Rum and coffee cake

Father’s day always forces me to bake altruistically as one of the CCD’s (Caked Crusader’s Da) favourite cake flavours is coffee, which I cannot abide in any shape or form.  This cake also uses one of his other favourite things: rum.

Sticking with my theme of altruism, I jettisoned any ideas for buttercreams or whipped cream because that is not at all the CCD’s style.  Serve him a wedge of sponge he can just pick up and eat and he’s happy.  Serve him something he needs a pastry fork to navigate around and he sees it as unnecessary fuss.

Given that the cake needed to absorb a lot of liquid without turning to mush I opted for a firmer, closer crumbed sponge and it held up well.  The inclusion of sour cream balances the sugar; I always think the inclusion of buttermilk/sour cream/yoghurt gives a velvety softness to a sponge.  Definitely plan ahead with this bake as it is best made the day before and left to absorb the coffee overnight. 

The liquid does make the sponge depress a little, so don’t worry.  I’m finding it hard to know what to say about this cake because I am so not the target audience for it!  Sometimes, though, the right cake doesn’t need to be flash nor a showstopper - all I can say is that the CCD enjoyed it so, job done!

Happy father's day!

Ingredients

For the cake:

190g unsalted butter, at room temperature
270g caster sugar
2 teaspoons vanilla extract
3 eggs
270g plain flour
1 ½ teaspoons baking powder
Pinch of salt
225g sour cream

For the rum coffee syrup:

3 tablespoons caster sugar
4 tablespoons rum
100ml hot, strong black coffee

Method

Preheat the oven to 200°C/fan oven 180°C/400°F/gas mark 6.

Line a 20cm round springform tin with baking paper.

Start by beating together the butter and sugar.  Take time over this and beat until it is pale, light and fluffy.

Beat in the vanilla.

Beat in the eggs one at a time, adding some of the flour if it looks like it might curdle.

Beat in half the flour.

Beat in half the sour cream.

Beat in the remaining flour, along with the baking powder and salt.

Beat in the remaining sour cream.

Spoon the mix into the prepared tin and bake for approximately 50 minutes, or until a skewer inserted into the cake comes out clean; check after 40 minutes to ensure the cake isn’t browning too quickly – if it is, loosely cover the top with foil and continue baking.

Leave in the tin and wrap the base and sides of the outside of the tin in foil- this will stop any leakage from the syrup and prevents a sticky cleaning up job!  N.B if you’ve used a liner for the tin there’s no need to do this.

Now make the syrup: mix together the sugar, rum and hot coffee until you can feel that the sugar has dissolved.  If you do this in a glass bowl you will be able to see when this has happened; I usually rely on dragging the spoon along the bottom of the dish – if it seems smooth everything has dissolved!

Poke some holes in the top of the cake and brush the hot syrup onto the warm cake – I find this gives the best absorption.  You can pour but I prefer the control over distribution that a brush gives.

If you feel that the cake is getting too wet, let it rest for 10 minutes then resume brushing on the liquid.

Leave to cool completely in the tin on a wire rack.

It is best to make the cake a day in advance to let the coffee and cake settle down overnight.

Serve in generous slices with some whipped cream.

Bask in the glory of the wonderful thing you have made.

Eat.

Tiramisu

 

Regular readers will know that I am not a coffee drinker and do not like coffee flavoured anything, other than perhaps a Revel (but only if there’s another choccy left in the bag to take the taste away!)  However, Mr CC loves coffee as does everyone else in my family.  Therefore, when I was asked if I would like to sample a Puro Coffee goodie bag my altruism shone through and I accepted!

What a goodie bag it was too; three large packs of coffee, hot chocolate, sugar, a cafetiere and two coffee cups and saucers.   I know many other bloggers have already mentioned it, and reviewed the coffee, but look at how gorgeous the cups are (they even have a little coffee bean embossed on the back!)

What is Puro Coffee I hear you ask? Puro is a leading brand of Fairtrade coffee that works in partnership with the World Land Trust to purchase and protect areas of precious rainforest in South America. Enjoy your favourite drink while saving the planet?  It’s never been easier!

While it’s perhaps not a familiar name (yet) many of you will have sampled the coffee without knowing - every National Trust site uses Puro coffee, as do all the Royal Parks in London (the Queen actually had to sign off that snazzy cup design to allow it in the parks), and a number of café/restaurant chains, such as Le Pain Quotidien and Leon.

