Toby's early birthday
Obviously, Toby, don't read this. Yet. :D
I have been making Strawberry Stack Cake for Toby, since his birthday is in a week, and he was gone to Dallas for most of the day for the RPG he's in. He loves key lime pie and strawberries, so I try to do something that incoriprates one or the other for his birthday, since I'm not that fond of either.
When I saw this cake come through the America's Test Kitchen blog last week, I knew I'd found this year's birthday cake. Loaded with TWO AND A HALF POUNDS of strawberries, cooked into a jamlike state and spread between thin sheets of cake, then allowed to sit overnight so that the cake becomes soaked with strawberry juices, but is still coherent enough to slice. I shall probably eat a tiny bit with him, but the majority of the cake is aaaall his, as that's too damn much strawberry for me.
I may have to see if it freezes well. XD
It took all. freakin. afternoon. to cook, as you ahve to do the jam first, then chill it, then make the cake dough (it's stiffer than batter), and then chill it, then pat the dough out into rounds for the cake layers, then bake them flat, on separate cookie sheets. And then cool them completely and assemble the layers, THEN wrap it all up in plastic wrap and shove it in the fridge for at least 8 hours. At least I know Toby will appreciate it, and appreciate even more than I washed the dishes afterward and didn't stick him with them! (well, hey, our deal is usually that whoever cooks doesn't have to clean!)
Anyway, it's now sitting in the fridge wrapped in plastic, marinating in its own berry juices until tomorrow, when we'll be able to dig in.
----
The recipe, in case it's gone by the time you click on the link in that post (it was up today, Saturday, when I checked, but it was supposed to come down on the 25th):
Strawberry Stack Cake
From Cook's Country
June/July 2010
Why this recipe works:
This traditional Appalachian Strawberry Stack Cake recipe combines thin, spiced molasses rounds with stewed dried apples. We decided to swap strawberries for the apples in an attempt to update it. We found that using cream cheese in the dough added a gentle tang and held up to the moist strawberry filling. Forming the cake rounds on a baking sheet instead of rolling them out individually drastically cut down on prep time. We found that cooking the strawberries to a jamlike consistency helped keep the cake moist without it becoming a soggy mess.
Serves 12
Total time:
You can substitute frozen berries for the fresh. Our favorite rimmed baking sheet is 18 by 13 inches, which allows you to bake 2 cake layers at a time. If using a smaller baking sheet, you’ll need to bake 1 layer per sheet. Let the sheet cool completely between baking layers. [I bolded that because it's important! Otherwise the dough will end up spreading too far and becoming too thin as it bakes--![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
telophase]
Ingredients
FILLING
2 1/2 pounds fresh strawberries (see note), hulled and halved
1/2 cup granulated sugar
2 tablespoons lemon juice
Pinch salt
CAKE
5 cups all-purpose flour
1 teaspoon baking powder
1 teaspoon baking soda
1/2 teaspoon salt
1/4 cup buttermilk
2 teaspoons vanilla extract
8 tablespoons (1 stick) unsalted butter, softened
4 ounces cream cheese, softened
2 1/2 cups granulated sugar
2 large eggs
2 tablespoons confectioners' sugar
Instructions
1. COOK BERRIES Bring strawberries, sugar, lemon juice, and salt to simmer in large saucepan over medium heat. Mash strawberries with potato masher and cook until thick and jamlike, about 30 minutes (mixture should measure 2¾ cups). Transfer to shallow dish and refrigerate until cool, about 30 minutes.
2. MAKE DOUGH Adjust oven racks to upper-middle and lower-middle positions and heat oven to 350 degrees. Whisk flour, baking powder, baking soda, and salt in bowl. Combine buttermilk and vanilla in measuring cup. With electric mixer on medium-high speed, beat butter, cream cheese, and granulated sugar until light and fluffy, about 2 minutes. Beat in eggs, 1 at a time, until combined, then buttermilk mixture. Reduce speed to low and add flour mixture gradually until combined.
