Blogiversary: Almond Cake with Chocolate Raspberry Ganache Filling & Raspberry Buttercream

Happy Birthday to my blog!

It's been a great year!  I started my blog, my home bakery, I taught a 4-week baking course at Williams, and most importantly, I've done a lot of baking!  This weekend, I'm participating in the Northern Berkshire Food Festival in North Adams, so if you're in the area, stop by!

If you've been following my blog at all, you'll recognize the almond cake in this recipe.  I used it for my birthday cake this year with brown butter frosting, and with chocolate raspberry ganache and chocolate frosting for a client.  It's extremely versatile, and a great addition to your repertoire!  And this frosting may be my new favorite. It's not as heavy as some buttercreams can be. It's light and fluffy, with a beautiful pink hue and raspberry taste.  You may not want to make it without a stand mixer; there's probably a good 20-25 minutes of beating with the stand mixer.  But if you need any more reasons to get a stand mixer, swiss meringue buttercream is it.  No heavy, dense, sugary mouthfuls here, this frosting is more reminiscent of a smooth, high quality ice cream with a more subtle sense of sweetness.  You'll see this frosting again soon, I'm sure of it.

And now, to celebrate my blog's birthday, I'm off to make a cake of course!  A chocolate butterfly cake for my niece's 4th birthday tomorrow.  Happy baking!

p.s. Stop by my Zucchero Dolce facebook page for more pictures, or to become a fan. 

Almond Cake (adapted from Rose Levy Beranbaum)

4 eggs
1 1/3 cups sour cream, separated
2 teaspoons almond extract
1/2 teaspoon vanilla extract
3 1/3 cups cake flour, sifted
2/3 cups finely ground almonds, toasted and preferably unblanched
2 cups sugar
1 teaspoon baking powder
1 teaspoon baking soda
1 teaspoon salt
3 sticks butter (12 ounces), room temperature

Preheat oven to 350F.  Spray 3 9" round cake pans with baking spray, line with parchment paper, and spray again.

In a medium bowl, stir together the eggs, 1/3 cup of the sour cream, and the extracts.  Set aside. Don't worry, it won't be smooth or pretty.


In the bowl of a stand mixer, combine all the dry ingredients - mix for 30 seconds.  Add the butter and the remaining 1 cup of sour cream, and mix on low until combined.  Mix on medium for 2 minutes to aerate batter.  Add the egg and sour cream mixture in 3 additions, beating 20 seconds after each addition.

 Split the batter between the cake pans, and smooth with a rubber spatula.  Bake for 30-40 minutes until a toothpick just comes out clean.  


Let the cakes cook in their pans for about 10 minutes, then turn on to cooling rack.  Cool completely, then wrap in plastic wrap and chill until ready to frost.

Raspberry Ice Cream Cake with Homemade Ice Cream

Are you finding it much too hot out to turn on the oven?  Time for ice cream cake!


Chocolate and Raspberry is one of my new favorite flavor combinations - doesn't matter the form: cakes, brownies, cupcakes, or ice cream cake like this one... Plus, I love that it's pink!


Ice cream cakes are great for entertaining, because so much of the work can be done ahead of time.  And guests are always impressed with homemade ice cream, though feel free to use store-bought if you don't have an ice cream maker.  You can even stir in the raspberry puree into store-bought vanilla ice cream, if you want to go the semi-homemade route.

Best-Ever (Bakewise) Pound Cake & The Science of Baking

I taught a 4-week, 40-hour course in January called The Art & Science of Baking.  We used Shirley Corriher's book Bakewise for a textbook.  Shirley is a frequent guest on Alton Brown's show Good Eats.  She's a chemist, and explains the science behind the baking. If you want to develop your own recipes, this is a must-read book.  She explains how to check the math of a given recipe and the important differences between baking powder and baking soda, natural cocoa powder and Dutch-process cocoa powder, and so much more.  One of the most surprising things I learned - so many cake recipes are way over-leavened!!