I asked Mr CC to make me up a batch (he chose the Noble – a blend of Arabica and Robusta beans) ensuring he made enough for my tiramisu, and for him to have a couple of cups.  I tried to get his tasting comments but Mr CC either likes stuff or he doesn’t, he’s not known for his Jilly Goolden-esque flowery reviews.  He did however say that he liked how strong and rich it was without being at all bitter...and he left the cafetiere out so he could make more (a very positive sign!)

Tiramisu is a hugely popular dessert, and because of that many food writers and critics have turned against it, much in the same way that the glorious black forest gateau was derided as naff a few years back.  But things become hugely popular for a reason – normally that they taste good.

This dessert couldn’t be simpler to make but my one tip is don’t let the biscuits sit too long in the coffee because they will absorb it all.  I learned this lesson the hard way and had to make up more coffee!

If you are envious of my lovely goodie bag and would like to win one, simply visit Puro Coffee’s Facebook page, where there is a monthly competition to win a gift box just like mine.  Good luck!

Ingredients

These quantities will provide four generous portions – scale up if you need more portions!

4 tablespoons kahlua liqueur – if you don’t have this masala, rum or brandy work too
200ml dark, strong coffee – make it strong to counter the richness of the cream
2 egg yolks
4 tablespoons caster sugar
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
170g mascarpone
300ml double cream
170g sponge finger biscuits – they are usually called Savoiardi or Boudoir sponge fingers in the UK
cocoa powder or crumbled Flake for decoration

Method

Start by making the coffee and pouring into a bowl along with the kahlua.

Put to one side to cool a little.

Place the egg yolks, sugar and vanilla in a bowl and whisk together until thick and fluffy.

Add the mascarpone and cream and beat until well combined and thick.

Take four dessert bowls – any glass dish that you might make individual trifles in will be fine.

Dip sponge fingers, two at a time, into the cooled coffee mixture.  Don’t leave them in for more than a couple of seconds or they will absorb too much liquid and make the dessert wet.

Place the sponge fingers in the bottom of a dish – you only need enough to cover the bottom of the bowl.

Cover the biscuits with a thick layer of the mascarpone mix and level.

Dip the remaining sponge fingers and place over the mascarpone.

Use the remaining mascarpone mixture to cover the biscuits.

Either dust the top with cocoa powder or a crumbled flake.

Refrigerate until you wish to serve.

Bask in the glory of the wonderful thing you have created.

Eat.

Coffee streusel layer cake

Today is Father’s Day and the CCD’s (Caked Crusader’s Da) favourite cake flavour is coffee.  That made the selection of this cake extremely easy – and yet another celebration cake I wouldn’t be eating.  Let’s just say coffee’s not my thing.

What sets this apart from other coffee cakes I have made is that the sponge itself contains no coffee.  However, baked into and onto the sponge is a streusel containing instant coffee granules thus packing a real wallop (technical term) of flavour along with texture.  I had my doubts as to whether this would provide enough flavour...until I made the streusel and sniffed it; it smelled like a coffee shop where they grind their own beans (a horrible or lovely smell, depending on your tastes).

A generous drizzle of coffee icing adds further oomph (enough of the technical language I hear you cry!) and looks rather pretty.  In order to test that the icing was smooth and ready to use I tasted a bit...and can vouch that it had a very, very strong flavour...shudder.

I selected this recipe as the cake keeps for several days in an airtight tin; this meant the CCD could take home some slices and enjoy them throughout the week.  Let’s face it, when you tot up all the things our dad’s do for us, they deserve more than one day of celebration!

Happy father’s day to all the dad’s out there!

Ingredients

For the streusel:

80g walnut pieces
2 tablespoons instant coffee granules
115g soft light brown sugar
2 tablespoons plain flour
30g butter – melted and cooled

For the cake:

115g unsalted butter, at room temperature
115g caster sugar
2 eggs
175g self raising flour
4 tablespoons milk

For the icing:
1 tablespoon instant coffee granules
1 tablespoon boiling water
100g icing sugar

Method

Preheat the oven to 160°C/fan oven 140°C/325°F/Gas mark 3.

