It’s the 27th of January. What does that mean, besides the fact that February is right around the corner? It means that it’s time to post about the January Daring Bakers’ Challenge, which was, well, a visually impressive challenge.
I freaking made a cake with hearts on the outside! For Valentine’s Day! And there’s pink! Isn’t that a sight!
Bragging aside, the January 2011 Daring Bakers’ challenge was hosted by Astheroshe of the blog accro. She chose to challenge everyone to make a Biscuit Joconde Imprime to wrap around an Entremets dessert. You should check out the .pdf file of her full instructions, because I’m just going to go over the interesting parts here.
Joconde Sponge Ingredients
¾ cup almond flour
½ cup plus 2 tablespoons powdered sugar
¼ cup cake flour
3 large eggs
3 large egg whites
2½ teaspoons granulated sugar
2 tablespoons melted butter
In a clean mixing bowl whip the egg whites and white granulated sugar to firm, glossy peeks; set aside. Sift together almond flour, confectioner’s sugar, and cake flour, then add the eggs one at a time on medium speed until smooth and light. Fold in one third reserved whipped egg whites to almond mixture to lighten the batter. Fold in remaining whipped egg whites and then fold in melted butter. Set aside.
Then I moved on to make the pink paste that would yield those beautiful hearts on the outside of the dessert.
Joconde-Décor Paste Ingredients
7 tablespoons butter, softened
3/4 cups powdered sugar
3 large egg whites
3/4 cup cake flour
Few drops red food coloring
Cream butter and sugar until light and fluffy, then gradually add egg whites; beat continuously. Fold in sifted flour and tint batter with red food coloring until pink.
Now for the fun part: making that design happen. First, I sketched out lines of hearts on parchment paper cut to fit a 10 inch by 15 inch jelly roll pan.
Then, using a pastry bag and fine piping tip, I filled in the design with my tinted décor paste.
I moved the paper onto the pan and slid it into the freezer for 15 minutes, and then poured about 2/3 of the batter onto the piped design. I poured the remaining batter into a 9 inch springform pan lined with parchment paper to give the final product a cake-like bottom, and baked both at 475ºF for about 10 minutes. I flipped the jelly roll pan over onto parchment paper prepped with powdered sugar, and allowed the cake to cool slightly before peeling back the top layer of parchment paper to reveal my heart design.
Even though the instructions said to bake for 15 minutes, 10 minutes actually slightly overbrowned this. Jessica over at Bake Me Away! noted that the overbaked portions simply look like zebra stripes and I ought to pretend this was the look I was going for.
Right-o.
That aside, I pressed ahead, cutting out the cake into strips 2 inches thick, which I’d sketched out on the parchment paper to ensure that hearts weren’t broken (woka woka woka).
After finishing “the hard part,” I filled the cake with lemon white chocolate mousse.
Yes, I do believe it does. So: Raspberry white chocolate ganache.
Raspberry White Chocolate Ganache Ingredients
12 ounces chopped white chocolate (Callebaut)
¾ cup heavy cream
6 ounces pureed and strained raspberries
Heat cream and white chocolate over low heat until chocolate is just melted, remove from heat and stir smooth. Allow to cool to room temperature, periodically stirring, then add the raspberries. Chill slightly before spreading over lemon white chocolate mousse layer.
Allow entire cake to chill overnight, then impress everybody around with the beautiful design on the outside and the tasty layers inside.
In case you were keeping track, there’s a pound and a half of white chocolate and almost a quart of cream in this thing.
Just a little on the rich side. Best to enjoy small slices. Often.
Have you previously wondered how entrements desserts were made?
How gorgeous! I would have been terrified to attempt this! =D
ReplyDeleteI did hearts for Valentine's Day too! :) I love your flavor combination, the raspberry-white chocolate ganache sounds amazing!
ReplyDeleteLove the hearts, and raspberry & white chocolate is always a winner!
ReplyDeleteWow, what a spectacular dessert! I would have to think more than twice about attempting something like this. The hearts are so perfect for Valentine's Day. Stunning!
ReplyDeleteSmall slices of a rich dessert just means that you get to savor the flavors and eat this for longer! Your hearts are so much fun, and the mouse sounds great. Thank you!!
ReplyDeleteAw! Gorgeous! And you're so very very talented...
ReplyDeleteLove the hearts, so cute. Wow, this filling is rich, but sounds so yummy (as everything that is rich...)
ReplyDeleteWOW those hearts are so so cute and you can never have enough white chocolate in an entremet LOL LOL I love rich dessert this would be perfect well done on this challenge.
ReplyDeleteCheers from Audax in Sydney Australia.
@fitchocoholic We were all a little scared. But what's the worst you can do? Set off your smoke alarm in the process? Because I did that ;).
ReplyDelete@Wilde in the Kitchen And you did yours without the overcooked zebra stripes. Impressive!
ReplyDelete@Debbie Yes, the tart raspberry and sweet white chocolate work well together. And it's a common flavor combination around Valentine's Day!
ReplyDelete@Cathy Thank you so much! You should try it, it's not really that hard, just involved.
ReplyDelete@Ruth H. You are so correct! Though I gave almost all of this away to stop myself from eating too many small slices.
ReplyDelete@Hannah Thank you, thank you...now don't you want to come visit?
ReplyDelete@Renata I simply don't understand people who don't like rich food. You just have to enjoy a small but delightful portion.
ReplyDelete@Audax Thank you Audax!
ReplyDeleteLove the hearts!!
ReplyDelete@The Capitol Baker Thanks! They were fun to pipe out.
ReplyDeleteOh, yummy! All that white chocolate and raspberry look heavenly! Great work! :)
ReplyDeleteHearts and zebra stripes FTW! Good job not breaking any of those hearts. I probably wouldn't have thought of that and would have had a sad cake. Those flavor combos sound amazing!
ReplyDelete@joe and stacy Thanks! I love white chocolate when well-balanced against another flavor (if that isn't obvious).
ReplyDelete@Jessica @ bake me away! I don't think your cake would have been sad. Though it would have lacked zebra stripes because yours was baked properly.
ReplyDelete