Strawberry Cardamom Sour Cream Upside-Down Cake

Well, it certainly has been a while since I last posted here. Turns out having a job and taking a class at the same time is a lot of work. I've been taking a b&w film photography class this summer. At first I was a bit confused as to why film photo is a pre-req for digital photo, but the class is actually very interesting. Contrary to everyones expectations, I did not take pictures of food, because food in black and white is just not particularly exciting. So I have been exploring the bay area / my house in search of situations to take pictures of.

(Creepy?) Handbags in Half Moon Bay

Dragonfly

California + Bikes

Public Transit

Donner Lake

That last picture somehow became brown when I took a picture of it, probably because the white balance on my digital camera was off. I think it fits the landscape well though.

But anyways, back to food.

Mmmm strawberries

Strawberries are good, right? And sour cream is pretty good with strawberries. And cardamom is just plain delicious. (While making this cake I discovered that chewing a cardamom seed is very refreshing.)

Mmmm cardamom

Joy from Joythebaker is a genius and combined these three flavors into a cake. The super thick batter is spread on top of sliced strawberries that are sitting in some butter and brown sugar. I decreased the amount of sugar from Joy's recipe because my strawberries were sweet enough for my taste. (And of course I doubled the number of strawberries!)

Also, if you look at her post, she somehow manages to keep her strawberries bright red, while mine went to a dull purple. I'm guessing that adding some lemon juice to the strawberries before baking might help prevent discoloration. 

Ugly but delicious. I'm sure your cake will be beautiful and delicious!

Anyways, recipe time!

But first some sliced strawberries

Ingredients:

     For the strawberries:

• 2 tbsp butter
• 2 tbsp brown sugar
• 2 cups sliced strawberries
• 1 tbsp lemon juice (opt, may preserve color) 

     For the cake:

• 6 tbsp butter, soft
• 1/2 cup brown sugar
• 1 egg
• 1 tsp vanilla extract
• 1 1/3 cup all-purpose flour
• 1 tsp baking powder
• 1/4 tsp baking soda
• 1/4 tsp salt
• 1/4 tsp ground cardamom
• 2/3 cup sour cream

Procedure:

1. Preheat oven to 350F.
2. Mix strawberries with lemon juice (if using.)
3. Put the 2 tbsp of butter in a 9" round cake pan and place in the oven until melted.
4. Rotate pan to coat all sides with butter, sprinkle the 2 tbsp brown sugar into the bottom of the pan.
5. In a medium bowl, stir together flour, baking powder + soda, salt.
6. In a large bowl cream together the butter and 1/2 cup brown sugar.
7. When butter is fluffy, add egg and vanilla, and beat until well combined.
8. Beat in dry ingredients and sour cream, batter will be very thick. 
9. Spread strawberries on bottom of pan.
10. Spoon batter over strawberries and spread evenly.



Spread it out more evenly than this

11. Bake for about 35 minutes.
12. When cake is cooked, run a knife along the edge of the cake and then invert over a plate. If the cake sticks to the pan, leave the pan upside-down over the plate and go read a book or check your email. After ~5 minutes, the cake will have unstuck from the pan (Yay gravity!)
13. Serve with a spoonful of sour cream

I brought this cake to a friend's house and it was gone in 5 minutes. Granted, there were three tall and skinny runner guys participating, so it wasn't particularly surprising. 

Gâteau au Yaourt: Yogurt Cake

This is a cake that my family has been making for a long time; I think we got the recipe from some of my cousins. It is a very simple and customizable snack cake that uses yogurt as a flavor base but doesn't actually taste like yogurt. The original recipe has all the measurements (except the eggs) based on the size of a pot of yogurt. Unfortunately, yogurt pots in France are smaller than in the US (they contain 150g of yogurt instead of 170g.) To make this recipe in the US, I find a glass that holds a bit less than a cup of water and use that as my measurement tool.
Once you have made the batter, you can pretty much add whatever flavor you want. The cake in the photo has chocolate chips and unsweetened coconut flakes, but I have also had success with pears, nutella  (mix nutella into some of the batter and swirl that into the rest of the batter,) dried fruit, etc. You could could probably make this a savory cake by removing most of the sugar and putting cheese or bacon or herbs in.
And to prove how easy this recipe is, I was able to make it in the kitchen of my college dorm with my bf.