Line a 20cm round springform tin with baking paper.

Start by making the streusel: Place all the ingredients in a bowl and stir together.  At first it will seem like there isn’t enough butter to bind the dry ingredients, but keep stirring and it will become moist and clump into a texture like wet sand.

Put to one side while you make the cake.

Beat together the butter and sugar until pale and whippy.  Don’t skimp on this stage as this is where the air gets into the sponge.

Beat in the eggs one at a time, adding a little of the flour if it starts to curdle.

Fold in the flour and the milk.

Spoon half the cake batter into the prepared tin and level the surface.

Sprinkle half the streusel mix over the cake in an even layer.

Spoon the remaining cake batter over the streusel and spread it out, taking care not to disturb the streusel.

Sprinkle the remaining streusel over the top.

Bake for 1-1 ½ hours or until a skewer inserted into the cake comes out clean.

Place on a wire rack to cool and, when safe enough to handle, remove the cake from the tin and leave to cool completely.

When the cake is cool, make the icing: dissolve the coffee in the boiling water and leave to cool.

When cool beat into the icing sugar to make a thick, glossy icing, adding more water if necessary.

Drizzle over the top of the cake.

Bask in the glory of the wonderful thing you have created.

Eat.

Coffee and walnut cake – a birthday cake

No one in my family much feels like big celebrations at the moment but it feels wrong to let birthdays go by without at least a cake.  The CCD (Caked Crusader’s Da) is partial to coffee cake and, when I gave him carte blanche to select his birthday cake flavour, it was – predictably – his first choice.

I don’t like coffee and what always surprises me is that when you say that to people (who like coffee), they will always respond with, “oh, but I bet you love the smell – that’s the best bit”.  Er, no.  It disgusts me just as much as the taste.  I don’t think people make that comment about any other food or drink; if you told someone you didn’t like garlic for example, they wouldn’t try and badger you into admitting you enjoyed its pungent aroma.

I stoked up the coffee element by using espresso coffee from Mr CC’s Nespresso machine.  I used 3 capsule’s worth of coffee spread across the cake and buttercream.  However, I know that most people probably don’t have this option so the recipe below sets out instant coffee quantities.  It does seem quite a ‘punchy’ cake and I think, from memory, uses more coffee than most similar recipes.

This cake is the classic combination of walnut and coffee.  Walnuts must have the best PR in the nut world as they have rather cornered the market in coffee based cakes and desserts.  I wonder how this monopoly came about but I suppose if it ain’t broke...

Happy birthday CCD!

Ingredients

For the sponges:

2 tablespoons instant coffee granules
2 tablespoons boiling water
175g unsalted butter, at room temperature
175g light muscovado sugar
3 eggs
175g self raising flour
100g walnuts, finely chopped

For the buttercream:

3 tablespoons instant coffee granules
3 tablespoons boiling water
175g unsalted butter, at room temperature
350g icing sugar
Handful of walnuts roughly chopped

Method

Preheat the oven to 180°C/fan oven 160°C/350°F/Gas mark 4.

Line two loose bottomed 20cm sandwich tins with baking paper.

Place the coffee granules in a small bowl and stir in the boiling water until you have no lumps left.  Put to one side to cool.

In a large bowl beat together the butter and sugar until light and fluffy.  Don’t skimp on this stage as this is where all the air gets into the mix.

Beat in the eggs one at a time, adding some of the flour if the mixture looks like it might curdle.

Stir in the flour and the chopped walnuts.

Stir in the cooled coffee.

Spoon into the two prepared tins, trying to make the distribution as even as possible.

Level the surfaces and bake for approximately 25 minutes or until a skewer inserted into the sponges comes out clean.

Place the cakes, in their tins, on a wire cooling rack and de-tin when they are cool enough to handle safely.  The leave to cool completely on the wire rack.

Now make the buttercream: As before, make up the coffee with the boiling water in a separate bowl and put to one side to cool.

In a large bowl beat the butter on its own until it is light and whippy.

Add the icing sugar and stir, at first manually, to incorporate.  When the icing sugar is mixed in you can use the electric mixer – taking this cautious approach stops your kitchen being dusted in a cloud of icing sugar!

Beat until light and whippy.  A good test is to take a small amount of the mixture and press against the roof of your mouth – if it feels grainy it needs more beating.

