Opera Cake

Whenever there is a celebration or special occasion in my families, or friends, they seem to always choose this classic cake. But, I sometimes don't want to wait for that special occasion to enjoy the delicate and delicious bite from this cake. I thought it would be nice to enjoy the cake on the weekend. The cake, like everyone might guess, may seem daunting by the look and the process. Fear not, it was pretty simple, and straight forward. The only thing you need is time and patient. That's all!

Recipe adapted from:

Gourmet Magazine, September 2004

Serve 6 To 8

For Almond Sponge Cake

3 tbs cake flour

2 large whole eggs, room temperature

2 large egg whites, room temperature

1 cup almond flour

½ cup confectioner's sugar, sifted after measuring

¹⁄₈ tsp cream of tartar

¹⁄₈ tsp salt

1 tbs granulated sugar

2 tbs unsalted butter, melted-cooled

• Put the oven rack in the middle position, preheat to 425⁰F. Butter a 15-by 10 inch shallow baking pan, then line with the bottom with parchment paper, butter the paper as well. Dust pan with cake flour, knocking out excess. Set aside.

• Beat the whole eggs until triple in volume, about 2 - 3 minutes. Reduce the speed to low, add almond flour and confectioners sugar, mix to combine. Sift the cake flour into the batter and gently fold.

• In another bowl, beat the egg whites until foamy. Add cream of tartar and salt, beat to a soft peak, add granulated sugar, increase the speed to high, continue to beat until stiff peak.

• Fold ⅓ of the whites into almond batter to lighten it, then fold the remaining whites gently. Fold in melted butter, spread the batter evenly into baking pan.

• Bake 10 minutes until golden pale. Cool in a pan for 10 minutes, then loosen the edge with spatula. Transfer the cake with its parchment paper to a cutting board.

• To make a three layers cake, here is how cut the cake: first, cut the cake into half crosswise. Second, cut off 3¼ inch wide strip from the bottom of each half so you have a total of 2 roughly 7 inch squares and 2 roughly 3 by 7 inch rectangles. Put the 2 rectangles to make the square middle cake layer.

For Coffee Syrup

1 tsp instant-espresso powder

½ cup + 1 tbs water

½ cup granulated sugar

¼ cup cognac or other brandy

• Dissolve espresso and 1 tbs water. Set aside.
• Bring sugar and remaining water to a boil, stirring until sugar melted, reduce heat and simmer without stirring until it becomes syrupy. remove from the heat, stir in Cognac and espresso mixture.

For Coffee Buttercream

2 tsp instant-espresso powder

¼ cup + 1 tbs water

6 tbs granulated sugar

2 large egg yolks

1 stick unsalted butter, cut into ½ inch cubes and softened

• Dissolve espresso powder with 1 tablespoon water. Set aside.
• Bring sugar and remaining ¼ cup water to a boil. Stir until sugar dissolve, then continue to boil without stirring until become syrupy and reach 238⁰F.

• While the syrup is boil, beat the egg yolks at medium speed for 1 minute, add hot syrup in a slow stream, add coffee mixture, continue to beat until cool about 3 - 5 minutes. Beat in butter a piece at a time. Continue to beat until thickened and smooth.

For Chocolate Glaze:

6 tbs unsalted butter

7 oz 70% bittersweet chocolate, coarsely chopped

• Melt the chocolate and butter in a double boiler over barely simmering water. Stir until smooth. Remove from the heat, cool at room temperature.

Assemble Cake

• Place 1 sheet of cake on a plate, brush generously with coffee syrup. Spread buttercream evenly. Place the rectangular cakes side by side on top of butter cream, brush with coffee syrup, spread half of the chocolate glaze. Place the last layer of cake, brush with coffee syrup, spread the remaining buttercream evenly. Chill the cake until firm, about 30 minutes.

• Reheat the glaze until warm to the touch about 88⁰F. Pour the glaze over chilled cake and spread evenly. Chill the cake until the glaze is set. Trim the edges with sharp serrated knife .

Tian d'Orange, The Daring Baker Challenge March, 2010

The 2010 March Daring Baker’s challenge was hosted by Jennifer of Chocolate Shavings. She chose Orange Tian as the challenge for this month, a dessert based on a recipe from Alain Ducasse’s Cooking School in Paris.

