Cakes and Sweets (3 Recipes)

★★★CAKES★★★

With this entry I'm going to complete the color codes finally. So today, we're going to talk about desserts! Before we get to my recipes though, let me take the time to show you something really amazing. Especially those of you living in the UK should take a look :)

Icing on the Cakery: http://www.icingonthecakery.co.uk/

It's the cake shop of Vicky, one of my friends. They're amazing! Pleasing to both the eyes and taste buds.

Now, my cakes don't look half as amazing as Vicky's but I try. I really do. ;)

In this entry I want to introduce you to 3 of my favorite cake recipes:

1. Chocolate Crumble + Vanilla Curd

2. Sponge/Biscuit (Base)

3. Mai Tai Cake (Filling/Topping) 

Caaaaaaaaake ^_^

Crumble + Curd Cake

RECIPE:

For a whole baking sheet/tray (roughly about 60cm x 40cm) you need:

Crumble:
500 gr Flour
250 gr Margarine/Butter
125 gr Sugar
50 gr Baking Cocoa (dark)
1 Pck. Baking Soda (about 7gr)
2 Pck. Vanillin Sugar (about 10gr)
2 Eggs

Curd Filling:
250 gr Margarine/Butter
125 gr Sugar
6 Eggs
2 Pck. Vanillin Sugar (I recommend getting at least 1 package of "Bourbon Vanilla Sugar" - about 10gr)
2 Pck. Vanilla Pudding Powder
2 Oranges (you need the juice, lime or lemon juice works, too)
1 kg Curd (mild/low fat ["Magerquark"])

2-3 jars of pit less cherries ("Schattenmorellen")


How to - Crumble:

Put everything up there - minus the flour - into a mixing bowl and KNEAD with your hand until it's a nice, even mass. If you have warm hands - like I do - cool them down with some cold water or ice water before you do, otherwise it'll be a sticky, greasy mess.

Add the flour bit by bit until the mass turns a bit dryer and you can crumble it. When you're done, crumble a layer of it onto the sheet/tray and spread it out evenly. Leave a little bit of the crumble for the top. Doesn't have to be much - enough so that you can sprinkle it on top as decoration of sorts.




How to - Curd Filling:

Put the margarine, sugar and vanillin sugar and orange juice into a mixing bowl. Separate the eggs into egg yolk and egg white. Beat the egg white in a separate bowl until it's stiff. Set aside for later. Add the egg yolks to the rest in the mixing bowl and mix well. Then add the curd and mix until you have an even mass. Fold in the stiff egg white until it's mixed in evenly as well.

Crumble Base + Cherries

Then put the pit less cherries onto the sheet/tray, on top of the crumble. Once you've spread out your cherries, pour the curd mass onto the tray as well and spread evenly.

Crumble + Cherries + Curd Filling + Crumble

Crumble the rest of the crumble onto the top. The cake should go into the oven at 200°C for about 50 min. Done.

Biscuit/Sponge Cake Base

RECIPE:

What you need (for a 20cm diameter base with a 2-3cm thickness [20cm springform cake pan]):

3 Eggs
40 gr Flour
40 gr (Potato) Starch [if you don't want to use this as a base but as a 'normal' cake, replace this with flour]
75 gr Sugar
1 Pck. Vanillin Sugar (about 10gr)
1 Teaspoon Baking Soda (about 4-5gr)
3 Spoons of Orange Juice (or lime/lemon juice) [1 spoon per egg, rule of thumb]

How to:

Mix the flour, baking soda and the starch. Set them aside in a sifter (Sieb) because you'll need to sift it in later on. Starch's finer than flour and adds to the 'stability' of the base.

Separate eggs. Add yolk, juice, sugar and vanillin sugar into a mixing bowl. Egg white has to be beaten until it's stiff in a separate bowl and set aside for later. Mix the yolk and the sugar until the color of the mixture turns lighter (it'll be a darker orange color first but later on be much lighter, almost pale yellow or beige). Sift in the flour+starch+baking soda and fold it in. Do not use the mixer anymore. Once everything's in, fold in the egg white as well to make the whole thing fluffy and light.

Should be done after about 15min in the oven at 200°C I think. You should check on it from time to time with a skewer or so and if it starts to turn too brown on top, put tinfoil over it to cover the surface.

Mai Tai Cake with Mandarin Oranges and Chocolate Sprinkles

RECIPE:

You can make a hard crumble base like in the first picture (using cookies and butter or a standard "shortcrust/shortpastry" [Mürbeteig] or just use the sponge/biscuit one from above. :)

You'll need (20cm diameter base):

400 gr Cream Cheese (roughly 3 normal sized packs of e.g. Philadelphia, or so - plain is okay but I can recommend the "honey" one or the strawberry or pineapple+mango flavored ones~)
150 gr Yoghurt
3 Pck. Gelierfix (Gelatin powder, in Germany available from Dr.Oetker)
1 Pck. Lemon Aroma/Lemon Peel (I recommend "Lemon Finesse" by Dr.Oetker, real lemon peel! :3)
2 Spoons Sugar
3 Spoons Orange Liquor (you can freely vary this)
3 Spoons Jamaica Rum (you can freely vary this)

How to:

Mix the lemon peel or aroma with 1 spoon of sugar. Set aside for later. Put everything else - minus the gelatin powder - into a mixing bowl and mix. Once it's even, add first the gelatin powder and then at the very end add the lemon stuff with the sugar and stir until it's spread out but NOT dissolved (so the sugar still has a bit of a crunch to it when you eat the cake later). Pour everything onto the base (make sure your cake pan is deep enough) and put it in the fridge.

Mai Tai Cake with Strawberries and Chocolate Sprinkles

You can also use cream cheese with fruit or add fruit syrup instead of alcohol of course. Over here, I am very fortunate to have a huge variety of cream cheese at my disposal. We have honey/chocolate/fruit flavored cream cheese, which is super awesome when you want to make this cake!

If you want to make quick bases, you can crumble up old cookies (butter cookies / Butterkeckse or Russisch Brot work really good) and then add cold butter to them. Knead until it's a stable mass and spread it out at the bottom of a cake pan (and the sides). Then you can pour the mixture on top and garnish.

What I also like to do is to use more of the lemon and orange peel stuff instead of alcohol when I make the cake for kids (like in the picture above, that was for my little cousin). My tip is to just try things out and find a mixture that you like best. This is definitely a good (and healthier) alternative to heavy butter-cream cakes btw and it tastes wonderful fresh from the fridge on a warm/hot summer day~!

Happy Baking!