When smooth, add the coffee and beat until the coffee is evenly mixed into the buttercream. (If you’ve made up Nespresso capsules and have any coffee left over, simply brush it over the sponges – waste not, want not!)

Place one of the sponges on the serving plate and spread a scant 1/3 of the buttercream over it.

Place the other sponge on top and spread a similar amount on top of that.

Use the remaining buttercream to cover the sides of the cake.

Scatter the chopped walnuts on top for decoration.

Bask in the glory of the wonderful thing you have created.

Eat.

Mocha (chocolate coffee) torte

It is the CCD (Caked Crusader’s Da) and CCU’s (Caked Crusader’s Uncle) birthday; I have mentioned in the past they are twins...and they still are! Recently, the CCD has discovered a love of mocha coffee – the sort that’s more like a dessert with cream and chocolate and a small dash of coffee. So I thought I’d use those flavours for a dessert.

This is the type of recipe that looks intimidating; firstly because I always think tortes seem difficult – even though they’re not; maybe it’s because we’re used to seeing them in patisserie windows that we assume they must be hard work. Secondly, there are three distinct stages to making the dish and, while not remotely taxing, you do have to plan ahead to allow appropriate cooling/setting time between each stage. I broke the dish down into stages and made the biscuit base one evening, the chocolate baked mousse layer the next morning and the coffee cream layer that same evening.

I didn’t taste this one as my loathing for coffee is only equalled by my loathing for lemon, but the feedback was positive with one eater rating it as an all time great bake! A recurring comment was that it tasted like something you’d buy from a high end patisserie.

The hazelnut biscuit base was crisp and crumbly and surprised me by being reasonably easy to cut though: it didn’t shatter all over the work top and stayed in one piece!

The rich chocolate baked ganache middle layer was the most commented on for it’s intense flavour and smooth, velvety texture.

The top layer of set coffee cream was a big hit with the CCM (Caked Crusader’s Ma). It has a strong punch of coffee but is light and whippy in texture.

Happy birthday CCD and CCU!

Ingredients

For the biscuit base:
100g chopped hazelnuts – I bought ready chopped
125g unsalted butter, diced
25g light brown sugar
40g caster sugar
125g plain flour
1 ½ tablespoons cornflour

For the chocolate filling:
400ml double cream
100ml single cream
300g dark chocolate, broken up into squares – I used Green & Blacks
100g milk chocolate, broken up into squares – I used Green & Blacks
2 eggs
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
1 tablespoon very strong black coffee (I made up some espresso and used it for this stage and the coffee cream)

For the coffee cream:
2 leaves gelatine
250ml whipping cream
4 tablespoons icing sugar
5 tablespoons very strong black coffee

To decorate:
200ml double cream
75g chopped hazelnuts
Flaked chocolate – however much you choose!

Method

Preheat the oven to 170°C/fan oven 150°C/340°F/Gas mark 3.

Line the inside of a 23cm round springform tin with baking paper.

Place all the ingredients for the base into a food processor and blitz until combined into a crumbly texture.

Pat into the base of the cake tin and bake for 15-20 minutes or until the base is golden. Mine took 20 minutes.

Leave to cool on a wire rack. You can make this a day ahead of the other two stages.

Reduce the oven to 160°C/fan oven 140°C/320°F/Gas mark 2.5

Now make the chocolate filling: pour the double and single creams into a saucepan and bring just to the boil.

Remove from the heat and tip in the chocolate.

Stir until melted – I used a silicon whisk to do this as I find it is quicker and produces a lovely thick, glossy chocolate.

Whisk in the eggs, vanilla and coffee.

Pour the filling over the biscuit base and level.

Bake for at least 20 minutes or until the chocolate is set but still has a wobble in the centre. Mine took much longer – about 45 minutes so don’t worry if yours needs longer; once it’s had 30 minutes check it every 5-7 minutes.

Leave to cool completely, still in the tin, on a wire rack.

Now make the coffee cream: Place the gelatine leaves in a bowl of cold water.

Whip the cream until it forms soft peaks and fold in the icing sugar.

Heat the coffee until it feels hot but don’t let it boil. Remove from the heat.

Squeeze all the water out of the gelatine leaves and whisk into the coffee.

Whisk the coffee mixture into the cream.