When I saw the announcement for this month challenge, I immediately checked my Alain Ducasse book. I recall seeing it in the book. I was right, although he didn't write the recipe, there is an explanation, and also the photo how the dessert look like. In his book, he explain what component goes into this dessert. Most component are very familiar among most people, such as; whipped heavy cream (let me know if you don't have any idea what heavy cream is), marmalade (in this case bitter orange marmalade), sweet tart pastry, and caramel-orange syrup. These are not a strange components for the Daring Bakers member, although, many of us perhaps, never really made our own marmalade, right? There you go, the challenge is right there!

I made marmalade using oranges that I harvested from my garden. Not much, but enough to eat for all of us, and some left to make bitter orange marmalade. Nothing beat home made marmalade, and I had to hide some of my marmalade for this challenge, my family are just too greedy for anything that has citrus flavor in it.

Since my blood orange trees are organic, no fertilizer, no pesticide, the fruit are very small, and they are a little challenging to cut them into segments. So, I just peeled them and sliced into round sections. I also was trying to play around, and covered this dessert with chocolate. They were pretty nice too.

Thanks for the challenge Jennifer, this was utterly delicious! For Yvonne and Lis, thank you for creating the most daring baker challenge event!

Pains Aux Raisins (Small Brioches Filled With Pastry Cream and Raisins Or Currants)

Weather is starting to warm up, it's about time to enjoy breakfast in the garden. Last weekend was our first morning sitting outside enjoying this delicious small brioches filled with crème pâttisière and dotted with currants. It was the perfect type of breakfast to welcome the perfect Spring morning. Brioche dough was the night before, then assemble and bake the next morning. Picture your family getting up in the morning with eyes half close, but their nose wide open to smell something delicious is baking in the oven.

Recipe adapted from: Paris Boulangerie Pâtisserie

Linda Dannenberg

For Brioche Dough:

4 cups (500 g) flour

¼ cup (65 g) sugar

1 tbs + 1 tsp (9 g) dry yeast (I used rapid rise highly active yeast, so I can mix it directly into dry ingredients)

5 large eggs, lightly beaten with fork

1 ½ cups (350 g) unsalted butter, cool

¼ cup (60 ml) water

• Place flour, sugar, and yeast to a mixer bowl, mix briefly with your hand or a spoon. Add water and eggs, knead with dough hook attachment for 5 minutes, or until the dough is smooth and elastic. Turn off the machine. Cover the bowl with plastic, and let rest for 1 to 2 hours until double in volume.

• Place the bowl back in the mixer, attach the dough hook.

• Pound butter lightly just to make it slightly malleable, but still quite cool.

• Turn the mixer on over medium speed, then gradually add butter about 2 tablespoon at a time. Mix until just absorbed, then quickly add another butter. Do not over mix or the dough will become warm.

• Transfer the dough into a clean bowl, cover with plastic, then refrigerate overnight.

For Crème Pâtissière:

2 (500 ml) cup milk

½ cup (100 g) sugar

5 large egg yolks

3 tbs flour

3 tbs cornstarch

1 tsp vanilla

• In a sauce pan boil milk and ¼ cup of sugar over medium heat. Meanwhile in another bowl, beat egg yolks and remaining sugar with handheld mixer until pale and ribbony. Turn the mixer off. Sift in flour and cornstarch over the eggs, then fold with rubber spatula. Slowly and gradually pour hot milk into the egg mixture, keep stirring while you do this. Return the mixture back into sauce pan, bring back to a gentle boil. Stirring constantly while you are continue to cook for another minute. Strain this mixture into a bowl, mix in the vanilla. Lay a piece of plastic directly on the cream to prevent skin formation. Cool completely, then refrigerate until needed up to 2 days.

For Rum-Raisins and Rum Glaze:

½ cup (40 g) dried raisins (I substituted with dried currants)

¼ cup (60 ml) dark rum

• In a small bowl, mix raisin or currants and rum, cover with plastic, and soak for several hours, or overnight. When ready to make the pains, drain the raisins, reserve the rum to make the glaze.
• To make rum glaze: mix reserved rum and ½ cup (70 g) confectioners sugar together until form a paste.

Pains Aux Raisins:

• On a lightly floured counter top, roll out brioche dough into 14 inch (35 cm) square, and ¹⁄₈ inch (⅓ cm) thick.

• Spread the crème pâtissière over the dough, scatter the raisins or currants evenly over the crème. Roll the dough into a jelly roll, slice the roll into pieces about 1 inch (2½ cm) thick.

• Lay the pieces flat on a baking sheet lined with parchment paper, make sure to leave enough space in between so they will not stuck together (about 2 inch/5 cm or more apart). Slightly flatten each piece with palm of your hand. Brush the top of each pain with egg wash. Let rise uncover in a draft free place for 1 hour, or until they are double in volume.

