Tropical Splendor

We’ve already established that I’m frequently overly ambitious on a rainy Sunday, and sometimes I’m just stupidly excessive.  This cake is the product of one of those stupidly excessive times, or perhaps two of those times, if you count the fact that I put up the mango butter that ended up as cake filling on a similar Sunday about two months earlier.

I’d been thinking for quite a long time about combining cashews and mangoes in a cake, since mangoes and cashews are close botanical relations and natural partners the same way almonds and apricots are. It’s so logical to pair them that I was really rather surprised at the dearth of cake recipes featuring them when I went a-Googling. There seem to be a lot of cashew-mango cheesecake and upside down cake recipes, but I actually rather dislike cheesecake (shocking that there’s cake I don’t like, I know) and wanted a proper layer cake for my Sunday afternoon tea.  Since I couldn’t find what I wanted, I decided to adapt the recipe for almond cake that ended up as my birthday cupcakes last year.

I was, I have to admit, a wee bit apprehensive about how the cake would turn out, given that cashews are higher in fat and waxier than almonds.  I was worried they might behave weirdly in the cake and make it dense or grainy, but it turns out I had no cause for concern.  The cashews melted right into the batter and the baked cake was just as wonderfully tender as it was with almonds.  I even think the extra richness of the cashews might have slightly bumped up the butteriness of the cake, which, as I suspected, went beautifully with the brightness of the mango butter.  To keep things really simple, I iced the cake with a very plain powdered sugar icing with just a hint of lime, and I covered the top with some more roasted, chopped cashews.

I made a huge rectangular cake because I have a largish workplace and have to make sure everyone gets their Monday treat, but you could cut all the quantities in half and make a 9-inch round cake for your tea party. Earl or Lady Grey would work especially well given the citrusy undertones of the mango butter, but any kind of tea should be lovely with this cake.

If you’re in an even more stupidly excessive mood and more inclined to fancy decorating than I ever am, I’d venture to say that this would make quite a lovely and unusual wedding or other special-occasion cake.  You could even go full-bore tropical by incorporating coconut into the buttercream or fondant and surrounding the layers with white or pale yellow orchid blossoms.

Cashew Layer Cake with Mango Butter Filling
(Adapted from Rose Levy Berenbaum, The Cake Bible)
Serves a large party (at least 24)

For the cake:

1 cup roasted unsalted cashews
2 tablespoons granulated sugar

3 ⅓ cups sifted cake flour
2 cups granulated sugar
1 teaspoon baking powder
1 teaspoon baking soda
1 teaspoon fine sea salt
4 large eggs, at room temperature
1 ⅓ cup sour cream, at room temperature
2 teaspoons vanilla extract
24 tablespoons (3 sticks) unsalted butter, softened

For assembly:

2 cups mango butter (see notes)
2 cups powdered sugar
Juice of half a lime
2 tablespoons hot water
1 cup roasted unsalted cashews, coarsely chopped

Preheat oven to 350 F.  Butter a 9 x 13 rectangular cake pan and line the bottom with parchment paper, then re-butter and flour the pan.

In a food processor, pulse 1 cup of cashews with 2 tablespoons sugar until finely ground, but be sure not to process so long it turns into cashew butter.  Measure out ⅔ cup plus 1 tablespoon of the ground cashews and reserve the rest for decorating the cake.

In a large glass measuring cup, whisk together the eggs, vanilla extract, and ⅓ cup of the sour cream.

In the bowl of a standing mixer fitted with the paddle attachment, combine the flour, ⅔ cup plus 1 tablespoon ground cashews, 2 cups sugar, baking powder, baking soda and salt.  Briefly mix on low to blend the dry ingredients.  Add the butter and remaining sour cream and mix on low until combined, then increase the speed to medium and beat for 1 ½ minutes to lighten the batter.  Scrape down the sides and add the egg mixture in 3 additions, scraping the sides and beating for 20 seconds between each one.

Spread the batter evenly in the pan, flattening the top.  Bake for 45-50 minutes, until the top is lightly springy and a toothpick inserted in the middle comes out clean.  Cool in the pan for 10 minutes and then invert onto a rack to cool completely, pulling off the parchment.

Once the cake is cool, split into two layers with a serrated knife. Carefully slide off the top half and spread the exposed lower half evenly with the mango butter.  Replace the top half, making sure the edges line up properly, and smooth out any of the filling that dribbles out the sides.

Whisk the powdered sugar, lime juice and water in a medium bowl until a thick paste forms.  Place the bowl over a saucepan of simmering water and continue whisking until the icing warms up and the sugar has dissolved completely, about 1 minute.  Immediately spread the icing in a smooth layer over the top of the cake, and sprinkle first with the reserved ground cashews and then with the chopped cashews.  Gently press down a bit to cement the cashews into the icing.

