Earl Grey and Cassis Cake

It was my friend Cat’s birthday and I think she’ll agree that she’s a very lucky birthday girl - cake-wise at least. She got 3 cakes, 2 of which were from me! I had planned an earl grey and black currant/cassis cake, when her sister asked me to re-make a the cake from last year. So the first cake she got was this pared-down version of last year’s banana nut crunch cake.

As I was making her second cake, I was reflecting on how long we’ve been friends - a long time. How long? Since the days when she worked at Blockbuster! Do you remember Blockbuster? Ahh, those were the days.

Anyway, do you know Ribena? It’s a black currant drink concentrate and it’s something that I’ve been wanting to incorporate into a cake for a while. So I tried out a black currant (aka cassis) curd.

Check out the verdict at the end of the post!

Earl Grey Cake Layers

I used the recipe by Tessa Huff and baked in 3, 6-inch cake pans for 35 min.

Cassis Curd (Make ahead of time)

Ingredients

½ cup Ribena

3 eggs

6 Tablespoon butter

Directions

1. Combine Ribena and eggs in a small sauce pan. Put on low heat and whisk continuously until thick.
2. Place butter in a bowl and strain the curd with a fine sieve over top. Stir to combine.
3. Cool completely before using.

Toasted Meringue Decor

Ingredients

4 teaspoons of meringue powder

4 Tablespoons of Ribena (or water)

Directions

1. Combine meringue powder and liquid and whip with a hand held blender until thick and stiff.
2. When ready to decorate, spoon onto cake and make peaks with a spoon. Toast with a kitchen torch.

Tea Syrup

See directions here and cut amount in half.

Early Grey Swiss Meringue Buttercream

See directions in this earlier post.  

Colour ¼ cup buttercream purple using gel food colouring. Colour the remaining buttercream blue.

Assembly

1. Place first cake layer on your cake board or plate. Brush tea syrup on top.
2. Pipe a dam around the perimeter of the cake using the blue buttercream.
3. Spread the cassis curd inside. Place next layer and repeat. Finish with final cake layer.
4. Crumb coat the cake with blue buttercream. Freeze for 10 minutes.
5. Add final buttercream coat. Smear purple buttercream around the cake and use a bench scraper to smooth it out and blend.
6. Add meringue and toast with a kitchen torch.

Verdict: Overall, this cake was really tasty. It has moist cake layers and visually, it was eye-catching. I just wish that the cassis flavour cake through more - it was a tad egg-y in flavour. In the future, I would just stick with black currant jam. I think Ribena could work well in a frosting.

Bridal Shower Part 4 - Meringue Sandwiches

As if making two cakes and macarons wasn’t enough, I wanted to make something for my friend’s bridal shower party favours. Keeping with the theme of “a shower in Paris”, I decided on meringues. They are so much easier to make than macarons, and as I would soon discover, sooo much more delicious.

Check out the verdict at the end of the post!

Meringue Sandwiches

Meringue recipe from Bakers Royale

Ingredients

3 large egg whites

¾ cup sugar

1 teaspoon vanilla

½ teaspoon white vinegar

Gel food colouring

Directions

1. Line 2 baking sheets with parchment paper. Pre-heat oven to 200 degrees F.
2. Wipe down a metal bowl (e.g., of your stand mixer) and whisk with vinegar to get rid of residual grease.
3. Whisk egg whites to stiff peaks. Gradually add sugar while mixing on medium. Add vanilla and vinegar and continue to whip until stiff and glossy (there should be no granules when you rub between your fingers).
4. Add gel food colouring and beat to combine.
5. Place the meringue in a pastry bag with the tip of your choice. I used 2M. Pipe rosettes or other shapes to your liking, 1 inch apart. Smaller rosettes work better (see note at the end).
6. Bake for 90-120 minutes until the meringue easily peel off the paper. Cool on a wire rack.

Filling

Fillings are only restricted by your imagination. Some options are jam, buttercreams, marshmallow fluff, ganache, lemon curd, caramel, Nutella, cookie butter, etc.

I had leftover chocolate swiss meringue buttercream from the chocolate cake that I made for the shower.

Assembly

Spread filling on one meringue and sandwich with another. Place in an airtight container for 12 hours to ripen.This will soften the meringue and improve the texture and flavour.

Verdict: OMG these are amazing!! Go and make these right now! They are my absolute new favorite treat! The texture is so chewy marshmallow-y and delicious. So happy that I made these for the party favours.

Note: Be sure to pipe smaller rosettes as the moisture from the filling does a better job of making the meringue chewy. Larger rosettes stay relatively crunchy.

