Forgetting a birthday- be it your partner's, your mother's or your best friend's, it's a cardinal sin. And whenever it happens, the guilty is always the worthy recipient of scorn and derision, and usually, what's coming to the accused is always warranted. Birthdays are important things, and should be celebrated accordingly- with festivity, and whenever possible with lots of food and alcohol. But what happens when you forget your own birthday?
Well, it's not exactly my own birthday that I have forgotten; now that would almost be equivalent to suffering retrograde amnesia, but it's actually the blog's birthday that I have neglected to remember. It's true, Milk and Cookies turned 2 years old, a good 8 weeks ago, and the momentous occasion almost passed by without so much as a mere mention or acknowledging it with a hip-hip-hooray and a little rendition of "for he's a jolly good fellow". Shame on me! Perhaps I was too distracted by my up-coming travel plans.
Born on the 2nd of May 2006, how could I forget that (slightly embarrassing) pioneer post that kicked off the whole odyssey into baking and eating? And the only way to exonerate one's self from the embarrassment and shame of forgetting their own blog's birthday is to make a cake celebratory enough to compensate for the indiscretion. Yes, for any baker, cake is the answer to most of life's quandaries.
I had always wanted to bake one of the celebration cakes featured in Dorie Greenspan's book Baking From My Home to Yours. But I've always had this aversion towards seemingly complicated cakes, especially layer cakes that looked so labour intensive. They look all great and majestic in the pictures; tiers and tiers of scrumptious layers towering towards cake heaven but ten mixing bowls and several whisks later you find yourself knee-deep in batter you no longer have the will to bake.
I'm more one of those 10 items or less chicks, nothing complicated, no fuss, no mess. I usually don't go for recipes with so many steps that include beating, melting, sifting, whisking, folding, sprinkling and a lot of waiting around for things to bake then cool and settle before you go on to the next step. Call me the impatient baker but I'm all for simple desserts; that's probably why you see so many small cakes on this blog. They're quick to bake, and the quicker they come out of the oven, the quicker I can get to eating them.
In saying this, my curiosity was getting the better of me and I was imagining what it would actually be like to be the architect of one of these tower of Babel constructions. It's mortifying to say but I think this has to be my first proper attempt at a layer cake. Be it a cake of only two layers, but a layer cake nonetheless. And all this time I had the audacity to call myself a baker, tsk tsk. There goes my reputation.
Also, I figured that going through the whole process of making this layer cake would be the only penance that could justify my wrongdoing. After all the blog has treated me so well over the past two years, it was the least I could do for such an oversight. So off I went, on my day off work to make a cake worthy of forgiveness.
There's not much I can say about this cake that you wouldn't already gather from looking at it. It looks delicious and it tasted just like it looked. The cake is all Dorie, except for the cream filling. I just thought that there needed to be something to soften the richness of the chocolate cake and the cream does this really well. There's also much to be said about my frosting skills (or lack of it) with the blank patches at the bottom edges of the cake, but hey, for my first reluctant hand at this I think the blog and I can finally move forward and put this whole thing behind us.
This cake is dedicated to the blog and to another great year of blogging. And with the blog going into a new chapter in the next coming months it's only fitting to set-off the move to London with this cake, I guess making layer cakes aren't all that bad (as she takes another forkful to her mouth).
And a big thank you to all the well wishers who voiced their delight and excitement about my up-coming move to the United Kingdom, I cannot wait.
Cocoa-Buttermilk Birthday Cake
Serves 12
Adapted from Baking From My Home to Yours
FOR THE CAKE
2 cups all-purpose flour
½ cup unsweetened cocoa powder
½ tsp baking powder
½ tsp baking soda
½ tsp salt
225g unsalted butter, at room temperature
1½ cup sugar
2 large eggs
2 egg yolks
1 tsp vanilla extract
1 cup buttermilk
110g bittersweet chocolate, melted and cooled (optional)
FOR THE CHOCOLATE MALT BUTTERCREAM
150g bittersweet chocolate, chopped coarsely
¼ cup (packed) brown sugar
2 tbsp malted milk powder
1 tbsp unsweetened cocoa powder
¼ cup boiling water
180g unsalted butter, at room temperature
pinch of salt
½ tsp vanilla extract
1½ cup confectioner’s sugar
FOR THE CREAM FILLING
200ml pure cream
2 tbsp confectioner’s sugar
Preheat oven to 180ºC.
