of cookbooks. Well, maybe just because of my genuine love for cookbooks, especially those pretty ones, I always hop over a cookbook instead of a cooking show or video. You Tube is just not my thing! Yeah, call me low-tech, old-school… I think I’m just a little nostalgic, maybe!

So when Food Bloggers of Canada asked me if I would like to bake one of the many beautiful cakes from Layered, the new cookbook from Tessa Huff, a fellow Vancouver blogger, my answer was A MILLION YESSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSS!

I run a home-based bakery. I bake almost everyday. I’d say I am a pretty experienced cake baker with all the skills and techniques that I’ve tried and failed and learned over the years. Being said that, I’m still learning! I enjoy reading cookbooks for the inspirations – to learn other bakers’ skills, read their stories and be amazed of their talents.

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Showcasing amazing photos, creating innovative flavours combination, exploring a great range of baking techniques, Layered is the kind of cookbook that you would want to put on your coffee table, so you can flip through the gorgeous cake pictures when lounging on the couch. Or let it hang around the kitchen, so when the baking mood calls, you can easily look for inspirations. Or leave it in your reading nook, enjoy a Sunday afternoon with a good read about the thorough yet user-friendly baking tips and tricks from Tessa.

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Layered presents Tessa’s collection of 150 classic and innovative recipes. And what I love the most about this cookbook is the endless possibility to mix and match the flavours of cake, fillings, frosting as well as the cake decoration and design. And that’s my approach when I decided to give the chocolate matcha cake a try.

I’ve gone a little crazy about putting chocolate and matcha together in my baking lately. Oh! Because the flavour combination is simply divine! Same as this cake. Both of the chocolate cake and matcha cake are well balanced in flavours and textures. In-between the cake layers is one of the genius creations ever – matcha ganache. Seriously I had a really hard time not licking the spatula when I was frosting the cake with it! This matcha ganache is smooth, silky and super delicious on its own. The exterior of the cake is Swiss meringue buttercream that I added in a little matcha powder to make the whole cake more matcha-y. For decoration, I mixed-and-matched some ideas from other cakes from the cookbook – garnish the bottom part with chocolate curls and drape the top with a blanket of dark chocolate ganache.

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You will love Layered! I know you will. And I’m excited to give away a copy to one lucky reader (open to Canadian residents only), thanks to Food Bloggers of Canada, Tessa Huff and Abrams Books. Simply leave me a comment below telling me what your dream layered cake is before June 2, 2016 (Thursday) midnight PST. One lucky winner will be selected at random and announced on this post.

As a bonus, Food Bloggers of Canada has put together a blog hop this week! Six other fellow bloggers are giving away a copy of Layered, meaning you have six more chances to win this book all week long! Visit their blogs and enter each time to win:

May 24 – Amanda of The Cinnamon Scrolls makes Coconut Mojito Cake
May 25 – Alanna of One Tough Cookie makes Honey Fig Cake
May 25 – Renee of Sweet Revelations makes Golden Champagne Celebration Cake
May 26 – Olivia of Liv For Cake  makes French Opera Cake
May 26 – Jenny of The Brunette Baker makes Birthday Cake
May 27 – Marie of Food Nouveau makes Lemony Zucchini Cake
May 27 – Food Bloggers of Canada wraps it all up

Disclosure: I received a copy of Layered as compensation for this review. All opinions are my own. 

*** Congratulations to Amber Young, the winner of Layered by Tessa Huff. Thank you all for participating! ***

45 comments

  1. My dream layered cake would be chocolate devil’s food cake with angle food cake layered with soem creamy white chocolate buttercream. Love those cakes!

  2. My dream layer cake must have chocolate! Maybe with raspberry or salted caramel? I do love the pairing of matcha and chocolate too, so this could be it!

  3. My dream layer cake….that’s a hard one. It’s have to be a classic vanilla on vanilla with lots of vanilla bean…that or chocolate with peanut butter…It’s so hard to pick just one!

  4. My dream layered cake would probably have layers of dark chocolate cake with a rich peanut butter frosting, and a salted caramel drizzle.

  5. My dream layer cake is chocolate layered with more chocolate layered with more chocolate!

  6. For my daughters birthday I made an orange layer cake with orange buttercream. That with a little dark chocolate ganache on top. Perfection.

  7. Oh I would love to have this cookbooj! My dream cake is strawberry and chovolate layered caje! :)

  8. My dream layer cake is a fresh mango cake with fresh mangos, mango pudding and sponge cake with light whip cream frosting and all encased in fresh mango slices!

  9. I’m also matcha obsessed so the cake you’ve created here easily fits my dream cake!! Thanks for giving us the opportunity to win this wonderful book!

  10. I’ve never really thought about my dream layered cake. Perhaps a chocolate and peanut butter layered cake with plenty of salty crunchy goodness throughout! I’m thinking pretzels, nuts, seeds or maybe graham crackers. I’m sure there are all kinds of excellent options that I’ve yet to consider.

  11. What a stunning looking cake! I have a girlfriend who loves matcha and would probably love this cake. Just so happens her birthday is coming up really soon. :)
    I’m going to need a copy of the book to make it for her.

  12. I love this perfect match with chocolate and green tea! So this cake would probably be my dream cake!

  13. Going to try a banana salted caramel malteser cake today but love anything with hazelnuts.

  14. I’ve just seen your banana chocolate espresso cake! Wow! That would be my dream layered cake! :P

  15. When I transit in Japan , the first thing I got from Duty Free Shop is Matcha Powder, and saw this picture make me want to try the recipe and your pictures are pretty too. Another cake I will love to try is layer cake with pistachio filling , aah,, mouth watering already :)

  16. My dream layered cake would be a chocolate strawberry cake (light on the chocolate, big on the strawberry) with a strawberry Swiss Merginue Buttercream, based on the cupcakes I made for my granddaughter’s birthday one year.

  17. Lemon layered cake would be my favorite but you can’t go wrong with anything that is layered.

  18. I would like a lemon layered cake with custard whipped cream layers along with fresh raspberries, strawberries and blueberries with chocolate curls on top

  19. How exciting!!! I would love to have a copy of this wonderful cookbook! My dream layered cake is exactly the one on the book cover, a strawberry shortcake!

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