Nina Forever: Surprise Bloody Cake
The Movie: Nina Forever
Category: Horror/Comedy/Drama
Release Date: March 17, 2015
Running Time: 98 minutes
No Spoilers Blurb: Suicidal Rob starts dating a colleague at the supermarket. But whenever they have sex, his dead girlfriend, Nina, pops up. A literal ghost of girlfriends past. Good discussions of prolonged grief.
Why I like it
This has been one of my favorites so far and I almost don’t know how to describe why it’s so good to me. Perhaps it’s the simple idea of how we romanticize death. The idea of love eternal and the realities of that. I enjoy watching Rob and Nina’s parents struggle with their complicated grief and I enjoy that this isn’t a normal horror film. It’s the kind of thing that gets overlooked because of the genre and a great example of how horror let’s us explore our feelings, sadness, and fear.
The Recipe: Surprise Bloody Cake
I have taken the original recipe and made vegan substitutions so you don’t have to.
I picked this because its a pure white cake with a blood red surprise and after you watch this film you’ll get why the “surprise!” blood on clean white works so well with this recipe.
Photo Credit: The Little Epicurean
Ingredients
Cake
3 cups (370 grams) cake flour
4 teaspoon baking powder
1 teaspoon fine sea salt
1 cup non-dairy milk
2 teaspoon vanilla extract, or vanilla paste
12 Tablespoons non-dairy butter, room temp
1.5 teaspoons of VÖR Aquafaba Powder + 12 Tablespoons of water (roughly 3/4 cup of water)
1 1/2 cup (312 grams) granulated sugar
Swiss Buttercream
3/4 cup of liquid aquafaba)
1 1/2 cups (312 grams) granulated sugar
2 cups (1 pound/16 oz) non-dairy butter, cut into tablespoons, softened
pinch of fine sea salt
Raspberry Coulis
12 oz package frozen raspberries
5 Tablespoons granulated sugar
2 teaspoon fresh squeezed lemon juice
1 teaspoon finely grated lemon zest
Raspberry Simple Syrup (Plus Directions)
3 Tablespoons simple syrup
Bring to a boil equal parts water and sugar. Remove from heat and allow to cool. Keep chilled. Store covered in fridge for up to 2 weeks.
1 Tablespoon raspberry liqueur (like Chambord)
Directions
Vanilla Cake:
Preheat oven to 350 degrees F. Butter and lightly flour four 6-inch cake pans. Line bottom with parchment paper and set aside.
Sift together cake flour, baking powder, and salt. Set aside. In another bowl, whisk together milk, aquafaba, and vanilla. Set aside.
In the bowl or a stand mixer, beat nondairy butter until smooth. Add sugar and mix until combined. Scrape down bowl as needed to ensure even mixing.
Add 1/3 of the dry ingredients. Mix on low speed while adding 1/2 of the liquid ingredients. Add another 1/3 of dry, follow with remaining liquid ingredients, and end with remaining dry ingredients. Mix until batter is evenly combined.
Divide batter among prepared cake pans. Bake 30-35 minutes until toothpick inserted in center of cake comes out clean. Let cake cool in pan for 5 minutes before unmolding. Allow cake to cool to room temperature on wire racks.
Once cake is cool, use a serrated knife to level off cake layers if necessary.
Photo Credit: The Little Epicurean
Swiss Buttercream:
In the bowl of stand mixer, whisk together aquafaba and sugar. Place bowl over a pot of simmering water to create a double boiler. Make sure simmering water does not touch the bottom of the bowl. Whisk sugar aquafaba mixture until it reaches a temperature of 160 degrees F.
Alternatively, if you don't have a thermometer, heat until all the sugar has melted. You can test this by dipped your pointer finger into the warm mixture and rubbing it against your thumb. The mixture should be smooth. You should not be able to feel the granules of sugar.
Return bowl to the stand mixer. With the whisk attachment, beat mixture at medium speed until it has cooled to room temperature. Reduce speed to low and add non-dairy butter one tablespoon at a time. Once all the butter has been incorporated, add pinch of salt. Increase speed to medium-high and continue to beat until buttercream is light and fluffy.
Raspberry Coulis:
In a medium sauce pot, add frozen raspberries, sugar, lemon juice, and lemon zest. Cook over medium heat until sugar has melted, raspberries have thawed, and mixture has slightly thickened. Stir occasionally to prevent raspberry sauce from burning along the sides of the pot. Remove from heat. Strain out raspberry seeds. Keep raspberry coulis (sauce) in the fridge until ready to use.
Raspberry Simple Syrup:
Mix together simple syrup and raspberry liqueur. Set aside until ready to assemble cake
Assembly:
Place one cake layer on a serving platter or cake turntable. Generously brush raspberry simple syrup over cake. Spread a thin layer of buttercream on cake. Place another cake layer and repeat adding simple syrup and buttercream.
Place third cake layer on top. Brush with simple syrup. Spread a very thin layer of buttercream on cake. Using a piping bag fitted with a small round tip to pipe a buttercream border along the edges of the cake. Gently pour raspberry coulis into the piped ring of buttercream. Reserve remaining raspberry coulis for serving.
Spread a very thin layer of buttercream over the last cake layer. Invert cake layer and place frosted side on top of cake to cover raspberry coulis.
Spread a layer of buttercream around the sides of the cake to seal in the crumbs (crumb coat). Place int he fridge and allow to chill for 15 minutes to set the buttercream. Add another thin layer of buttercream. While the turntable to rotating, use a toothpick to drag lines around the cake. Keep cake stored in the fridge until ready to serve. Allow cake to come to room temperature before serving.
Once you slice into cake, the raspberry coulis will ooze out. Serve cake slices with reserved raspberry coulis.