Butter 2 x 22cm round springform cake tins, dust the insides with flour and line the bottoms with parchment paper.
MAKING THE CAKE
Whisk together flour, cocoa, baking powder, baking soda and salt.
Using a stand mixer with paddle attachment or hand mixer in a large bowl; beat the butter on medium speed until soft and creamy.
Add the sugar and beat for 2 minutes.
Add eggs one at a time, then yolks, beating 1 minute after each addition.
Beat in vanilla extract.
Reduce mixer speed and add the dry ingredients alternatively with buttermilk, staring and ending with dry ingredients. Mix only until each new batch is blended into batter.
Add the melted chocolate and fold in with rubber spatula (optional).
Divide batter between two cake tins.
Bake for 26-30 minutes or until cakes feel springy to the touch and start to pull away from the sides of the tins.
Transfer cakes to racks and cool for 5 minutes.
Run a knife around the sides of the cakes and unmould. Peel off parchment paper and invert and cool to room temperature.
MAKING THE BUTTERCREAM
Melt the chocolate with half the brown sugar in a bowl set over a saucepan of simmering water. Remove from heat.
Whisk the malt powder and cocoa together in a small bowl, pour over 3 tsp boiling water and whisk until smooth.
Gradually whisk in hot malt-cocoa mixture with melted chocolate- it should be dark smooth and glossy. Set aside.
Beat butter until soft and fluffy and add the remaining sugar and beat for another 2-3 minutes, until well blended.
Beat in salt and vanilla.
Scrape in chocolate mixture and mix until smooth.
Gradually add the confectioner’s sugar and beat for a couple of minutes, then add the remaining tablespoon of boiling water and beat until well blended.
It should be thick enough to use immediately. If it doesn’t hold its shape then beat it a just a bit more.
MAKING THE FILLING
Whisk cream into stiff peaks, it should be able to hold its shape properly.
Sift in confectioners sugar and fold into cream.
ASSEMBLING THE CAKE
Place one layer top side up on a cardboard round or a cake plate protected by strips of parchment paper.
Spread the top of this layer with cream filling.
Cover with second layer.
Frost the sides and top of the cake either smoothing buttercream for a sleek look of using a spatula, knife of spoon to swirl for more exuberant look.
Refrigerate the cake for at least 1 hour to set the frosting then bring it to room temperature before serving.
We just got through day 13. I'm suffering from umbrella fatigue. Yes, it's been the 13th day of continuous rain in Sydney; from drought to drenching, the pendulum does swing both ways. And I guess now it's official, autumn is here, and I have to say a begrudging thank you for making it so obvious that you've arrived. Say hello to soaked hems, muddy feet and one constantly wet dog. I'll just try to think of it as one less bath I have to give him.
I know posting on the blog has been quite scanty of late, must be that crisp autumn air forcing me into hibernation. But the advantage of this is that my motivation for baking grows even the more as the weather gets colder. Keeping those oven fires burning is one way of staving off the chills.
Sydney houses, are notoriously known for not being able to stand up to the colder months. Many overseas friends living here who come from much colder climes always gripe about the inadequate amount of insulation in our houses. And coupled with the lack of central heating in most homes, it makes the winter months even more unbearable.
Our comparably mild winter probably doesn't warrant builders making houses with central heating a standard thing, but no matter where you're from cold is cold, especially at 6am when the dread of getting out of bed to take a shower overcomes you. I guess keeping the oven on is one way to get around this minor setback.
I made these cakes earlier this month but decided to give it an encore appearance at around day 7 of our marathon rainfest, while holed up at home just watching the spate of storms come and go. It was either build an ark or bake a cake and seeing as I was sitting on a pile of passionfruit, I made some cakes. If I was going to go down in a deluge, I might as well go down with cake.