Gâteau au Yaourt:

Ingredients

• 3 eggs (separated)
• 1.5 pots sugar
• 1 pot yogurt
• 0.5 pots oil or 60g butter
• 1 tsp vanilla
• 3 pots flour
• 0.5 tsp baking soda
• 0.5 tsp salt
• up to 1.5 cups filling (ie 1 cup chocolate chips + 0.5 cup unsweetened coconut)

Instructions

1. Preheat an oven to 350F.
2. Beat yolks with sugar until thick and white.
3. Add egg whites, yogurt, oil, and vanilla, still beating.
4. Add remaining ingredients (flour, baking soda, salt) but not the filling. Mix by hand.
5. Stir in the filling gently.
6. Grease a cake pan or loaf pan and pour in the batter.
7. Bake for 40 (cake pan) to 50 (loaf pan) minutes
8. Enjoy on a picnic or as a snack or casual dessert! You can serve it with greek yogurt and berries or dress it up with whipped cream.

Some Crust Cupcakes at the Library!

Raspberry-Lemon Cupcake

In Claremont there is a bakery called "Some Crust." It makes killer egg sliders with rosemary bread, a fried egg, and your choice of cheese, vegetable, and sauce. I had one with provolone, bell pepper, and pesto, and it was simply delicious. I also bought a loaf of bread from the bakery ("Rosemary French,") that had good flavor but a disappointingly (and ironically) tough crust.

But, as the title of this post implies, Some Crust also makes cupcakes. Beautiful cupcakes. And these cupcakes are even more beautiful because, as I discovered on Saturday, they are sold in the library, where I can use my "flex" dollars instead of actual cash.

Chocolate cupcake

These cupcakes delicious because instead of reserving the frosting for the top, Some Crust also swirls frosting into the cake base!

Strawberry Shortcake (and longcake)

Yesterday I met up with my friend E to make some strawberry shortcakes. This was, however, not just a whim. This meet up had been "in the planning" ever since we sat next to each other during the sophomore year STAR test and passed each other drawings of long and tall strawberry shortcakes:

tall strawberry shortcake (strawberry tallcake)

tall shortcake with radioactive shortcake, radioactive mushroom, and  one-legged turkey

long strawberry shortcake (or strawberry longcake)

eating shortcake

giant strawberry+apartment building 

I'm not really sure what was going through our minds at that point, but apparently the STAR tests made us hungry. But anyways, that was when we decided to make strawberry shortcake together. We met up about a year ago with a recipe from Cook's Illustrated to do it, but we accidentally put way too much baking soda into the shortcakes and they tasted horribly metallic. So we met again yesterday (3 days before I leave for college) to wrap up the emptiness of the failed strawberry shortcake. E found a biscuit recipe on Joy of Baking and I got some strawberries and cream and we got down to it.

This time we did not mix up our leaveners and the biscuits were flaky and buttery.

We sliced up the strawberries and let them macerate in their own juice with a teaspoon of sugar, and we added some sugar and vanilla to the hand-whipped cream. (The electric mixer was European and we couldn't find a transformer.)

When the biscuits were cooked, we simply sliced them in half and layered strawberries and whipped cream. The shortcakes were delicious and everyone had seconds (and/or thirds).

To keep with tradition, we made one long biscuit to make a strawberry longcake.

Note: From what I understand shortcakes are called shortcakes because they contain fat (unlike bread) and so do not develop as much gluten which makes them crumbly (they have "short" fibers).

Chocolate cake: A scientific method

I am in France right now! But before I blog about that, I will tell you about my attempts to make a near perfect chocolate cake.