Let the cake sit for 15 or so minutes for the icing to firm up, and then slice with a serrated knife to serve, wiping the cake crumbs and mango filling off the knife between cuts for clean slices.

The cake should keep well for about a day at room temperature. To keep it longer, tightly wrap the filled but not iced cake in plastic and refrigerate or freeze, decorating it shortly before serving.

Notes:

To make a normal-sized cake for 8-12, cut all quantities in half and bake the batter in a 9-inch round or springform pan for 35-45 minutes. It could also be divided among lined cupcake tins for about two dozen cupcakes.

If you don’t have pre-roasted cashews, spread 2 cups raw cashews on a cookie sheet and bake at 350 for 10-15 minutes, until evenly dark gold, checking often to avoid burning.  Cool completely before grinding half of it with the 2 tablespoons sugar in the food processor.

I made my own mango butter shortly before I made the hurricane plum jam, because I had half a case of them getting ready to turn when I got back from a weekend trip.  It would be far more sensible for you to use store-bought, but I’d suggest adding about ¼ teaspoon of ground cardamom and the juice of an orange to the butter and gently heating it until the dusty raw cardamom flavor cooks out and the extra liquid evaporates.  If you’re not a mango fan, apricot or peach butter would also go quite nicely with the cashew cake and give you the same pretty color contrast.

In case you’re wondering, the reason to bother with the whole double boiler business with the powdered sugar icing is that it helps it set up quickly.  If you just mixed in the liquid and poured it over the cake, it would flow right down the sides after barely covering the top, not leaving you enough structure to embed the cashews in afterward.  Because it does set up VERY quickly, be sure to have the cashews at hand for pressing into the top when you start to spread the icing. If you don’t want the hassle at all, the cake is still yummy, if slightly less pretty and more mildly cashew-flavored, without the decoration.

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Seeing Red

So one of my coworkers requested I make red velvet cupcakes for my regular Monday-morning office treat, which posed a bit of a dilemma. While I’m not a food nazi, I do try to avoid the patently unnatural, and red velvet cake is defined by the glowing red produced by huge quantities of artificial food coloring.

What to do: compromise my principles, or settle for less-incendiary red from some more natural source?

As much as I like to please my coworkers, the idea of pouring two bottles of blood-red fluid straight from some Frankenfood plant on the New Jersey turnpike weirded me out too much, so I decided to go the natural route. Since research pointed to beets as an accepted coloring agent in the early history of the red velvet cake, and beets are one of my favorite vegetables, that’s what I chose to experiment with.

My first attempt used a Cook’s Country recipe, since despite my continuing annoyance with Kimball for the polenta fiasco, a lot of bloggers had used it with good results. While I agreed that the taste and texture were good, the pretty magenta color of the batter baked out to an extremely generic tan. I got no complaints when I passed them off as Brown Suede cupcakes, but I still wanted to make genuinely red red velvet without resorting to food coloring.

A little more research turned up the cause of the color change and a potential solution. Rose Levy Berenbaum’s most recent cake book has a recipe for red velvet cake, which uses artificial color but includes a note about baking soda neutralizing the natural pigments in beet juice. Her batter, in contrast, is highly acidic, which should preserve the color.

And it did! Although there was a little fading from bright raspberry to dusky pink in the oven, the resulting cupcakes were definitely in the red end of the spectrum. Because it’s an egg-white-only chiffon batter, it was considerably drier than the conventional Cook’s Country one, but a thick coating of cream cheese frosting mostly took care of it.

I won’t call these the best cupcakes I’ve ever posted here, but they’re perfectly respectable and they are a legitimately non-toxic red. And no, they really don’t taste like beet, I swear. They taste mildly of cocoa and of the cream cheese frosting, which, besides the inflammatory color, is what I understand the whole point of red velvet to be.

Non-Radioactive Red Velvet Cupcakes
(Adapted from Rose Red Velvet Cake in Rose Levy Berenbaum’s Rose’s Heavenly Cakes)
Makes 24 cupcakes

For the cake:

1 large beet, peeled
3 large egg whites, at room temperature
1 1/2 teaspoons vanilla extract
2 cups minus 2 tablespoons cake flour
1 cup granulated sugar
3 teaspoons baking powder
2 tablespoons natural cocoa powder, sifted
1/2 teaspoon salt
1/4 cup grapeseed or canola oil
4 tablespoons (1/2 stick) unsalted butter, at room temperature
1/2 cup buttermilk

For the frosting:

8 ounces cream cheese, softened
8 tablespoons (1 stick) unsalted butter, softened
1 tablespoon creme fraiche or sour cream
Pinch of salt
1 cup powdered sugar
1/2 teaspoon vanilla extract

Set the rack to the lower-third position and preheat the oven to 350 F. Line two muffin tins with paper liners.