3. SHAPE ROUNDS Divide dough into 6 equal pieces. Pat each into 5-inch disk, wrap in plastic, and refrigerate until firm, about 30 minutes. Meanwhile, cut six 9-inch parchment rounds. Following photos 1 to 3 at left, line 8-inch round cake pan with parchment round and press chilled dough disk into bottom of lined pan. Transfer round to rimmed baking sheet. Repeat, placing second round ½ inch apart. Repeat with 2 additional disks on second rimmed baking sheet. Bake until just golden around edges, 16 to 20 minutes, switching and rotating sheets halfway through baking. Cool 10 minutes on sheets, then transfer to counter to cool completely. Repeat with remaining dough.
4. ASSEMBLE Place 1 cooled cake round on serving platter. Spread ½ cup cooled berry mixture over cake, leaving ½-inch border uncovered, then top with another round. Repeat with remaining berry mixture and cake rounds, finishing with cake. Cover with plastic wrap and refrigerate until cake has softened, at least 8 hours or up to 3 days. Dust with confectioners’ sugar and serve.
MAKE AHEAD: Both berry mixture and cake rounds can be frozen for 1 month. Freeze cooked and cooled berry mixture in airtight container. Wrap individual cake rounds in plastic and foil. Bring all components to room temperature before assembling.
[These next bits are missing the photos of the process (they're in the blog post I linked to), but you don't really need to see them. Just know that the cake dough rounds are fairly thin, and will expand from 8" to about 9" in diameter during baking, so leave a little space between the rounds on the baking sheet.--telophase)
Press-in-the-Pan Cake Rounds
Instead of laboriously rolling out half a dozen layers, we divide the dough into six equal pieces and use an easy pat-in-the-pan method.
1. Position a 9-inch parchment round over an 8-inch pan, pressing the paper snugly into the pan edges.
2. Using lightly floured hands to prevent sticking, press a dough disk evenly over the parchment round.
3. Lift the parchment to transfer the rounds to a baking sheet. Two rounds should fit on a large baking sheet.
Stack the Odds in Your Favor
Replacing the thick dried-apple filling traditionally used for stack cake with juicy fresh strawberries wreaked havoc. Simply pureed, the fresh berries turned the cake to mush. Cooked until thick and jammy, they concentrated their juices for a moist, but not wet, cake.
SOGGY CAKE Uncooked berries were too wet.
SLICEABLE CAKE Cooked berries were perfect.
I have been making Strawberry Stack Cake for Toby, since his birthday is in a week, and he was gone to Dallas for most of the day for the RPG he's in. He loves key lime pie and strawberries, so I try to do something that incoriprates one or the other for his birthday, since I'm not that fond of either.
When I saw this cake come through the America's Test Kitchen blog last week, I knew I'd found this year's birthday cake. Loaded with TWO AND A HALF POUNDS of strawberries, cooked into a jamlike state and spread between thin sheets of cake, then allowed to sit overnight so that the cake becomes soaked with strawberry juices, but is still coherent enough to slice. I shall probably eat a tiny bit with him, but the majority of the cake is aaaall his, as that's too damn much strawberry for me.
I may have to see if it freezes well. XD
It took all. freakin. afternoon. to cook, as you ahve to do the jam first, then chill it, then make the cake dough (it's stiffer than batter), and then chill it, then pat the dough out into rounds for the cake layers, then bake them flat, on separate cookie sheets. And then cool them completely and assemble the layers, THEN wrap it all up in plastic wrap and shove it in the fridge for at least 8 hours. At least I know Toby will appreciate it, and appreciate even more than I washed the dishes afterward and didn't stick him with them! (well, hey, our deal is usually that whoever cooks doesn't have to clean!)
Anyway, it's now sitting in the fridge wrapped in plastic, marinating in its own berry juices until tomorrow, when we'll be able to dig in.
----
The recipe, in case it's gone by the time you click on the link in that post (it was up today, Saturday, when I checked, but it was supposed to come down on the 25th):
Strawberry Stack Cake
From Cook's Country
June/July 2010
Why this recipe works:
This traditional Appalachian Strawberry Stack Cake recipe combines thin, spiced molasses rounds with stewed dried apples. We decided to swap strawberries for the apples in an attempt to update it. We found that using cream cheese in the dough added a gentle tang and held up to the moist strawberry filling. Forming the cake rounds on a baking sheet instead of rolling them out individually drastically cut down on prep time. We found that cooking the strawberries to a jamlike consistency helped keep the cake moist without it becoming a soggy mess.