A few weeks ago, a friend asked me to bake a cake for another friend's surprise birthday/goodbye party. A commission of sorts! How honoring and surprising! I was told that the recipient like chocolate cake, and the theme of the party was Pink Lemonade (pink and yellow), so I was a bit stumped on how to combine them. I personally am not a fan of lemon and chocolate (I am actually not a fan of any lemon desserts), so I figured I could just add pink and yellow food coloring in a couple places. Unfortunately, chocolate cake is not very easy to color... I considered red velvet, but the one time I tried to make red velvet cupcakes, they did not turn out well at all. And by at all, I mean at all. As I only had 1.5 weeks to prepare, I wanted to stay on the safe side.

But how to add color to a chocolate cake? White chocolate frosting.

I began with the base of the cake. I wanted the base to be good, not just sweet and fluffy, so I gathered a couple recipes. I decided to try two of them: a relatively simple recipe from Scharffen-Berger (that I had made before here) and a more complicated recipe from Cook's Illustrated (which was surprisingly available on their website while I was making the cake, but is now only available to subscribers here). I made half of each recipe to get one layer of each.

For the frosting I turned to one of my favorite cookbooks: I Want Chocolate! by Trish Deseine. I made half of her recipe for Easy Chocolate Ganache, substituting white chocolate for dark. If I remember correctly, it used about 3/4 cup for 8oz of chocolate. This turned out to be a bit to liquid for my purposes, so I had to almost freeze my ganache for it to be thick enough. I often find frosting to be too rich, so I wanted to test two different ganaches, a heavier one (just cream and chocolate) and a lighter one (cream, chocolate and whipped cream). So I made both and colored the heavier one yellow and the lighter one pink.

Then I assembled my test cake. On the bottom I put my layer of simple cake,

 then I spread some heavier frosting,

 put the complicated cake,

and spread the lighter frosting. I did not have enough lighter frosting to cover the entire cake, so it ended up looking pretty ugly. That's why I had a test cake!

Then I had my parents test the cake. I did not tell them which layer corresponded to which cake (because that would have biased the data. I should have made two half cakes, one with the layers in the opposite order, for less bias, but I was worried that would not be stable).

Results: First, the top layer is lighter colored. However, it was also found to be more strongly chocolatey, as well as more tender and lighter than the bottom layer. The bottom layer was not found to have any redeeming qualities in comparison with the top layer. Fortunately for me, the choice was easy. Unfortunately, the chosen cake was the more complicated recipe.

As for the frosting, I decided that I liked having the two types, but that I should switch their positions.

Making the final cake:

I had originally planed to have a second practice cake, but I was out of time, so I went directly to the final cake. I made the full Cook's Illustrated recipe for the base and made ganache with 12oz of white chocolate and 3/4 cup of cream. I put the lighter frosting in between the cake layers and tried to spread the thicker frosting on top. However, the thicker ganache was now too thick to spread easily, and cake crumbs got mixed into the frosting, ruining the smooth finish:

To solve this, I made another batch of ganache using 8oz of white chocolate and spread it on top of the previous layer of frosting. For decoration, I had made letters and shapes with colored melted white chocolate:

The cake was a success, my friends really liked it!

A note: for all of this, I used white chocolate bars. I strongly recommend NOT using so called "White Chips" as these contain absolutely no cocoa butter and have a very different texture when melted.

Raspberry Cupcakes with Chocolate-Orange Ganache

As the school year is ending (I had my last day of High School last Friday!) we had a good-bye party for a teacher who is leaving the country, so I decided to bring cupcakes! I have just recently been introduced to Sprinkles cupcakes, and there are really quite good (especially when they are free!!), so I was inspired to continue the cupcake trend.