Run the beet through a juicer. Skim off any foam, and measure out 2 tablespoons of the juice. Whisk the beet juice and vanilla into the egg whites just until the color is evenly distributed.

Whisk together the flour, sugar, baking powder, cocoa and salt in a medium bowl.

Mix the oil and butter together in a stand mixer fitted with the paddle attachment for 1 minute on medium speed. Add the flour and buttermilk, and mix on low until the dry ingredients are moistened, then increase the speed to medium and beat 1 1/2 minutes longer. Scrape down the bowl and add the egg mixture in two parts, beating 30 seconds on medium speed after each addition.

Using an ice cream scoop, evenly divide the batter among the cups. Bake for 16-18 minutes, until the tops spring back when pressed lightly. Cool for a few minutes in the tins, then turn out onto a wire rack to cool completely.

While the cupcakes are cooling, combine the cream cheese, butter, creme fraiche and salt in a food processor and pulse until smooth. Add the sugar and vanilla and keep pulsing until evenly incorporated. Spread the cupcakes with this frosting once they’ve cooled.

Notes:

If you’re less gunshy about fake food coloring than I am, you can replace the beet juice with the same amount of liquid red food color to get a really bright red cake, but if you’re going to do that, I’d go with the moister, richer Cook’s Country version.

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What Makes a House a Home, Part 2

As much as I was itching to, it took a while for me to be able to bake again.  While we did ship some particularly loved or difficult-to-replace equipment, there was so much that was too heavy or bulky that it wasn’t worth it, and a lot of demands were further up the priority chain than finding a restaurant supply store so I could fill in the gaps.

As soon as I got home from stocking up on baking sheets, cake pans, cooling racks and pie pans, I immediately had to throw together something to fill the house with the aroma of vanilla, butter and sugar.  The pantry is still pretty spartan, a state I may even try to maintain deliberately to combat the pack-rat tendencies that necessitated all the tossing just a few weeks ago.  In looking at the basics I did have and considering what could be quickly made from them, I fell back on Chlotilde’s nearly-instantaneous yogurt cake.

Since we had a nearly-full container of it, I substituted sour cream for the yogurt, and while I was at it, I threw in a few small bars of chocolate from the vestiges of the strategic chocolate reserve.

What, you thought the reserve had gone the way of the rest of the pantry dregs?  Ah, no, my little chickadees.  That is not the way we roll chez Disdain.  What was left was swept into a cooler with the biscotti, some honeycrisp apples and a couple of other snacks and stashed behind the driver’s seat for the trip.  Not only is chocolate never, ever, ever to be thrown out, but we had to be prepared if, god forbid, we got stuck in South Dakota or something.  And we did!  Circumstances were not nearly dire enough to necessitate draining the supply, but still!  They could have been!

Anyway, less than an hour after scraping the batter into my brand-new pan and popping it into the oven, I was cutting into a fragrant, buttery, chocolate-flecked symbol of home. Made with sour cream, the cake lacks the whisper of sourness yogurt imparts and offers nothing but elegant, melting richness.  It undoubtedly destroyed what little health value might have been residual in the original cake, but I think I like the end product made with sour cream even better.

Whether you have an empty new house or last-minute guests, this is instant grace.

Sour Cream Cake with Chocolate Chunks
(Adapted significantly from Chlotilde’s Yogurt Cake)
Serves 6-8

2 cups all purpose flour
1 1/2 teaspoons baking powder
1/2 teaspoon baking soda
1/8 teaspoon salt
2 eggs
1 cup sour cream
1 cup granulated sugar
1/3 cup canola oil
1 tablespoon vanilla paste or extract
3 ounces dark chocolate, chopped

Preheat the oven to 350 F.  Line the bottom of a 9- or 10-inch cake pan with parchment paper or non-stick foil, greasing the sides.

In a medium bowl, whisk together the flour, baking powder, baking soda and salt.

In a large bowl, combine the eggs, sour cream, sugar, oil and vanilla.  Add the dry ingredients to the liquid mixture, stirring until it just comes together.  Gently fold in the chocolate.

Scrape into the prepared pan and bake for 30-35 minutes, until the top is golden and springy, and a tester comes out clean. Transfer to a rack to cool.

Notes:

A 10-inch pan is ideal since it will produce a less domed top, but 9-inch is what I have.

I see no reason you couldn’t use light sour cream if you wanted to make this just a wee bit less decadent.  Conversely, you could bump up the proportion of chocolate, but I actually think this relatively spare amount was just right.

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