Heavenly Cake Bakers: Chocolate Feather Bed

I think this is my first recipe repeat from Rose's Heavenly Cakes. The first time I tackled the chocolate featherbed, a flourless alteration of eggy cake and whipped ganache, was for the second night of Passover. I was flipping through the book just looking for a Passover cake, of which Rose provides several options, and came across this one. I noticed that it was not only Passover-friendly but actually gluten-free, which has become a recent necessity for some of my family members. It seemed, at the time, with about five hours to go before leaving for New Jersey, somewhat complicated, but I made a half recipe and managed to get it out there, where it was devoured despite the presence of about 15 other desserts (and around 20 guests).

Versatile and delicate, yet easy to travel with, the chocolate featherbed immediately became my cake-of-choice for seders, Passover birthdays, and gluten-free events. But, such is the rotation that when I first made it again, last Thursday, there was no event at all, other than my sister visiting, so she had to cut it up and take it to her friends.

On the natural assumption that no time crunch means more time to mess up, I immediately messed up my second attempt by misreading the directions. Rose directs the baker to bake two batches of batter, on two half-sheet pans. Possessing only one half-sheet pan and no occasion, I planned to halve the recipe, but somehow misunderstood and thought that two batches of batter would be used for each half. I made the correct amount of batter, (the recipe printed, which Rose instructs doubling) but in halves, and spread the first half onto the whole half-sheet pan. It came out OK, but a bit thin and dry. I made the second half on a smaller pan, and the cake the size of 1/4 the half-sheet pan. Got it?

On my first attempt, I had made the chocolate-gelatinized whipped cream option. This time, I went with the whipped ganache, which I thought was good, but also dried the cake a bit. Next time I am going to follow the example of several Heavenly Bakers and omit chocolate in the filling, using gelatin-stabilized plain whipped cream. I love whipped cream, and I think the color contrast would please me. Unless you cut it just right, and shave chocolate artistically, this cake's simple appearance belies its somewhat complicated making. With some nonpareils sprinkled on, it resembled a cafeteria sheet cake.

I usually don't include recipes for Heavenly Cakes, as this bake-along is also a promotion for the book, but if anyone wants this one, email me, it's easier than it looks.

Heavenly Cake Bakers: Pecan Torte with Coffee Cream

It's an excellent thing when the foremost authority on cake in the US is also a New York Jew. Not only is her cradle taste sensibility delightfully Eastern European--cream, levkar, coffee, etc...but her repertoire includes many flourless or flour light cakes suitable for Passover, and Marie at Heavenly Cake Place has kindly included two of these for the posting dates that fall on Passover this year.

I made this week's cake, the Pecan Torte with Coffee (Whipped) Cream, and it was very good, and seemed to sell well at the bakery, but this post will be a little conflicted because although pictures are scanty, my heart belongs to the Chocolate Featherbed cake I made for our actual Passover seder on Tuesday.

Still, although still dreaming of mounds of souffle chocolate and whipped cream, I didn't stint on the Pecan Torte, which consists largely of toasted pecans ground fine, sugar, and eggs whipped high. Working at the bakery early in the morning allows me to bake relatively free of distractions, so while I sometimes do odd things just because of the inattention of exhaustion, I am actually much more precise and conscientious than I usually am at home. And I take more pictures, of each step.

The eggs, separated.

The pan, filled and smoothed.

The cooled cake, unmolded and re-inverted. The deep grooves don't matter because it will be covered in coffee whipped cream. I considered frosting the bottom of the cake, with also sunk slightly into an attractive shallow depression like store-bought 'shortcake,' but in the end went with Rose's program because the cake widened at the base.

The whipped cream was a few steps, softening the gelatin, whipping with instant coffee, etc...but all in all the assembly was simple. This is a purist's cake, dark and light-textured and strong flavored. Miriam came by the bakery and ate it for breakfast, laughing as another girl wandered in to ask if we had any breakfast pastry.

I doubt that many Passover-observant Jews wander hopefully into the bakeries of my neighborhood, but someone liked the cake--about 2/3rds were gone when I strolled by around 4pm.
 

