The famous Brown Derby Cake.
Ok well maybe it’s not exactly famous; I mean I had never even heard of it until I bought my bakery way way back in 2005.
The previous owner was already making it for years and it was the first time I had ever seen one or heard of one!
It was a great seller too! So naturally I continued with making it myself!
This cake fast became my favorite cake in the entire bakery~ I know I know, how can EVERY CAKE be my favorite cake?
I cannot really answer that question right now, I have more important things to talk about!
This cake is so simple yet packed with flavors.
You have to be sure your bananas, strawberries and peaches are in their peak of ripeness though, or this cake goes from bursting with juicy, delicious, fruity-ness to just “eh, It’s Ok.”
Chocolate cake is the base foundation for this Building on Recipes project and piles and piles of fresh whipped cream.
I didn’t use the stabilizer for the whipped cream though (I don’t really use it that often to be honest) since I knew this cake wasn’t going to last very long and the whipped cream was sturdy enough to last 3 days with out it!
Many people worry about fresh fruit in cakes; especially bananas. I have never had a problem using fresh cut fruits for my cakes they last for days even after the cake has been cut.
While it’s true bananas will oxidize~ but only when air hits them; so the sliced portion of the cake may get some browning but there is no worry about the bananas turning brown while they are IN the cake before you cut it.
In my experience once this cake has been cut it doesn’t stand too much of a chance to sit around and get brown, so…..
I cannot say enough about the fresh peaches in this cake. They are quite possibly the main attraction that beings this cake to #1 status.
While I owned my bakery many people always inquired about what that interesting dome shaped cake in the display case was all about; and when we would proceed to tell them it was filled with peaches, their noses wrinkled and they often turned it down!
This was so upsetting because it is truly (in my opinion) what is so delicious about this entire combination!
I will confess that I was once caught eating this entire cake with just a fork over the garbage can one day….. yeah ~ did I mention this is my favorite cake?
https://youtube.com/watch?v=w33TCGJr9ww
5.0 from 8 reviews
Brown Derby Cake
This is a building on recipes project but all you really need to do ahead of time is bake your chocolate cake.
You will notice in the video this cake is mostly whipped cream with just a small ratio of cake, so I used just a half recipe baked into 1-8″ layer If you do not have the excess cake crumbs though, like I did in the freezer~ you may want to bake the entire recipe of chocolate cake so you have some excess to crush up for the garnish
Author: Gretchen’s Bakery
Serves: 1 – 8″ cake
Ingredients
- ½ Recipe Chocolate Cake
- 4 Cups Heavy Cream or Stabilized Whipped Cream Recipe
- Granulated Sugar ½ cup (100g)
- Vanilla Extract 2 teaspoons (10ml)
- 1 Fresh Ripe Banana
- ½ lb Fresh Strawberries
- 2 Ripe Peaches *skins peeled
Instructions
- Assemble as per the video tutorial