I went to Joy the Baker's blog and found a tasty looking recipe for raspberry almond cupcakes with chocolate ganache, and I decided to make it. I gathered all my ingredients and started measuring and mixing, but when I opened my bottle of almond extract, it was empty! All of the extract must have had evaporated over the many years we have had that bottle. So, I replaced the almond extract with 1/2 tsp of vanilla extract and 1 tsp of orange flower water. Unfortunately, the orange flower water did not come out much at all in the final cupcakes, so next time I will put more in. In an attempt to bring out the orange flavor, I added some orange zest to the chocolate ganache, and it was delicious!

I made mini cupcakes instead of full sized ones, using a mini muffin pan and filling a regular pan 1/3 of the way. I also boosted the raspberries, going from the original 1/3c to 1/2c or more. The cupcakes were not soggy at all.

Raspberry Cupcakes with Chocolate-Orange Ganache (basically copied from raspberry almond cupcakes with chocolate ganache with a few variations)

Batter (makes 12 cupcakes)

• 1 cup all-purpose flour
• 1 1/2 teaspoons baking powder
• 1/8 teaspoon salt
• 5 Tablespoons unsalted butter, softened
• 1/2 cup sugar
• 1 large egg
• 1/2 tsp vanilla extract
• 1 1/2 tsp orange flower water
• 1/2 cup milk
• 1/2 cup fresh or frozen raspberries, roughly chopped

1. Put a rack in the middle of the oen and preheat oven to 350 degrees F. Line muffin cups with paper liners.
2. Sift together flour, baking powder and salt inside a bowl.
3. Beat together butter and sugar in a large bowl with an electric mixer at medium-high speed until pale and fluffy, about 3 minutes.
4. Beat in egg and almond extract.
5. Reduce speed to low and add flour mixture and milk alternately in 3 batches, beginning and ending with the flour mixture and beating just until incorporated.
6. Fold in the raspberries.
7. Divide the batter among lined muffin cups. Bake until pale golden and a wooden pick inserted in the center of a cupcake comes out clean, about 20 minutes. Turn cupcakes out onto a rack to cool completely.
8. Spread frosting on cupcakes once cooled.

Chocolate-Orange Ganache

• 3/4 cup mini semisweet chocolate chips
• 1/4 cup heavy cream or 2 tbsp milk
• 1 tsp orange zest

1. Microwave the chocolate with the cream on low until the chocolate is partially melted.
2. Stir until all of the chocolate is melted.
3. If frosting is too loose to spread, let it sit at room temperature for 10 to 30 minutes, stirring occasionally, frosting will continue to thicken as it stands.

Hazelnut Chocolate Cake

Ok, well, I didn't make it. My mom did! For my birthday! Isn't that nice?

This is pretty much one of my favorite cakes out there. It's like nutella, but better, and in a cake. More hazelnutty too.

I love this cake because it is quite light and airy for a nut cake, and the flavor combination is delicious. Make sure you use good hazelnuts though, rancidity is just not very tasty...

This is a french recipe from Elle magazine, so it is in grams. Just get yourself a balance and be happy I translated the instruction for you.

Hazelnut Chocolate Cake

Ingredients:

• 200g shelled hazelnuts
• 3 eggs
• 150g sugar
• 20g flour
• 60g melted butter
• 50g chocolate chips

Method:

1. Pre-heat the oven to 180C (350F.)
2. Butter a 9in diameter round cake pan.
3. Using a food processor, grind the hazelnuts to a coarse sand-like texture.
4. Separate the whites from the yolks and beat them into stiff peaks.
5. In a medium-large bowl combine the sugar with the egg yolks and beat until pale and mousse like. (about 3 minutes with an electric mixer)
6. Slowly, still mixing, add in the flour.
7. Add the melted butter, mix it in, then add the hazelnuts.
8. Gently fold in the beaten egg whites.
9. Fold in the chocolate chips.
10. Pour the batter in the buttered pan and bake for about 35-40 minutes, or until golden.
11. Let it rest 10 minutes out of the oven before un-molding
12. Enjoy! You can decorate with a thin dusting of confectioner's sugar if you like.