Daring Bakers Challenge April 2009: 10 Plagues Cheesecake

So, I joined another baking group. (Stop looking at me that way) This isn't just any baking group, it's the Daring Bakers, one of the most impressive and exciting baking groups out there, who recently launched an ambitious new website to contain all of their forums. This group follows the work of no one cookbook writer nor chef, posts variations on complicated and...well...daring recipes picked by the monthly host. I'm late to the bandwagon and honored to join--these are projects just for the fun of it, for those of us who like difficult technique and hard to find ingredients. (That's been my only complaint about Tuesdays with Dorie, sometimes people seem to be bitching about having to try new things or make something new to them).

The April 2009 challenge is hosted by Jenny from Jenny Bakes. She has chosen Abbey's Infamous Cheesecake as the challenge.

Cheesecake is one of those things that isn't that hard to make yet somehow is easy to mess up. It always tastes good, so I would say that it's forgiving, but it can so easily get soggy or cracked or or just look a little iffy. It's a lump of cream cheese, after all. Not the most photogenic dessert. But, it is always good.

I made this cheesecake for a Passover seder at Stacey and Avi's house, and I rushed through it but got lucky anyway. Everything that could go wrong went wrong and it was delicious. I made the crust out of crushed pink macarons to keep things kosher, and that worked out well.

The rest was simple--mix batter, pour batter, bake batter in water bath, curse when finding that water bath had penetrated springform through foil defenses, drain, carry around all day in bag, bring to seder, get a little drunk, pose cake with 10 plagues puppets, eat. It was much praised, and, like every part of the Passover seder, reminded me just how lucky I am.

Click on through for the recipe and variations...
I left the macarons out of the official recipe because given the chance, I'd probably go with the graham crackers. Oh, and to match the macarons, I did flavor it with a bit of almond extract.
Abbey's Infamous Cheesecake:

crust:
2 cups / 180 g graham cracker crumbs
1 stick / 4 oz butter, melted
2 tbsp. / 24 g sugar
1 tsp. vanilla extract

cheesecake:
3 sticks of cream cheese, 8 oz each (total of 24 oz) room temperature
1 cup / 210 g sugar
3 large eggs
1 cup / 8 oz heavy cream
1 tbsp. lemon juice
1 tbsp. vanilla extract (or the innards of a vanilla bean)
1 tbsp liqueur, optional, but choose what will work well with your cheesecake

DIRECTIONS:
1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees F (Gas Mark 4 = 180C = Moderate heat). Begin to boil a large pot of water for the water bath.

2. Mix together the crust ingredients and press into your preferred pan. You can press the crust just into the bottom, or up the sides of the pan too - baker's choice. Set crust aside.

3. Combine cream cheese and sugar in the bowl of a stand-mixer (or in a large bowl if using a hand-mixer) and cream together until smooth. Add eggs, one at a time, fully incorporating each before adding the next. Make sure to scrape down the bowl in between each egg. Add heavy cream, vanilla, lemon juice, and alcohol and blend until smooth and creamy.

4. Pour batter into prepared crust and tap the pan on the counter a few times to bring all air bubbles to the surface. Place pan into a larger pan and pour boiling water into the larger pan until halfway up the side of the cheesecake pan. If cheesecake pan is not airtight, cover bottom securely with foil before adding water.

5. Bake 45 to 55 minutes, until it is almost done - this can be hard to judge, but you're looking for the cake to hold together, but still have a lot of jiggle to it in the center. You don't want it to be completely firm at this stage. Close the oven door, turn the heat off, and let rest in the cooling oven for one hour. This lets the cake finish cooking and cool down gently enough so that it won't crack on the top. After one hour, remove cheesecake from oven and lift carefully out of water bath. Let it finish cooling on the counter, and then cover and put in the fridge to chill. Once fully chilled, it is ready to serve.

Pan note: The creator of this recipe used to use a springform pan, but no matter how well she wrapped the thing in tin foil, water would always seep in and make the crust soggy. Now she uses one of those 1-use foil "casserole" shaped pans from the grocery store. They're 8 or 9 inches wide and really deep, and best of all, water-tight. When it comes time to serve, just cut the foil away.

