I've never baked cakes in jars, but I'm going to try it for my daughters' teachers, administrators, etc. and gifts for neighbors. I'm planning on alternating red and white cake batters or red and green, so it bakes up striped (scratch recipes, red will be red velvet cake and the white probably just vanilla cake or cinnamon vanilla).

I make IMBC, but I'm not sure how I will incorporate it with the gift if they are not refrigerated! I had a great idea to take "plugs" out of the finished cake using a small cylindrical roller and pipe channels of IMBC into the jarred cake (like maybe 3 channels) so the person isn't just eating dry cake. The only other way I could do it is to just attach a glasine bag but that just looks tacky and the IMBC is a bit more protected inside the cake.

What do you think I should do?

im not familiar with imbc, however after looking at the recipe i can see why it would need to be refrigerated. only thing i can think is to deliver the jars to school as its about to get out and put a lil sticker that says something cute like "I'm like santa, I live in the cold please refrigerate me!" yeah it sounded better in my head. or maybe you could freeze them (not sure if imbc is freezable) and then by the time school got out and they went back into the fridge they would be thawed but not warm. im sure tho that theres an amount of time you can leave it out of the fridge... and besides, doesnt the cooking process cook the eggs?? i know with my bc which i use half butter and half shortening, but ive never seen any go bad. supposedly theres enough sugar in bc to act as a preservative so im not sure if this is the case with imbc and its eggs or not...

and i like the idea of putting holes in the cake to pipe frosting into. no one likes dry cake... or depending on the size of the jars, like say the smaller i think pint sized jars (im seeing the jars my nanny puts her jellys in if that helps) fill with batter that will go about lil over 2/3s of the way up and just pipe the imbc on top and then put the top on... then its more like a cupcake in a jar...

hope you get it figured out.

You're not going to like this but if the IMBC goes to school and has to sit out all day without refrigeration because the teacher is so busy with Holiday activities she/he forgot to put it in the refrigerator in the teachers lounge..............then ends up with salmonella for Christmas as your gift to her............................ What I would do is purchase cans of icing - I know I know, Yucky compared to IMBC, but remove some of the icing and put into a small snap shut container then pop the container into a fancy drawstring gift bag then wrap them both up with a ribbon. OR, use a cupcake corer and cut a hole in the center of the cake and put the icing in the hole and recap.

may just have to use buttercream

They have refrigerators in schools. You could deliver late in the day. IMBC is a little more resilient than SMBC. The eggs have been converted to a confection by the 245 degree syrup. Your weakest link is the butter which can sit out for a day or two provided that the room is not too warm. If you put a tag stating, "Refrigeration Required, let stand at room temp 1/2 hour before serving", you are off the hook. This is just like a grocery store label. The store is not liable if you leave your properly labeled milk out and subsequently get sick.

In theory, IMBC is stable for 12 to 24 hours but this theory does not hold or jive with State regulations and if someone does get sick because of tainted IMBC you can be sued within the last cent you ever had because of it - our state does NOT allow IMBC because everything a home baker produces has to be shelf stable.

Can you really be sued over a gift? That you labeled "requires refrigeration"? Really? That seems a bit ridiculous.

If you knowingly give someone something that will spoil before they ingest it - yes - people are so sue happy now-a-days that they'll sue over a cup of hot coffee spilled in their laps. The chances of this happening with a gift is nil but what I'm trying to get across is that if you own a cake business and produce an item that you know will spoil if it remains at room temp for hours - even if it is a gift - yes you are held responsible. Can you see a judge believing in the "I didn't know" theory from a person standing before them in court whose business it is "to know about things like this". So, if you're not 100% sure it will be refrigerated immediately, use a shelf stable icing, .................just trying to protect you and give you all the angles to consider.

Thank you for the input! BTW, Denise, I grew up in New England (my husband, born and raised in Boston area) and we've been in NC for 7 years now. I must say, you Yankees indeed are very litigious

I will have to think on this! I HATE ABCs. Once I learned how to make MBCs, I could never go back!!

As far as the legal ramifications, my husband and I are both attorneys (not related to the food industry!), and it really depends on in what state you are baking and what your training/experience is. This also varies greatly with the case law in your specific jurisdiction, too. Courts and judges in NH and MA may be much more progressive (pro-consumer) than perhaps others would be in the South.

Oh, and another comment on the cake jars: this does not relate to the IMBC but as for the cake part, most cake-in-a-jar instructions say that the cake itself if properly sealed in the jars will last up to 10 days (sometimes longer).

Now, as far as whether the sealing would also apply to any IMBC that one would pipe into the cake before sealing, that would be the million dollar question!!

There's two ways to blow a person away with a Christmas Gift 1.) Give them something handmade that they can actually use instead of something from a store. 2.) give them something they'll always remember..................... because when they open the lid of a jar cake accented with IMBC after 10 days of non-refrigeration, you truly WILL blow them away - and send them to the hospital for the holidays - with botchulism. Trust me, they'll never forget that gift

I'm not suggesting I'm going to insist on using IMBC. It seemed from your last post you are thinking I'm going to go ahead and use it anyway.

I'm either going to use nothing or try last minute to find a non-meringue buttercream I can live with giving.

After years of IMBC application, I'm just giving you sage advice and trying to inject some humor into it. I know that's not the route you'll choose, Not to worry. Have a great holiday everyone.

I have to agree with paulstonia, I think you should use the half-pint jars, don't fill them quite as full so you're left with some head room, then frost with regular buttercream. I know it's not your favorite, but most people aren't connoseurs like we bakers are and they will think it's yummy! A "cupcake" in a jar. Cute idea, btw!

Thanks! Yes, from what I've read, pint sized or half-pints are the only ones you should use. Most of the recipes I've found do say to fill only to halfway.

Well, after several failures, I finally gave up on baking these things in the jars :/ I was going to throw the whole idea out, until I realized I still had some red velvet frozen from last week. . .

I must say, I am SO much more happy with the way these turned out than if they had been baked in the jar! This way, I got to put the frosting in between the layers (I went with Indydebi's Crisco BC) and I think they look great!!!

I was going to say why not just layer up circles of cake in the jars along with the filling - which you did! They look great!