Various Winter Bakings

Here are some things that I've been baking this winter. No recipes here but I thought it might be nice to show you some photos. I really need a professional light for taking photos. Short days mean short time periods of when I can photograph, and in dark and rainy Vancouver, the light that is available isn't great. This winter, I didn't even bother trying to catch the light, thus these photos. Oh well.

Let's start with a birthday cake with blueberry jam. I just love those colours.

Next is a Winter Wonderland cake that I made for a potluck. A chocolate cake with vanilla swiss meringue buttercream. Pretty simple and it's all in the decor!

Next is the World's Best Cake, which was a disaster, but which I managed to salvage. The final product is layers of angel food cake, whipped cream, and meringues with slivered almonds.

Next is a dairy free birthday cake. Chocolate cake with meringue frosting. Fluufffyyyy!

And finally, a pretzel cake from Christina Tosi (Milk Bar). Interesting flavours for sure - pretzel, honey frosting, and ganache. A grown up cake for 3 grownups' birthdays.

That's all for now. I'll be here hoping for better weather and lighting.

Strawberry Cheesecake Cake

This one’s been in the blog bank for a while - since Mother’s Day to be exact. I wanted to bring a cake to a family potluck for mother’s day. The Huz’s family has 5 aunts (and one uncle) so they like to celebrate Mother’s Day together. Instead of bringing a cheesecake, why not make a cake that plays on a cheesecake? I’m really into desserts that are like other desserts (e.g., a cake that’s a take on a pie, an ice cream that tastes like birthday cake, a doughnut that tastes like root beer, etc). It’s confusing and awesome.

This cake has many components, so I premade the cake layers and froze them and kept the graham crunch in an airtight container until assembly day.

Check out the verdict at the end of the post!

Graham Crunch

adapted from Milk Bar Cookbook

Ingredients

¾ cup graham crumbs

2 Tablespoons milk powder

1 Tablespoon sugar

pinch of salt

2 Tablespoons butter, melted

2 Tablespoons heavy cream

Directions

1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees.
2. Toss graham crumbs, milk powder, sugar, and salt in a bowl to combine.
3. Pour in butter and cream and toss to combine.
4. Spread on a baking sheet and break apart large chunks. Bake for 25 minutes tossing halfway through.
5. Cool completely. Break apart and big pieces. Store in an airtight container until ready to use.

Vanilla Cake

From Anna Olson.

Baked in 3, 6-inch cake pans. 25-30 minutes until a toothpick comes out clean.

If the cakes dome, cut off to make them flat (and you can eat the best part of the cake!)

Strawberry Cream Cheese Filling

Ingredients

¼ cup butter, softened

½ cup cream cheese, softened

½ teaspoon lemon juice

½ cup icing sugar

3 Tablespoons strawberry jam

pinch of salt

Directions

1. Beat butter and cream cheese in a stand mixer to combine.
2. Add lemon juice, icing sugar, jam, and salt and beat until fluffy.

Cream Cheese Marshmallow Frosting

Ingredients

½ cup cream cheese, room temperature

1 ¼ cup butter, room temperature

1 cup icing sugar

1 teaspoon vanilla

1 jar marshmallow cream

pinch of salt

pink food colouring

Directions

1. Beat cream cheese and butter together with a stand mixer (paddle attachment) to combine. Add icing sugar and vanilla and beat to combine.
2. Add marshmallow cream and salt and beat to combine.
3. For an ombre decorating effect, colour ⅓ of the frosting with a dark pink and the remaining ⅔ light pink (less food colouring).

*note that this frosting won’t be completely smooth - it’ll look a little bit curdled. I know, not ideal for a frosting, but it does taste great.

Assembly

Components

1. 1 cup thinly sliced strawberries
2. Vanilla cake layers
3. Strawberry jam
4. Strawberry Cream Cheese Filling
5. Cream Cheese Marshmallow Frosting

1. Smear a small dollop of strawberry cream cheese filling on you cake plate or cake board. Ideally, use a turntable for easier decorating. Place the first layer of cake on top.
2. Spread strawberry jam. Top with strawberry slices.
3. Spread the strawberry cream cheese filling and sprinkle the graham crumbs on top.
4. Place next cake layer and repeat. Finish with the final layer.
5. Frost the entire cake with the light pink cream cheese marshmallow frosting. Place in the fridge for 10 minutes to firm up.
6. Spread the dark pink frosting on the bottom ⅓ of the cake. Smooth out with a large spatula, blending the line between the two colours as you twirl the cake around.
7. Add graham crumbs along the bottom. Decorate to your liking. Keep in the fridge until an hour before serving.