• Preheat oven to 400⁰F (220⁰C).

• Brush each pieces once more with egg wash. Bake for 10 to 15 minutes until golden brown. Remove from the oven, cool on a wire rack. Leave the oven on. When the pains have cooled, brush each pain with rum glaze. Arrange the pains back on a baking sheet, return to the oven and bake for a minute or two, just until the sugar is melts and transparent. Remove the baking sheets immediately. Serve warm or at room temperature.

Sending this to Susan for "yeast spotting" event!

Semolina-Citrus Cake

I picked up plenty of citrus on Friday with a few plans in mind, one of them is most definitely preserved lemon. I love preserved lemon, I use it a lot in my cooking. I am not going to post about it, since I've already posted last year in my cooking blog. Over the weekend, I've managed to make, candied citrus peel, yum!, marmalade, which I made with kumquats, Meyer lemon, and blood orange, oh my gosh, oh my gosh, tastes heavenly, I could probably skip lunch and dinner just eating jars of marmalade and bread. I will post my marmalade recipe next week, hopefully.

Anyway, on Saturday morning, I saw Stacey post her experiment about clementine and olive cake. That inspired me! I thought, I am going to make this, but I knew I didn't have light olive oil. And, it's too early to make a trip to grocery store on the weekend. I, somehow like to buy extra virgin, not sure why, maybe something to do with that word, virgin! Didn't want the olive oil to stop me from making it, I made my own version. I decided to make it using mix citrus (Meyer lemon and Cara cara orange) that I picked up on Friday, mix of semolina and almond flour instead of all-purpose flour. I also Inspired by middle eastern sweets that use a lot of orange flower syrup to make it, sometimes even sweeter dessert and moister. I dressed it up, with candied orange segments, pour a bit more syrup on top, then caramelize it with a kitchen torch just for the sake of showing it off to all of you and get your attention. Kidding!!!!, apart from beautiful and more appealing appearance, it is actually add those caramel flavor to it. Anything caramelized, always taste better, agree?

Although this cake tastes superb, citrusy, and probably good to eat on its own, it is a little crumbly and dry. This is why the addition of syrup will do the job of making the cake moist. I also figure out that my cara cara orange was not too juicy. So, I think it really depends on how juicy your citrus are, the end result can be varies, yours might not be dry. Let me know if you decide to make it, and perhaps to perfected the recipe. I am willing to take your suggestion, and try to make it again. Thank you.

Ingredients:

3 medium size organic Meyer lemons, or any lemon

1 large organic Cara cara oranges, or any orange

½ cup canola oil or any vegetable oil

2 large eggs

2 cup semolina flour

1 cup almond meal

½ cup sugar

2 tsp baking powder

pinch of salt

• Preheat oven to 350⁰F. Butter generously a 9 or 11-inch cake pan, coat with a little flour. Tap off the excess. Set aside.
• Wash and dry lemons and oranges, cut into quarter, take out the seeds if any. Place them in a food processor, and process until smooth. You need 1⅓ cup of this puree citrus. Put it in a bowl, add oil and mix. Set aside.
• In another bowl, add semolina, almond meal, baking powder, and salt. Mix lightly using a hand whisk. Set aside.
• Beat eggs and sugar until pale on high speed, lower the speed to low, add the dry ingredients in 3 addition alternating with citrus puree in 2 addition. Beginning and end with dry ingredients. Turn of the machine. My batter look a bit thick and not runny.
• Pour into prepare cake pan. Bake for 30 minutes until tooth pick inserted in the middle comes out clean. While the cake is in the oven make the syrup.
• Take the cake out from the oven, pour the cooled syrup on top. Let it soak for 5 minutes before inverting the cake into a serving plate. To serve, cut into serving pieces, top with candied Cara cara orange segments and a little more syrup. You can caramelized the top with a kitchen torch if you like.

Orange Flower Syrup

1 cup sugar

½ cup water

1 tbs orange flower water

• Bring the water and sugar to a boil on a medium high heat, reduce the heat to low, and cook until it become syrupy. Add orange flower water, stir, and take off the heat. Cool.

Candied Cara cara Orange Segment

5 Cara cara orange, peeled and take out the segment (you can reserve the peel to make candied peel)

1 cup sugar

½ cup water

• Boil sugar and water until become syrupy, add the segments, turn the heat to very low. Simmer for 5 minutes. Let cool at room temperature. Using a fork, transfer the segment into a plate carefully. Reserve the sirup for another use. I actually use it to make candied peel.

