Jessie Oleson (aka Cakespy) drops by every week to share a delicious dessert recipe. —The Mgmt.

[Photographs and original illustrations: Cakespy]

When it comes to festive food for Independence Day, here's a sweet treat that really takes the cake: a layer cake decorated to resemble the American Flag!

Surprisingly easy to assemble (I used this tutorial as a starting point), this cake can really be made with any white cake recipe you'd like; just make three layers, one tinted red, one blue, and one left untinted for the white sections. But I found that the following cake recipe, which is fairly dense and egg-rich, yielded nice sturdy layers which, in addition to being pleasingly poundcake-y on the palate, were easy to cut and shape.

To get the desired height on each of the three layers, I suggest baking this as a 6-inch cake. But it's true that the resulting cake is fairly small. If you are using larger pans or prefer thicker layers, I suggest making two batches of the cake batter and dividing it among your three cake pans.

Happy Fourth of July!

Get the Recipe

American Flag Cake »

About the author: Jessie Oleson is a writer, illustrator, gallery owner, and cake anthropologist who runs Cakespy, an award-winning dessert website. Her first book came out in October 2011; she is currently at work on her second book.