Great American Flag Cake

Cake:

1 Cup butter, softened

2 Cups Imperial Sugar/Dixie Crystals Extra Fine Granulated Sugar

3 eggs, separated

1 tsp. vanilla extract

2 tsp. almond extract

3 Cups cake flour, sifted

1 Tbsp. baking powder

½ tsp. salt

1 Cup milk

Cream butter with the sugar until light and fluffy.  Add the yolks of the eggs, one at a time, beating well with each addition.   Add the vanilla and almond extracts.  Blend well.  Sift the cake flour with the baking powder and salt and add alternately to the creamed mixture with the milk, beginning and ending with the flour mixture.  Beat the egg whites until stiff and fold into the batter.  Spread batter into a greased and floured 9-13-inch sheet cake pan and bake in a preheated 350 degree oven for about 30 minutes, or until cake begins to leave the sides of the pan and a wooden toothpick comes out clean when inserted in the center of the cake.  Cool cake on a rack 5 minutes and turn out of pan.  Cool completely before icing.

Icing:

1 Cup butter, softened

1 Cup vegetable shortening

8 Cups Imperial Sugar/Dixie Crystals Powdered Sugar, sifted

¼ Cup flour

2 tsp. almond extract

¼ Cup milk

Food coloring for tinting

Blend butter and shortening until smooth on the low to medium speed of an electric mixer.  Sift the powdered sugar gradually into the butter mixture.  Add the flour and blend well.  Mixture will be dry.  Add the almond extract and the milk and beat until smooth and creamy.  (Again, do not exceed the medium speed setting on your mixer.  A high-speed setting whips air into the icing causing unsightly air pockets on the finish of the cake.)

To decorate our Great American Flag Cake:

Spread icing as smoothly and evening as possible on the top and sides of the cooked sheet cake.  Allow iced cake to stand about 5 minutes to allow the surface of the icing to dry slightly.  Make off a 4x5-inch rectangle on one corner of the iced cake.  Simply press a straight edge lightly in the icing to draw your “mark”.  Tint about 1/3 cup of the remaining icing a deep American blue.  Pipe a smooth edge of blue icing with any size flat tip around the edge of your rectangle.  Fill in the center of the rectangle with blue icing.  Smooth as much as possible and allow to “dry” for a few minutes.  Pipe a “bunting border” (with the white icing) around the bottom edge of the cake with a “leaf” tip.  Pipe stars onto the blue rectangle with a small star tip.  Now you can tint the remaining icing red and pipe on your stripes.  Try to pipe 7 red stripes equally spaced, beginning and ending with a red stripe.