Prep notes: While the actual making of this cheesecake is a minimal time commitment, it does need to bake for almost an hour, cool in the oven for an hour, and chill overnight before it is served. Please plan accordingly!

Some variations from the recipe creator:

** Lavender-scented cheesecake w/ blueberries - heat the cup of heavy cream in the microwave or a saucepan until hot but not boiling. Add 2 tbsp of lavender flowers and stir. Let lavender steep in the cream for about 10-15 minutes, then strain the flowers out. Add strained cream to cheesecake batter as normal. Top with fresh blueberries, or make a quick stovetop blueberry sauce (splash of orange juice, blueberries, a little bit of sugar, and a dash of cinnamon - cook until berries burst, then cool)

** Cafe au lait cheesecake with caramel - take 1/4 cup of the heavy cream and heat it in the microwave for a short amount of time until very hot. Add 1-2 tbsp. instant espresso or instant coffee; stir to dissolve. Add this to the remainder of cream and use as normal. Top cheesecake with homemade caramel sauce (I usually find one on the food network website - just make sure it has heavy cream in it. You can use store-bought in a pinch, but the flavor is just not the same since its usually just sugar and corn syrup with no dairy).

** Tropical – add about a half cup of chopped macadamias to the crust, then top the cake with a mango-raspberry-mandarin orange puree.

** Mexican Turtle - add a bar of melted dark chocolate (between 3 and 5 oz., to taste) to the batter, along with a teaspoon of cinnamon and a dash of cayenne pepper (about 1/8 tsp.). Top it with pecan halves and a homemade caramel sauce.

** Honey-cinnamon with port-pomegranate poached pears – replace 1/2 cup of the sugar with 1/2 cup of honey, add about a teaspoon or more (to taste) of cinnamon. Take 2 pears (any variety you like or whatever is in season), peeled and cored, and poach them in a boiling poaching liquid of port wine, pomegranate juice/seeds, a couple of "coins" of fresh ginger, a cinnamon stick, and about a 1/4 cup of sugar. Poach them until tender, then let cool. Strain the poaching liquid and simmer until reduced to a syrupy-glaze consistency, then cool. Thinly slice the cooled pears and fan them out atop the cooled cheesecake. Pour the cooled poaching syrup over the pears, then sprinkle the top with chopped walnuts and fresh pomegranate seeds.

Some variations from Jenny (from JennyBakes):

**Key lime - add zest from one lime to sugar before mixing with cream cheese. Substitute lemon juice, alcohol, and vanilla with key lime juice.

**Cheesecakelets - put in muffin tins, ramekins, or custard cups. Try baking 20-35 minutes, or until still a little jiggly, and cool as before.

Next month, I promise, more attention to presentation and variation. This month, I'm glad to be making it to the table.

Tuesday Without Dorie

I've been sneaking my baking time in like crack between my homework time. Last night I came home after a long long day of homework and work, holed up another three hours with my paper until it cried for mercy, and then somewhat guiltily escaped the office (yes! I actually worked in my office) and made pink macarons, cheesecake, roasted broccoli, and a much smaller version of The Silver Palate's "Chili for a Crowd," which features the unusual addition of dijon mustard.

The cheesecake was supposed to be for a new project I'm starting this month, and for Stacey's seder tonight, but since it got a bit waterlogged, we'll eat it, but I'll be making more. Everything else seems to have gone as planned, and I was happier last night than I've been all week. Kitchen sneaking is great. No Tuesdays With Dorie, though, couldn't face more cake after Passover's extravaganza (think sponge cake, matzo toffee crunch, chocolate chestnut cake...and unlimited macaroons of all varieties), so the 15 minute Chocolate Amaretti Torte will live to fight another day. More pictures and writing soon, I miss the kitchen and the blog, but schoolwork comes first.

Matt looked around the kitchen devastation last night and said...'I know, Passover, but you have to make granola and bread again...and," looking worried, presumably by my recent defections..."teach me how.'