Shirley examines pound cake early on in her book, and takes you through her process of developing the perfect recipe.  Make this cake immediately, and as you taste the moist buttery cake with just a slight hint of almond (perhaps unidentifiable to some, but you'll taste something a little different), with a dense (but not heavy) crumb, you'll see how successful she was.  The whipped cream is not a typical ingredient in pound cake, but after you make this cake, it might become a regular in all your cake recipes.  It adds moisture, and of course enriches the flavor of the cake; whipping air into the cream lightens the texture of the cake.  Replacing some of the fat (i.e. butter) with oil also adds moisture to the cake; oil is better at greasing the flour proteins than are butter or shortening, so less gluten forms.

Full-disclosure, I did adapt Shirley's recipe slightly.  Potato starch isn't readily available at my grocery store, so I stuck with flour; Shirley says the potato starch adds moisture to the cake, and that the large granules make the texture a little less tight than the average pound cake. I believe her, but my version of the cake is still extremely moist, and the texture is not as dense and tight as your everyday pound cake.  I also didn't add her optional cream glaze or pound cake icing. I didn't miss them. 

Other things to note:  don't make this cake in a loaf pan, it won't work.  The abundance of butter and sugar in this cake make the cake perfectly moist and sweet, but don't contribute enough protein structure for the cake to dome in a loaf pan.  Using a tube pan or Bundt pan insures that the cake remains fully in the pan; in a loaf pan, we would want the cake to dome nicely above the pan, but without the sides of the pan to climb, the cake needs sufficient protein structure to reach that high.  Also, if the cake sinks slightly on top, it's not noticeable with these pans, since you invert the cake before serving anyway.

Oh, and I'm not sure she mentions this, but this cake improves after baking, so try not to eat it all the first, or even second day.  It's still moist on day 3, and the butter flavor is even more pronounced (I haven't figured out why yet!).

Carrot Cake Cupcakes

I've never quite understood the world's fascination with carrot cake, but everyone seems to love it.  I do think these cupcakes are pretty cute with the pecan on top, and I love cream cheese frosting, but carrot cake will never be my cake flavor of choice. To each his own...

By the way, if you don't already use an ice cream scoop to fill cupcake liners, I highly recommend it. It makes the whole process go much more quickly and I also think it makes it easier to fill the wells uniformly. Remember, each one should be filled just over halfway (for most recipes).

Peanut Butter Cheesecake with a Brownie Crust

It's been months since I posted any chocolate and peanut butter treats, that's just not right!  So here's another.  I don't need to convince you how great the flavor combination is.  I made this as one of several desserts for a party for my Abstract Algebra students.  I never have students over without serving cheesecake, it's so easy and quick, it serves a lot, most people really like it, and there are endless flavor combinations!  And it can be made ahead of time, perfect for parties!  You could definitely serve this on an oreo crust if you prefer, but I really like the brownie texture.

 

Almond Cake with Chocolate Raspberry Filling & Chocolate Frosting

Do you own 6" cake pans yet?  I love mine!  If you like to bake, and don't want to gain 5 pounds, you should definitely invest in some 6" pans.  You can usually just half the recipe for a 9" cake, and make it as a 6" instead - no complicated math required! If you're intimidated by the thought of putting together a big layer cake, a 6" is also a little less scary. The smaller layers are less likely to break while you're assembling the cake, and frosting the 6" is just a little bit easier than a bigger, unwieldy cake.

I didn't get to eat any of this cake unfortunately (it was for a Zucchero Dolce order), so I don't have any shots of the inside.  I'll just have to make it again soon so I can get you some more pictures... yeah, that's the reason I need to make it again soon. Really it is...

Almond Cake (adapted from Rose Levy Beranbaum)

This recipe makes a 2-layer 6" cake.  Double the recipe to make a 3-layer 9" cake, a 3-layer 8" cake, or a 2-layer 9" cake if your pans are a full 2" tall.

2 eggs
2/3 cups sour cream, separated
1 teaspoons almond extract
1/4 teaspoon vanilla extract
1 2/3 cups cake flour, sifted
1/3 cup finely ground almonds, toasted and preferably unblanched
1 cup sugar
1/2 teaspoon baking powder
1/2 teaspoon baking soda
1/2 teaspoon salt
12 tablespoons butter (6 ounces), room temperature

Preheat oven to 350F.  Spray 2 6" round cake pans with baking spray, line with parchment paper, and spray again (you can probably skip the parchment if you spray well).