Verdict: I really liked the flavours of this cake - really reminiscent of a strawberry cheesecake. The crunch of the graham crumbs on the outside gave the cake an interesting texture. Too bad that the graham inside the cake turned soft. It was definitely a crowd pleaser!

Chocolate Meringue Cloud Cake

Spring is here, finally! This winter was a tough one – it seemed like the dreary weather was never going to end and that the short days were going to drown me. Anyone else felt like this?? But as soon as daylight savings hit, so did Spring! And I was compelled to make a cake that was a nod to the feel of the season.

Opportunity arose: it was my dear friend’s birthday. She loves chocolate cake, one of her favorites being a ganache covered cake. There was this Smartie cake, and this Mint Chocolate cake that I made for her in the past. This year, it was a chocolate meringue cloud cake

Check out the verdict at the end of the post!

 

Meringue disks pre-baking.

Meringues

Ingredients

4 egg whites

1/4 teaspoon cream of tartar

¼  teaspoon salt

1 teaspoon vanilla extract

1 cup sugar

Blue and pink gel food colouring

Directions

1.  Preheat oven to 250^○ F. Trace 3 circles (of the cake pan that you will use; I used 5” rounds) onto parchment paper.  Place circle side down onto baking sheet. Place a sheet of parchment on another baking pan.

2.  In a large metal bowl, beat egg whites, cream of tartar, and salt to soft peaks.

3.  Add vanilla and beat.

4.  Gradually add sugar and beat until stiff.

5.  Take out half the meringue. Add pink gel food colouring to the remaining meringue and whip until incorporated. Add to a piping bag.

6.  Clean out mixing bowl, add back the white meringue and add blue gel food colouring. Whip until incorporated and add to a piping bag.

7.  Pipe two disks of one colour and one disk of a different colour, tracing the circles leaving a small gap between the line and meringue disk. The meringue disks will expand a bit while baking. Keep the disks fairly flat – I only did 2 layers.

8.  With the remaining meringue, pipe designs for decorating the outside of the cake onto the other baking sheet.

9.  Bake for 2.5 hours or until they are thoroughly dry. Leave in oven with heat turned off for another hour.

10.Store in a Tupperware container.

 

Meringue decorations, post-baking.

Chocolate Cake

Adapted from here.

Ingredients

¾ cup + 2 Tablespoon flour

1 cup sugar

1 teaspoon baking soda

½ teaspoon baking powder

½ teaspoon salt

¼ cup + 2 Tablespoon cocoa powder

1 beaten egg, room temperature

½ cup strong coffee

½ cup buttermilk, room temperature

¼ cup canola oil

½ teaspoon vanilla

Directions

1.  Preheat oven to 350 degrees F. Line the bottom of two 5-inch round cake pans with parchment. Grease and flour the sides.

2.  In the bowl of a stand mixer, add flour, sugar, baking soda, baking powder, and salt. Sift in cocoa powder and mix with the paddle attachment.

3.  Add the remaining ingredients and beat until smooth (approx. 1 minute).

4.  Pour into pans and bake for around 25 minutes or until a toothpick comes out clean.

5.  Cool completely before assembling.

Chocolate Swiss Meringue Buttercream

Ingredients

75 grams dark/bittersweet chocolate

3 large egg whites

¾ cup sugar

1 cup butter, cubed, room temperature

¼ teaspoon salt

½ teaspoon vanilla

Directions

1.  Place chocolate in a bowl over simmering water until melted. Take off heat and cool near to room temperature.

2.  Place egg whites and sugar in a heat proof bowl over simmering water. Beat continuously by hand until the mixture reaches 160 degrees F.

3.  With a stand mixer, beat mixture with a whisk until stiff and glossy (about 5 minutes). Mixture should be at room temperature before moving onto the next step.

4.  Switch to a beater attachment and beat in cubes of butter one at a time. Beat on high until smooth (may take 15 minutes).

5.  Once buttercream is smooth, add salt and vanilla and beat to mix.

6.  Dump melted chocolate into the buttercream and beat until completely blended, scraping down the sides every once in a while.

*If the buttercream is really soft, place in fridge for 15 minutes to stiffen.

Assembly

1.  Cut cake layers in half to make 4 layers.

2.  Place first layer on cake plate. Spread a layer of buttercream.

3.  Place a meringue disk on top. Spread a layer of buttercream on top.

4.  Place next cake layer and repeat layering. Finish with final cake layer.

5.  Cover the entire cake in buttercream and decorate with meringues and sprinkles.

Verdict: I was really happy with this cake! “Cloud” cake is the perfect description – so fluffy and light in texture. The cake is fluffy, the meringue is fluffy, and the frosting is fluffy! I’ve made a lot of cakes for my friend in the past, but she said that this might be her favorite!