This Strawberry Shortcake Baked Alaska is an ice cream dessert in a 9×13 baking pan that it is easy to make. It is one that will impress anyone you serve it to. The flavors of the yellow cake with the strawberry and lime puree topped with strawberry ice cream and meringue toasted to perfection is devine!
This is very easy to make. The name makes it sound more difficult than it is. If you can make a cake, you can make this dessert. It is a series of layering which is what makes it take a few hours to create.
This is a special occasion dessert. This particular one was my husband’s birthday “cake”. It’s a great dessert for holidays or family get togethers. It is a very impressive looking and tasting dessert! It will be memorable.
Cake
The cake uses a yellow cake mix and a dry package of instant pudding to make the cake base. To that you add extra eggs, extracts, and different amounts of water and oil. This makes the cake very flavorful and very moist.
For this recipe, we only need half of the cake batter. Otherwise, the dessert is too tall for the pan after all the other layers are added. This is why you get the extra cupcakes too. You can eat the cupcakes as they are, frost them, or use them however you wish.
Since this dessert goes in the freezer, I like to bake it in a 9×13 covered baking pan. I do not want to risk the meringue sticking to any plastic wrap.
Puree
To me, the strawberry lime puree as a total game changer for this Strawberry Shortcake Baked Alaska. It’s a little unexpected tang that adds freshness to the dessert and it is so worth it!
You will take 1 lime. Zest it and squeeze out the juice. When picking out a lime, select one that feels heavier than the other ones. That means it will have more juice.
You can put the lime zest, lime juice, sugar, and half of the strawberries into a blender and puree them until they are very fine.
After the cake is baked and cooled you can poke holes on the cake top and drizzle the puree over the top of the cake. Try to drizzle it so each bite will get a little bit of the puree. It’s just enough puree to add flavor, without freezing and getting hard on top of the cake.
Put it back in the freezer until you’re ready for the next step.
Ice Cream
Since the ice cream plays a pretty big role in this dessert select a good quality and flavored Strawberry ice cream.
You’ll need to put it in the refrigerator for about 1 1/2 – 2 hours to soften before putting on top of the cake. After the ice cream has softened, I used an ice cream scoop to scoop out smaller pieces that I laid on top of the cake. Once I had the ice cream all scooped and on top of the cake, I used an offset spatula to spread the ice cream out. Once I was done spreading the ice cream it resembled frosting on the cake. It spread very nicely too.
Then back into the freezer.
Meringue
The meringue is whipped up egg whites with sugar and extract that create a kind of marshmallow flavor. This really completes this dessert. It’s the icing on top of the cake! Yes, the pun was intended.
If you’re new to making meringue, it’s really pretty easy. Please don’t let it intimidate you and prevent you from making this dessert. Here are a few helpful tips.
- There cannot be ANY grease on any of the equipment you use. Always use fresh clean equipment or wipe your equipment down so there is no greasy residue.
- Use room temperature eggs.
- There cannot be any yolk in with the whites, not a speck.
- The cream of tartar helps stabilize the egg whites, meaning they stay fluffed up and stiff.
- Stiff egg whites are when the beaters are taken out of the whites it creates peaks and curls over. It needs to hold the peaks and the curl to be stiff. Otherwise, it is known as soft peaks. In this recipe, you do not want soft peaks.
- Whites must be stiff peaks before adding sugar, vanilla, and vanilla bean seeds.
- Once whipped to stiff peaks with the mixer on, slowly add the other ingredients to avoid deflating the stiff egg whites.
Once you have the beautiful meringue with the pretty little vanilla bean specks in it you spread it on top of the ice cream layer. And you guessed it, back into the freezer until showtime.
I make homemade vanilla and I will take out a vanilla beans out of a batch that is ready, or I’ll buy vanilla beans and remove the seeds, or caviar, and add it to the meringue. I just love the speckled look it gives the meringue and the extra vanilla flavor punch it gives the meringue and the dessert.
Serving
About 1 to 1 1/2 hours before you plan to serve this dessert, put it in the refrigerator to soften slightly. When you are ready to serve it, using a kitchen torch slowly move the torch over the meringue creating the beautiful, toasted marshmallow look. If you move the kitchen torch too fast there will not be much toasting happening, if you move too slow it’ll be really toasted. Just try out different hand movement speeds to determine the perfect amount of toasting. You can go over any area multiple times to get it just perfect. I usually torch the entire dessert, but you could torch them piece by piece after plating them up. This is a step the guests often find very interesting.