In a medium bowl, stir together the eggs, about 1/4 (that's a little under 3 tablespoons) of the sour cream, and the extracts.  Set aside. Don't worry, it won't be smooth or pretty.


In the bowl of a stand mixer, combine all the dry ingredients - mix for 30 seconds.  Add the butter and the remaining 1 cup of sour cream, and mix on low until combined.  Mix on medium for 2 minutes to aerate batter.  If you don't have a beater blade, scrape down the sides of the bowl frequently with a rubber spatula.  Add the egg and sour cream mixture in 3 additions, beating 20 seconds after each addition.

Split the batter between the cake pans, and smooth with a rubber spatula.  Bake for 20-30 minutes until a toothpick just comes out clean.  (that's a big time window, but cooking time can vary drastically with different ovens, so it's best to keep an eye on it).


Let the cakes cook in their pans for about 10 minutes, then turn on to cooling rack.  Cool completely, then wrap in plastic wrap and chill until ready to frost.

Chocolate Raspberry Ganache Filling

3 ounces semisweet chocolate
3 tablespoons butter
1/3 cup raspberry puree*

To make the puree, I find it easiest to use frozen raspberries.  Thaw (or microwave) the frozen berries, and puree in the blender or food processor.  You'll need about 2 cups of berries to get 1/3 cup puree.

Melt together the chocolate and butter in a double boiler or in a microwave (short 30 second spurts, stir in between or you're likely to burn the chocolate).  Stir in the raspberry puree, and use to fill the cake.  If you make this ahead of time, you may need to microwave it very briefly to bring it back to spreadable consistency.

Chocolate Frosting (adapted from Chocolate Chocolate)

 

4 1/2 tablespoons unsalted butter 

2 ounces unsweetened chocolate, melted and cooled to tepid 

2 ounces bittersweet or semisweet chocolate, melted and cooled to tepid 

Large pinch of salt 

1/2 tablespoon vanilla extract 

3-4 cups powdered sugar, sifted 

3 fluid ounces (3/8 cup) milk, heated to tepid

Beat butter on medium speed for 1-2 minutes.

Blend in the melted chocolate, salt, vanilla, and 1 cup powdered sugar.

  

Add in the rest of the powdered sugar in three additions, alternating with the milk in two additions (begin and end with the powdered sugar). Add more powdered sugar for heavier (this may be necessary if you want to pipe your frosting) frosting, or more milk for a creamier frosting.  Use the frosting immediately.  If it starts to harden before you're ready to frost, re-whip, adding a small amount of milk if necessary to restore the creamy consistency.

 

Assembly

About 1 cup ground almonds (I like salted)

2-3 tablespoons toasted slivered almonds (toast at 300F for 5-8 minutes)

Raspberries, lightly coated with sugar

Be sure the cake is completely cool before frosting. I always chill my cakes to be safe, you don't want cake layers melting frosting and sliding every which way!).  

Place one cake layer on a serving plate or a cake board, and spread the chocolate raspberry ganache on top, leaving roughly a 1/4" border on the outer edges (the weight of the second layer will make the ganache spread to the edge).  Top with the second cake layer, and chill if you have time (not long, even a half hour would be good if your kitchen is warm; you can assemble the whole thing at once if it's not too hot out).  Cover the entire cake with chocolate frosting.  

Cover the sides of the cake with the ground almonds while the frosting is still smooth and creamy (if you wait too long, the frosting will begin to harden and the nuts won't adhere to the cake).  To cover with nuts, just scoop some nuts up in your hand and gently press in to the cake.  Many many nuts will fall down on to the platter. Just keep scooping them back up and pressing on to the cake until it's covered.  Work quickly, so the frosting doesn't harden.

Pipe chocolate frosting around the edge of the cake if desired.  Scatter the toasted slivered almonds on top, and to with raspberries.  Serve at room temperature.  Enjoy! 

Croquembouche - The Recipe

Photo by Amanda

Sorry to make you wait, here's the recipe for the Croquembouche with the Daring Bakers. As I mentioned, it didn't quite turn out to be the towering beauty I longed for, but after doing it once, I'll do it again - much sooner.  Amanda and I made this for her birthday (along with a raspberry ice cream cake); everyone seemed to have fun disassembling the pyramid.