Banana, Teff, Buckwheat, and Hazelnut Cupcakes With Mascarpone Cream

It was one of those happy morning, right when I started to open my eyes, I saw the sky was blue and the air felt so fresh. What I felt lately when the weather was grey, suddenly disappeared. Oh, how much I really appreciate what is given to me and to my family.

With a cup of freshly brewed coffee in my hand, I invited my husband to have a morning stroll in our garden, off course our little dog would always follow us too. We walked quietly as of we didn't want to disturb anyone, or any animals. We checked to see if anythings I planted survived the winter. We started to see some of tulips appear from the ground, yellow daffodils open their petals one at a time, some cymbidiums also showing off their flowers, and linaria gracefully dancing under the canopy of olive tree. I must add something about this Linaria, it is not your average dwarf linaria that you see in your local nursery. This linaria (L. Reticulata Flamenco) is tall, the branches that bear those tiny flowers erect from the base up to 26 inches high, which is very unusual. Muscaris, crocus, and galanthus, who know what else yet to be discover, and I will always try to share them with you too.

Now, let's go to the kitchen and bake something, shall we? I thought cupcakes would be good for an afternoon tea to day, plus, I must use my leftover mascarpone that I made for the db's challenge before it goes rancid.

Originally I was going to make this cup cakes, then I found out that I only had half of teff flour that originally needed for the recipe. So, I ended up borrowing the formula, and used what I had in my pantry. This cupcakes were delicious, moist and flavorful to eat just like that without any cream. But, since I still have leftover homemade mascarpone, I thought it would be delicious to serve it with this cream too. To make the cream for this cupcakes, I just whipped my leftover mascarpone with confectioner's sugar and cocoa powder. Apologize in advance that, I don't quite remember the measurement, but you can't hardly go wrong with this combination. If not sweet enough, then add more sugar, if not chocolaty enough, add more cocoa powder. As simple as that!

Oh, one more thing, for those of you who are not familiar with teff flour, you can find more info here. I've known this flour and fall in love with it when I first tasted injeera at the Ethiopian restaurant about, oh gosh, maybe 10 - 15 years ago?. Back then, I had difficulty to find this precious flour, but now you can almost find it in any gourmet store, and even easier to purchase this online. I also never thought of using this flour for cake, I only use it whenever I want to make injeera which I'll share with you one day.

Banana, Teff, Buckwheat, and hazelnut Cupcakes

makes 12 cupcakes and 1 small loaf

Recipe idea from Aran

3 eggs

300 grams bananas, mashed

150 grams canola oil

200 grams sugar

1 tsp vanilla extract

50 grams buckwheat flour

50 grams teff flour

100 grams hazelnut meal, or finely ground hazelnut

15 grams cocoa powder

½ tsp baking soda

½ tsp salt

100 grams chocolate chips

• Preheat oven to 350⁰F. Line the muffin pan with paper cupcake molds. Butter a loaf pan generously. Set aside.
• In a large bowl, add eggs, bananas, canola oil, sugar, and vanilla, mix well with wooden spoon.
• In another bowl, sift together buckwheat, teff, hazelnut meal or finely ground hazelnut, cocoa powder, baking soda, and salt. Add this mixture to the wet ingredients (egg-banana mixture). Fold gently with rubber spatula, add chocolate chip, fold to mix. Divide the batter evenly among cupcake paper mold, pour the leftover onto loaf pan. Bake for 20 minutes. Cool completely.
• Just before serving, whip mascarpone quickly with confectioner's sugar and cocoa powder powder (see my note above) until smooth and spreadable. Spread on each cupcakes and the loaf.

Homemade Mascarpone

474 ml to 500 ml (2 cups) heavy cream

1 tbs lemon juice

• Heat the cream on a low heat until bubble appear a long the edge of the pan. Add the lemon juice, stir until hot (about 190⁰F) and thicken, you are aiming for creme anglaise or almost custard like consistency. Don't worry if seems a bit thinner, it will be thicken in the refrigerator. Take off the heat, let rest for about 20.
• Meanwhile line a sieve with a 4 layers lightly dampen cheesecloths. Place the sieve on top of another bowl, to catch the liquid from the cream. Pour the cream onto the cheesecloth, but don't squeeze or press the cream. The liquid will comes out by itself. Cool completely, then refrigerate overnight, up to 24 hours.

This mascarpone cheese will keep for 3 days in the refrigerator.