Spread over the top of the chocolate layer and refrigerate to set, ideally overnight.

On the day you will be serving the torte, whip the cream and pipe a border around the top of the torte.

Scatter over the hazelnuts and chocolate.

Serve in generous slices.

Bask in the glory of the wonderful thing you have created.

Eat.

Mother’s Day Coffee and chocolate cakes

It is Mothering Sunday when mothers the land over should be spoiled and pampered....before returning to the more normal state of affairs tomorrow!

The CCM’s favourite cake flavouring by far is coffee. When I looked back over my previous coffee bakes they have all been sponge and some sort of buttercream. Time for something a little different. But not that different as these are sponge too!

This cake is made with a coffee flavoured sponge which, straight from the oven, is brushed with coffee syrup. The recipe said to use all the syrup and their photo showed the cake oozing with liquid. The CCM isn’t mad on that wet a sponge so I only used about half the syrup – but it’s up to you.

I added a chocolate ganache and put some of the coffee syrup into this to provide an extra coffee hit. My top tip for coating cakes in ganache is to place tin foil under the wrack so that, when you’re clearing up, all you have to do is scrunch up the foil rather than scrub your work top clean.

Using brown sugar gave an interesting extra taste and it worked really well. Coffee is bitter and the brown sugar gave it an almost caramel-y toffee edge that sweetened it but left it unmistakably coffee.

Some more of the coffee syrup went into lightly whipped cream to serve alongside the cakes. When I create a coffee cake I really put coffee into it!

Ingredients

For the sponge:
3 tablespoons instant coffee granules
4 tablespoons boiling water
180g soured cream
250g unsalted butter, at room temperature
165g soft brown sugar
4 eggs
310g self raising flour

For the coffee syrup (this will make enough to brush over the cakes, use in the ganache and the whipped cream):
4 teaspoons instant coffee granules
330g soft brown sugar
340ml water

For the chocolate ganache:
250g dark chocolate, broken into small pieces
300ml double cream (have extra on standby should it be needed to get the thickness you want)
3 tablespoons of the coffee syrup (recipe above)

Method

- Preheat the oven to 180˚C/ fan oven 160˚C /350˚F/Gas mark 4.
- Have ready 12 mini loaf pans each one with a capacity of 250ml. You could use a cupcake pan but will probably get many more – 24 I should imagine. You can grease the tin but I didn’t and my cakes turned out fine. Make a judgement on how ‘non stick’ you think your pans are!
- Start by making the cakes: dissolve the coffee into the hot water and stir until there are no lumps.
- Allow to cool, then stir in the soured cream. Put to one side.
- Cream together the butter and sugar until well combined and light. It won’t go fluffy because the brown sugar is a heavy and granular sugar.
- Beat in the eggs one at a time.
- Fold in the flour in three batches, alternating with the soured cream coffee mixture.
- Spoon into the tins and level the surface.
- Bake for approximately 25 minutes or until a skewer inserted into the cake comes out clean. Mine sank a little on removing from the oven but this had no effect on the lightness of the sponge.
- About 10 minutes before the cooking time is up make the coffee syrup: Place all the ingredients into a saucepan over a medium heat and stir until the sugar has dissolved – you can tell this by looking at the back of your spoon; no crystals? It’s dissolved.
- Bring to the boil then remove from the heat.
- Brush some coffee syrup over the straight-from-the-oven cakes. If you want a wet, rum baba style cake use most of the syrup. I didn’t, so brushed each cake three times with some syrup barely using half.
- Leave the cakes to cool completely in their tins before turning out. At this point they will keep in an airtight container for three days.
- On the day of serving make the ganache: place the cream and coffee syrup into a saucepan over a medium heat and bring it just to the boil.
- Remove from the heat and add the chocolate. Use a whisk to ensure the chocolate melts.
- At this point you have a choice: continue whisking if you want a fluffy, thick whipped chocolate ganache. I wanted a thick but runny ganache to spoon over my cakes like a glaze so stopped whisking. If the ganache is too thick to run over the cakes whisk in a dash more cream.
- Spoon over the cakes and allow to run over the edges. My tip for avoiding lots of mess is place the cakes on a wire rack over a sheet of foil. Any drips will land on the foil and you can simply throw this away.
- Let set for 20 minutes or so before placing your chosen decoration on top.
- Serve with lightly whipped cream – add some of the coffee syrup to the cream if you wish.
- Bask in the glory of the wonderful thing you have made.
- Eat.

