I like your idea of also using milk chocolate. Do you enjoy being a tester. How many times do you test the recipe over? I don’t have the book. The recipe was on the vanilla baking blog.
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I tested the blackberry cake several times - I also tested the confetti cake and the vanilla scones. I LOVE being a tester. I’m a researcher professionally so it’s a perfect blend of my love of baking & research!
I followed Ali’s modification to add chocolate chips -
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Sounds like great fun. I’ve gotten a few new baking books as presents lately but there doesn’t seem to be a “what cookbooks you have bought” topic and I’m not up to starting one. I enjoyed that thread.
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Sally was also kind enough to share the scone recipe with me and I made the rhubarb variation. So good! I’m planning to try them again if I have any left from the batch I just bought.
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Here’s a version you might consider the next time you use the mold. I applied the chocolate ganache first, then the sugar glaze. I used limoncello as the liquid …gave it a very nice flavor. The cake is 2/3 of NYT one bowl cake from The Pantry series, the entire batter would fit but I wanted a smaller cake.
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Looks moist and lovely!
It was delicous! Everytime I bake, I learn something. Today I learned not to turn my back on a cooling cake. I normally set it by the stove to cool, moving it if I’m going to cook something. I was away, today, however, when somebody decided to fire up a burner right next to it to make a cup of tea. My glaze melted a little, so it wasn’t quite as pretty as I hoped. A good excuse to make it again, becasue the flavor was very good.
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@Stef_bakes (and others who may be interested) - I started a “what cookbooks have you gotten” discussion for 2022 here
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Thanks MTT
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Today I made the “Quick and Creamy Rhubarb Pie” from Easy as Pie by Susan Purdy. Rhubarb is my favorite type of pie and this book’s original/regular version is the one my mother made when I was growing up, so I was really curious to try the creamy take on it instead. Of course, when I called and asked if my mom had ever tried this variation, she said she had, but it wasn’t as good as her usual. I persevered and I’m glad to have tried it, but of course, she was right. The original is better. Sigh.
This was certainly quite simple, with a thick custard that you just stir together (but don’t need to cook) and pour over top of the cut rhubarb. Plus, you only have to roll out one crust because it’s a single crust pie. Still, I prefer the plain version. Either the one from this book or the fancier brown sugar one from Pastry Love.
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wow, tremendous!
Local strawberries (which I am obsessed with) made their inaugural farmer’s market appearance of the year on Friday, so I combined them with my home grown rhubarb to make a crisp. The photo doesn’t really do it justice, but it was incredibly tart and delicious.
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Careful. Once you start eating local, seasonal strawberries, you can never go back to the commercially transportable stuff.
Oh I made that transition at least 30 years ago. Strawberries are my favorite food and I don’t eat anything but local. Once they’re gone for the year, I am done til the following summer.
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When I lived in NYC, the thing I missed most about my native California was the long growing season, and the most fleeting of them in the east felt like local strawberries. We’re just hitting peak strawberry season in Northern California, but they are often at the farmers markets from April into October.
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Did it all go smoothly? Were you pleased with how everything turned out? It looks perfect!
Ours (Washington State) won’t be in for several weeks yet, or possibly not at all if it won’t quit raining! We look forward to it every year and stuff our freezer with as many as possible.
Costco, SSF, has gorgeous organic strawberries, Driscoll. Quite delicious!
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CaitlinM: The wedding cake was vanilla with strawberry filling & lemon buttercream, with the top 6" tier being gluten free and 8" & 12" being regular cake. It was pretty darn heavy when fully assembled, I’m glad my brother in law was strong enough to carry it.
Shellybean: I was very pleased with how it turned out, it tasted great and got many compliments. Things went fairly smoothly with the cake until I had it set in a spot where the sun was hitting it, some flowers melted and tumbled down. I replaced the flowers and covered dents with more flowers. I got smart and moved the cake. I also had way too much cake for the party.
We bought some togo boxes last minute so people could take slices of the cake home and it was a good decision, we had enough cake for about 2-3x the number of guests even while serving massive slices on dinner plates instead of cake plates. And that was after leaving out the 10" tier that was already baked. My wedding lost a lot of guests after we had to postpone a week due to medical emergency.
Memorial day weekend is not a convienent weekend for most people, but it was thoroughly enjoyable anyway , worth the extra work to rebook everything on such short notice instead of cancelling.
Back to the cake: I used cake acrylics for the first time to frost the cake and it was a much faster way to get even & smooth sides than doing it free hand.
This YouTube video was really useful to learn how to use them.
Also, in the end, I just used the same buttercream recipe (from sugargeeks) for the frosting, filling, and flowers, just at different consistencies and that worked out very well. Quite stiff and dense for the filling dam, still kinda dense but whipped more for the flowers, and whipped fully and then using the paddle attachment to stir the air bubbles out of it for the outside of the cake.
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