Sky High: Irresistible Triple-Layer Cakes

by Alisa Huntsman, Peter Wynne, Tina Rupp (Photographs)

A classic layer cake has always been the best party pleaser, but this cookbook takes dessert to a whole new level. Sky High celebrates the triple-layer cake in all its glorious incarnations with more than 40 decadent and delicious recipes. The wide range of flavors will appeal to anyone with a sweet tooth. The book features such delights as Boston Cream Pie, Mile-High Devil's Food Cake, and Key West Cake. There are even three astonishingly beautiful (and totally do-able) wedding cakes! From luscious chocolate creations to drizzled caramel confections, take simple layer cakes to new heights with Sky High .

Genres: Cookbooks, Cooking, Food, Nonfiction

224 pages, Hardcover

First published October 4, 2007

Reviews

[Kate]

I don't know if it's fair to rate and review a cookbook if you haven't made everything from it, so instead I'm going to use this as a running log of everything I've baked in here and update it as I go, most recent first.

Next in baking queue: Key west cake with mango mousse and ginger-lime creme

Mocha cake with espresso drizzle: We made several adaptations to this cake. Cut the sugar down by 2/3 cup. Added about 1/2 tsp of salt to the mocha drizzle - without it, it's way too sweet and the espresso flavor isn't evident. Chose to decorate with raspberries (the sharpness was a great addition). With these changes, we highly enjoyed - cake was simple but delicious (almost like a brownie), and the mocha drizzle (which you wanted on every bite) helped it pop without making it overwhelming. Like the banana spice chocolate chip cake, I would classify this as an "everyday" triple layer cake, as well as one more likely to use ingredients you already have on hand.

Banana spice chocolate chip cake with caramel drizzle and cream: Thoroughly delicious. Like a rich spice banana bread drowning in cream and caramel. Probably the easiest cake in the book so far - an "everyday" triple layer cake, if such a thing exists. 50% of the eaters of the cake agreed the chocolate chips could have been left out.

Sweet potato cake with orange creme filling and cream cheese frosting: I substituted squash for the sweet potatoes which was a good lesson in "why we don't adapt recipes until you've tried it as written at least once." Still worked and was enjoyed, but was dryer with a more cloying texture than I wanted. Definitely do not skimp on the orange creme filling - it sounds odd but it's one of the most distinctive and delicious parts of the cake.

Sour cream-chocolate cake with peanut butter frosting and chocolate-peanut butter glaze: Like every other reviewer here, this was, hands down, my favorite recipe (and what introduced me to the book - I found an adaptation (hardly - really it's just this book typed online) through the Smitten Kitchen Blog). Which isn't surprising considering the recipe is essentially peanut butter. SO rich - easily overwhelming on the palette and yet you can't stop eating.

[Aryanna · Rating 5 out of 5]

Favorite cake book. I love all the recipes I've tried...but nothing tops the chocolate peanut butter cake! to DIE for!!

[Gwen Daniels · Rating 5 out of 5]

For almost a decade I've reached for Sky High, now smeared with frosting between the pages, when I needed to make a show-stopping cake. I love triple-layer cakes because I can squeeze in so many rich, wonderful components between the layers: fillings, frostings, jams, nuts, candies, curds, pastry creams, mousses, more. I've even made the coconut cake — the most perfect coconut cake known to man — for a friend's wedding.

Other favorites include:
Sour Cream-Chocolate Cake with Peanut Butter Frosting and Chocolate-Peanut Butter Glaze (the BEST!)
Triple Chocolate Fudge Cake with White Chocolate Mousse Filling
Vanilla Bean Cake with White Chocolate Buttercream Frosting

Recommended for any home bakers who relish the thought of hours in the kitchen to make something spectacular.

[Peggy · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is without a doubt one of my favorite cake books. I've tried a number of the recipes - the vanilla cake with fudge frosting, the coconut cake, the strawberry shortcake... they've all been very very good. But, hands down, the absolute best most frequently requested cake I've made from Sky High is the sour cream chocolate cake with peanut butter cream cheese frosting and chocolate/peanut butter ganache. It disappears at any event I take it to, whether as an awe-inspiring three layer cake or in the more mundane form of cupcakes.

[Anita Covington · Rating 5 out of 5]

The cakes in this book are so good, my family asked me to stop baking them for a while. I was in my cookbook cabinets looking for another book and found this book. I will start back baking cakes once I get over my cookie lady phase.

[Riona · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is the book I reach for first whenever it's someone's birthday, so by now I've made at least half of the cakes in this book. So far none of the recipes have failed me, and most of them are really simple despite multiple components. This book makes gorgeous, multi-layer cakes accessible to the home baker. A few faves:

Triple Chocolate Fudge Cake (p. 46) - the "secret ingredient" (mayo) makes the cake incredibly moist, while the frosting is super fudgy and the white chocolate mousse filling is really unique.

Sour Cream Chocolate Cake with Peanut Butter Frosting and Chocolate Peanut Butter Glaze (p. 62) - this cake was ridiculously rich and absolutely divine. I took it to a party and it was devoured in about 10 minutes.

Peach Melba Cake with Raspberry Cream (p. 79) - Perfect for spring or summer. The recipe has you make peach and raspberry puree syrups to flavor the filling, so you can use the extra to do a fancy drizzle on the plates when serving.