Yummy chocolate cake!

Last weekend I threw my friend a surprise birthday party, and we made a chocolate cake! The cake was delicious, and it was also my first layer cake with frosting and all that. The recipe was pretty easy, but with a strange ingredient...

I made one change: I replaced the milk with soy milk for my other friend who is allergic to milk. The soy milk left no aftertaste. We were going to halve the recipe, but I accidentally added the full volume of water, so then we just completed he recipe to make the entire cake.
This brings me to the strange ingredient: 1 cup of boiling water. I was surprised when I first saw, but then I noticed that quite a few other recipes for chocolate cake also use boiling water. I am going to try to find out why.

I found this recipe in Sharffen-Berger's Essence of Chocolate "That Chocolate Cake" (the first recipe), and it is also online, but I pasted it in here to facilitate your life

Here is the recipe, copied straight from Sharffen Berger (with my comments in [brackets])

Ingredients:

Cake

• Unsalted butter and flour for pans
• 2 cups granulated sugar
• 1-3/4 cups all-purpose flour
• ¾ cup Scharffen Berger unsweetened natural cocoa powder [really, any brand works, just make sure it's unsweetened]
• 1 teaspoon salt
• 1-1/2 teaspoons baking powder
• 1-1/2 teaspoons baking soda
• 2 large eggs, lightly beaten
• ½ cup canola oil
• 1 cup whole milk
• 1 cup boiling water

Frosting

• 1-1/4 cups granulated sugar
• 1 cup heavy cream
• 5 ounces Scharffen Berger 99% Cacao Unsweetened chocolate, finely chopped [Once again, any brand. I used 100% from Ghirardelli]
  
• 8 tablespoons (4 ounces) unsalted butter, cut into ½-inch pieces
• 1 teaspoon pure vanilla extract

Method

For the Cake:

Position a rack in the center of the oven and preheat the oven to 350 degrees F. Lightly butter the bottom of two 9-inch round cake pans. Line the bottom with parchment paper, then butter and flour the parchment and the sides of the pans.

In the bowl of a stand mixer fitted with the paddle attachment, combine the sugar, flour, cocoa, salt, baking powder, and baking soda, mixing on low speed. Min in the eggs, oil, and milk.

Increase the speed to medium and beat for 2 minutes. Reduce the speed to low and mix in the water. The batter will be soupy.

Divide the batter evenly between the cake pans. Bake for 30 to 35 minutes, or until a skewer inserted in the center comes out clean. [I baked them 25 minutes in a convection oven]

Remove from the oven and cool on a cooling rack for 5 minutes, then turn the layers out onto the rack and cool completely.

When the cakes have cooled, check the frosting. It should have the consistency of mayonnaise. If it is still too thin, allow it to cool longer. [See, I didn't read the last instruction and didn't wait long enough]

For the Frosting:

In a small saucepan, combine the sugar and cream and bring to a boil over medium heat, stirring occasionally. Reduce the heat and simmer for 6 minutes. Add the chocolate and butter and stir until melted. Pour into a bowl and stir in the vanilla. [If the frosting starts curdling like mine, just beat it continuously for a few minutes. When it cools it will be normal again.]

To Frost the Cake:

[it will be a lot easier to frost the cake if you let the frosting cool one hour before hand]

Place one cake layer on a serving plate. Spread the frosting with a hot palette knife or icing spatula to give the frosting a beautiful shine. Run the knife under hot tap water and dry with a towel. Spread about ¾ cup of the frosting over the top of the first layer. Top with the second layer. Spread the remaining frosting over the top and sides of the cake, heating the knife again as necessary.

Serves 8 to 10

Note: The cake was soft and fluffy when fresh, and after three days in the refrigerator it was denser and more intense. You choose.
Also, if the cake is fresh, I recommend slicing it with a serrated bread knife, it will tear the cakeless.

Picture time!


Frosting!

Playing with fire!

A slice!