Serves 12
Total time:
You can substitute frozen berries for the fresh. Our favorite rimmed baking sheet is 18 by 13 inches, which allows you to bake 2 cake layers at a time. If using a smaller baking sheet, you’ll need to bake 1 layer per sheet. Let the sheet cool completely between baking layers. [I bolded that because it's important! Otherwise the dough will end up spreading too far and becoming too thin as it bakes--
telophase]Ingredients
FILLING
2 1/2 pounds fresh strawberries (see note), hulled and halved
1/2 cup granulated sugar
2 tablespoons lemon juice
Pinch salt
CAKE
5 cups all-purpose flour
1 teaspoon baking powder
1 teaspoon baking soda
1/2 teaspoon salt
1/4 cup buttermilk
2 teaspoons vanilla extract
8 tablespoons (1 stick) unsalted butter, softened
4 ounces cream cheese, softened
2 1/2 cups granulated sugar
2 large eggs
2 tablespoons confectioners' sugar
Instructions
1. COOK BERRIES Bring strawberries, sugar, lemon juice, and salt to simmer in large saucepan over medium heat. Mash strawberries with potato masher and cook until thick and jamlike, about 30 minutes (mixture should measure 2¾ cups). Transfer to shallow dish and refrigerate until cool, about 30 minutes.
2. MAKE DOUGH Adjust oven racks to upper-middle and lower-middle positions and heat oven to 350 degrees. Whisk flour, baking powder, baking soda, and salt in bowl. Combine buttermilk and vanilla in measuring cup. With electric mixer on medium-high speed, beat butter, cream cheese, and granulated sugar until light and fluffy, about 2 minutes. Beat in eggs, 1 at a time, until combined, then buttermilk mixture. Reduce speed to low and add flour mixture gradually until combined.
3. SHAPE ROUNDS Divide dough into 6 equal pieces. Pat each into 5-inch disk, wrap in plastic, and refrigerate until firm, about 30 minutes. Meanwhile, cut six 9-inch parchment rounds. Following photos 1 to 3 at left, line 8-inch round cake pan with parchment round and press chilled dough disk into bottom of lined pan. Transfer round to rimmed baking sheet. Repeat, placing second round ½ inch apart. Repeat with 2 additional disks on second rimmed baking sheet. Bake until just golden around edges, 16 to 20 minutes, switching and rotating sheets halfway through baking. Cool 10 minutes on sheets, then transfer to counter to cool completely. Repeat with remaining dough.
4. ASSEMBLE Place 1 cooled cake round on serving platter. Spread ½ cup cooled berry mixture over cake, leaving ½-inch border uncovered, then top with another round. Repeat with remaining berry mixture and cake rounds, finishing with cake. Cover with plastic wrap and refrigerate until cake has softened, at least 8 hours or up to 3 days. Dust with confectioners’ sugar and serve.
MAKE AHEAD: Both berry mixture and cake rounds can be frozen for 1 month. Freeze cooked and cooled berry mixture in airtight container. Wrap individual cake rounds in plastic and foil. Bring all components to room temperature before assembling.
[These next bits are missing the photos of the process (they're in the blog post I linked to), but you don't really need to see them. Just know that the cake dough rounds are fairly thin, and will expand from 8" to about 9" in diameter during baking, so leave a little space between the rounds on the baking sheet.--
telophase)Press-in-the-Pan Cake Rounds
Instead of laboriously rolling out half a dozen layers, we divide the dough into six equal pieces and use an easy pat-in-the-pan method.
1. Position a 9-inch parchment round over an 8-inch pan, pressing the paper snugly into the pan edges.
2. Using lightly floured hands to prevent sticking, press a dough disk evenly over the parchment round.
3. Lift the parchment to transfer the rounds to a baking sheet. Two rounds should fit on a large baking sheet.
Stack the Odds in Your Favor
Replacing the thick dried-apple filling traditionally used for stack cake with juicy fresh strawberries wreaked havoc. Simply pureed, the fresh berries turned the cake to mush. Cooked until thick and jammy, they concentrated their juices for a moist, but not wet, cake.
SOGGY CAKE Uncooked berries were too wet.
SLICEABLE CAKE Cooked berries were perfect.
no subject
There is NOTHING wrong with that.
no subject
(I worked ou the calories per slice. Going by that, this is a delicious cake. XD)