Triple Lemon Chiffon Cake (p. 112) - light and fluffy lemon chiffon cake filled with lemon curd and frosted with homemade lemon whipped cream. Another great spring/summer option.

Almond Raspberry Cake (p. 122) - Sweet and simple. The cake has a really nice crumb and tastes like marzipan.

Gingerbread Beer Cake with Bittersweet Chocolate Frosting (p. 136) - this cake sounds really bizarre at first, containing beer, mustard, and a whole bunch of spices, but it actually works really well.

[Kylie Briggs · Rating 4 out of 5]

Southern Coconut Cake - 3 stars - didn't taste like coconut which was good for me but bad for people who wanted coconut

Triple Chocolate Cake - 3 stars - flavor is four but the recipe irritated me - the white chocolate mousse needed to be refrigerated in order to firm up enough to support cake layers but the recipe didn't specify that. it's things like this that separate the good cookbooks from the amazing ones

Banana chocolate chip cake- 4.2 stars - easy to make and very satisfying

Chocolate cola cake with toasted pecans - 3.8 stars - this was enjoyable but not my favorite. I don’t think the cola adds anything to the cake.

Boston cream cake - 4 stars - every part of this is delicious. I could use a little more chocolate glaze. My husband wishes there was more pastry cream. But I think that’s just because chocolate is my favorite and pastry creams are his favorite. Not really a problem - just a more is better attitude.

[Jen · Rating 3 out of 5]

The first 40 pages of this cookbook are not recipes, but helpful technique/ingredient info. We made two cakes from this cookbook; the first was a chocolate cake, with peanut butter cream cheese icing and peanut butter ganache. It was very rich, tasted like I bought it from a fancy bakery, and wasn't expensive to make. The other cake was just a vanilla cake with fudge frosting that I did not like as much but the kids loved. The triple layer does pack a visual wow.
Laurel, I think the almond-raspberry cake would make a great birthday/mother's day cake for you -- the cake contains almond paste and extract, then a raspberry filling and almond frosting. Other cakes we might make one day are: the dulce de leche cake, ginger chiffon cake with key lime curd and lime buttercream, the ice cream birthday cake, and the halloween sweet potato cake.

[Rachel · Rating 4 out of 5]

Read through the whole thing and marked the cakes I would love to try, of which there are many. These include:

Peach melba cake with raspberry cream
Marbled lemon-blueberry butter cake
Chocolate hazelnut gianduja cake (anything with gianduja chocolate in the frosting has to be heavenly!)
Ginger Chiffon cake with key lime curd and lime buttercream
Chai Cake with honey-ginger cream
Lemon-poppy seed cake with almond cream cheese frosting

Now I just have to go get another cake pan and money for ingredients and I'll be set.

[Julie]

I'm not going to rate this book since I didn't *read* it in the traditional sense, nor have I made more than one recipe from it (the sour cream chocolate with peanut butter frosting and chocolate peanut butter glaze). But based on what I did read and how many recipes I *want* to try, this is a winner. Some of the language is a bit pretentious foodie talk, but I can forgive that for the rest of it. The only real complaint I have is that not all the cakes have pictures. Do I have to use my imagination?

[Dana · Rating 5 out of 5]

I've been drooling over this book for a while, but finally checked it out of the library so that I could make something stunning for my in-laws' 40th anniversary party. I settled on the Park Avenue cake, a white and dark chocolate checkerboard confection with dark chocolate ganache and white chocolate buttercream. Visually, it was gorgeous, and the taste? Nothing short of perfection. I'm definitely looking forward to making more cakes from this book.

[Morgan · Rating 3 out of 5]

Definitely a go-to book for badass celebration cakes. My only complaint is that the layers, without fail, tend to require a brushing of syrup to make them extra moist before frosting. Otherwise they're too much like dry wedding cake.

[Travis · Rating 4 out of 5]

I've made two cakes from this book and both were fantastic! The recipes are sometimes complicated, but not all. They all call for high-quality ingredients and inspire the fun and celebratory nature of a beautiful cake. One I will be returning to for future celebrations.

[Yasmeen · Rating 4 out of 5]

The only cookbook I own that's specialized in show-stopping 3-layer cakes. I found the flavor combinations interesting, and unique. I would definitely recommend it if you're a cake baker looking for something new to inspire you.

[Laura · Rating 5 out of 5]

I have made two cakes from this book so far and both were excellent. The recipes that I've made, at least, are relatively time-consuming but were so delicious that (for special occasions at least) I didn't mind. I can't wait to try the others in the book!

[Rachel · Rating 4 out of 5]

These will be excellent wedding cake recipe ideas for C's wedding in June. Pictures are magnificent.... now on to the test phase. The best phase of all.

[Az · Rating 4 out of 5]

I havent baked anything from the book yet but the recipes seem straightforward and the pictures make you want grab a fork and dig in

[Deb]

Umm, YES.

[Emily · Rating 3 out of 5]

I'll probably never get around to actually using any of these recipes, but they're nice to aspire to. Great photos (though sparse), and the instructions seem to be clear.

[Liz · Rating 5 out of 5]

LOVE this book! Evrey recipe is awesome!

[Jessica · Rating 4 out of 5]

Fun cook book of cakes. Beautiful photography. Makes my mouth water. Haven't tried any of the recipes (not sure I will) but it was fun to look at.