Austrian coffee cake with coffee buttercream

It’s the CCD’s (Caked Crusader’s Da) birthday on the 28th April. It’s also my uncle’s birthday which isn’t all that surprising seeing as they’re twins!

OK, so I can't explain what happened on the "T" in birthday; it took on a life of its own!

The CCD is rather partial to coffee cake and swiss meringue buttercream so I took a recipe for Austrian coffee cake and teamed it up with my trusted recipe for swiss meringue buttercream. The cake was particularly interesting to me as it used a technique that I’ve only previously seen with lemon cake, that of making a syrup to drizzle over and be absorbed by the fresh-from-the-oven cake to guarantee maximum flavour and moistness. I suppose it isn’t dissimilar to the technique used for making tiramisu. Here’s the sponge after the syrup was brushed over:


The original quantities for the sponge layers looked a bit mean to me so I scaled the recipe up, hence the oddly exact looking volumes. I find that all sponges are scalable and you shouldn’t ever fear doing this. My quantities are 150% of the original (except for the eggs, where I scaled three up to five) and gave a lovely tall sponge.

Candles can be used to express that special heartfelt message (this is probably an appropriate place to explain that my family are all blessed with the same "unusual" sense of humour - I think the candles were the CCD's favourite part of the cake!):



It’s a tricky cake to cut and get crisp, neat slices but no one seemed to mind!


These photos show how the sponge absorbs pockets of coffee syrup and stays extremely moist:


Happy birthday CCD and Nunks!

Ingredients:
For the sponge cake:
75g walnuts, finely chopped
263g self raising flour
2 ½ teaspoons baking powder
263g unsalted butter, at room temperature
263g golden caster sugar
5 eggs
2 ½ level tablespoons instant espresso coffee powder (I used Nescafe) mixed with 3 tablespoons boiling water

For the syrup:
1 ½ level tablespoons instant espresso coffee powder
75g Demerara sugar
83ml boiling water

For the swiss meringue buttercream:
4 egg whites
250g caster sugar
250g unsalted butter
2 level tablespoon instant espresso coffee powder mixed with slightly less than 1 tablespoon boiling water

How to make:
- Preheat the oven to 170°C/fan oven 150°C/325°F/Gas mark 3.
- Line two 20cm round sandwich tins with baking paper.
- Beat together all of the ingredients except for the coffee and walnuts. Ensuring that your butter is soft will make this task easier.
- Add the coffee and walnuts and beat further until the mixture is well combined.
- The mixture should drop from the spoon when tapped on the bowl. If it doesn’t add a little more hot water.
- Divide the mixture evenly between the two prepared tins and bake for approximately 30 minutes or until a skewer comes out clean. Mine took 40 minutes.
- While the cakes are cooking, make the syrup: place the coffee and sugar in a heatproof bowl and then add the boiling water.
- Stir until both the coffee and sugar have dissolved. You will need to stir briskly to ensure this.
- When the cakes are cooked, leave in the tins, on a wire rack.
- Prick them all over – while they are still hot – and spoon the syrup over both sponges, trying to distribute it as evenly as possible. I found this a lot easier to achieve using a silicon pastry brush and gently brushing the syrup over the sponges.
- Leave the cakes in the tin to absorb the syrup and only remove when completely cool. Take care as a moist cake is a fragile cake.
- Now make the swiss meringue buttercream. Place the egg whites and sugar in a bowl over a pan of simmering water. Stir pretty much constantly to prevent the egg from cooking.
- After 5-10 minutes, when the sugar has dissolved (when you cannot see any crystals on the back of the spoon), remove the bowl from the pan of simmering water and whisk until the meringue has puffed up and the mix is cool.
- Add the butter and coffee to the meringue and whisk until the butter has been completely incorporated into the meringue. At first it will look a disaster – it will collapse and look curdled but don’t worry! Stop when the mixture is smooth, light and fluffy.
- Spread approximately a third of the buttercream on top of one of the sponges and then put the other sponge on top.
- Use the remaining buttercream to cover the top and sides as desired.
- Bask in glory at the wonderful thing you have made.
- Eat.