Now it is time to plate it. This is one of my favorite parts of creating a dessert like this. This is the presentation that makes people go “Ooooo Ahhhh” when they see it. We eat with our eyes first, right? I like to put some of the puree on the plate and gently add a piece of the Strawberry Shortcake Baked Alaska and a fresh strawberry set beside the cake is pretty too.
So, what would I serve with this Strawberry Shortcake Baked Alaska? The answer is very simple, a fork and a napkin. They’ll need to wipe their chin after they lick their plate clean.
Happy Baking!
Strawberry Shortcake Baked Alaska
Equipment
- 1 Mixer
- 1 Rubber spatula
- 1 9x13 inch cake pan
- 1 Knife
- 1 Muffin Pan
- 1 Cutting board
- 1 kitchen torch" class="wprm-recipe-equipment-link">Kitchen Torch
- 1 Zester
Ingredients
- 1 Box Yellow Cake Mix
- 1 Small box Instant Cheesecake pudding dry
- 4 Large Eggs
- 1 tsp Vanilla extract
- ¾ Cup Vegetable Oil
- ¾ Cup Water
- 1 tsp Vanilla
- 1 quart Strawberries
- 1 ea Lime
- 1 tbsp Sugar
- 1½ quarts Strawberry Ice Cream
- 4 large Egg Whites room temperature
- ¼ tsp Cream of Tartar
- 1 cup Sugar
- 1 tsp Vanilla
- 1 each Vanilla Bean Seeds
- 1 cup Frosting
Instructions
- Preheat the oven to 350 degrees.
- In a mixing bowl add cake mix, dry pudding, water, and oil.
- Using only 4 of the eggs, add one at a time mixing very well. The batter should be smooth and shiny before adding the next egg. Repeat until all 4 eggs have been added.
- Add 1 tsp of vanilla and beat for 3-4 more minutes.
- Grease a 9x13 inch baking pan. Pour half of the batter into the baking pan. Pour the other half of the batter into a muffin pan to make cupcakes. It should be about 12 cupcakes.
- Bake the cake for 18-20 minutes or until a toothpick comes out clean. Bake the cupcakes for 13-18 minutes or until a toothpick comes out clean.
- Cool the cake and cupcakes.
- The cupcakes can be frosted and used for anything else. They are only to use up the extra cake batter.
- Zest the lime and squeeze out the lime juice.
- Clean the strawberries. Put half of the strawberries, 1 tbsp sugar, the lime zest, and the juice from the lime in a blender and puree until smooth. Set aside.
- Using a fork, poke holes on top of the cake. Pour about half of the strawberry and lime puree over the top of the cake in the cake pan. Each bite should have some of the strawberry lime puree. Reserve the other half of the puree for serving later. Cover the cake and put it in the freezer.
- Put the container of ice cream in the refrigerator for 1½ - 2 hours to soften.
- Spoon the ice cream on top of the puree layer on the cake and spread it over the top covering all of the cake. It should use up the entire tub of ice cream.
- Cover the cake and put the cake back into the freezer.
- Place your 4 egg whites and cream of tartar into a CLEAN metal or glass bowl. Put your mixer on high speed and begin whipping up your egg whites to stiff peaks that curl when you lift the beaters. This will take several minutes, up to 10-15 minutes.
- Once the egg whites are stiff, with the mixer running, slowly and gently add in the sugar, vanilla, and vanilla bean seed. If you add it too quickly you can deflate the egg whites.
- Spread the meringue on top of the ice cream. Put back into the freezer.
- Put the Strawberry Shortcake Baked Alaska in the fridge about an hour or so before you plant to toast it with a kitchen torch.
- Using a kitchen torch, toast the meringue to the desired golden-brown color.
- Cut into servings. On the serving plate drizzle some of the remaining strawberry and lime drizzle. Gently place a piece of the Strawberry Shortcake Baked Alaska on top of the strawberry lime drizzle. You can add the other fresh strawberries to decorate each plate. Serve immediately.
Notes
- There cannot be ANY grease on any of the equipment you use.
- Use room temperature eggs.
- There cannot be any yolk in with the whites, not a speck.
- The cream of tartar helps stabilize the egg whites.
- Whites must be stiff before adding sugar, vanilla, and vanilla bean seeds.
- Once whipped add other ingredients slowly to avoid deflating the egg whites.