With my priorities in the right place, I spent the better part of a day baking. With no central heating in our house, Jack (the dog) and I spent the rainy afternoon in front of the blazing oven, our makeshift fireplace. I'm sure he spends his time loitering around the oven just in case a rouge piece of food happens to accidentally fall out and magically land in his strategically poised mouth. He's quite the optimist, but it's still nice to have his company, no matter what the motives. He likes to think of himself as the sous chef, although most of the time he's more like the cleaner, mopping up spilled ingredients. He doesn't mind.
Right now, passionfruits are ubiquitous, so there's every reason for you to buy a whole lot. Here in Sydney we get the smaller round and wrinkled variety that have that distinct deep purple colour. They look quite strange and unassuming on the outside, and they weigh almost nothing but once you cut through that purple woody exterior there's a wonderfully rich and intensely brilliant daffodil yellow pulp inside.
By itself the pulp can be a little too tart to eat, but ripple a few spoonfuls through some vanilla ice cream or yoghurt and you have yourself a killer dessert. And if you are familiar with the Australian picnic staple, the pavlova, then you know that it's the passionfruit that gives it its bite.
The cakes are actually lime flavoured, but only subtlety. The passionfruit syrup is what gives the cake its kick. And like many other tangy fruits, a little bit of sugar takes this a dish a long way and livens it up a bit more. Add a dollop of whipped cream and you have all the insulation you need to get through a rainy day.
Baby Lime Cakes with Passionfruit syrup and cream
Serves 10
Recipe from Australian Gourmet Traveller
FOR THE LIME CAKES
125g soft butter
165g (¾ cup) caster sugar
2 tbsp finely grated lime rind
3 eggs
120g (½ cup) sour cream or plain yoghurt
150g (1 cup) self-raising flour
PASSIONFRUIT SYRUP
110g (½ cup) caster sugar
80ml (1/3 cup) lime juice
3 passionfruit, pulp only
PASSIONFRUIT CREAM
300ml thickened cream
1 passionfruit, pulp only (optional)
30g pure icing sugar, sieved
Preheat oven to 170ºC.
Beat butter, sugar and rind using an electric mixer until light and fluffy, add eggs and beat to combine, then add sour cream or yoghurt and beat to combine.
Fold in flour, then spoon mixture among 8 greased and floured 150ml-capacity dariole moulds and bake for 15 minutes or until golden.
Cool for 5 minutes then turn onto a wire rack to cool completely.
For syrup, combine all ingredients and ¼ cup water in a small saucepan and stir over medium-high heat until sugar dissolves, then bring to the boil and simmer for 10 minutes or until syrupy. Makes about 1 cup.
For cream, combine ingredients and whisk until soft peaks form.
Refrigerate until required.
To serve, pour half the warm syrup over cool cakes and serve with passionfruit cream and extra syrup passed separately.
There's been a chill in the air of late. Autumn is well and truly here and although summer may well be done and dusted, some of it's late harvest has decided to stick around for a farewell party. Yes, stone fruits are something to look forward to come summer, but there's always enough left behind to tide you over till the beginning of autumn. In a last ditch effort to relive summer days, I suggest getting stoned.
Of course I'm not talking about sparking up a doobie and getting fried, but rather enjoying the last that summer has to offer in its stone fruits. I'm having summer weather withdrawals right now, seeing that we never really got to have a proper one on the east coast. So this was my way of sparking up some lost memories of summer.
And really, what's a summer without a peach? The quintessential image of biting into a ripe one, its juice dripping from the corners of your mouth, can make up for all the lucklustre weather we have had for months. They said it was going to last till March and it certainly did, and it looks like we just sailed right into autumn without even the slightest bump. Maybe there was the odd lightning crash and tree falling on one's roof, but other than that, as far as I'm concerned we've been in autumn since December.
So this is my long overdue swan song for the summer we never had- almond cakes topped with roasted peaches. There's only one way to bid her farewell and it's with the best she had to offer. So rosy blushed peaches was an appropriate choice for a goodbye offering.
I actually made this a few weeks back, although never had time to blog about them for a while. I found the peaches at the Entertainment Quarter Farmer's markets going for a song and couldn't pass them up. Then I happened upon a recipe for Almond cakes with roasted apricots on the Australian Gourmet Traveller website, and you know when you see a recipe that you simply must have right now, well that sheer impulse overcame me and I was bent on making this that very same day. I'm sure the droolworthy photograph on the AGT website helped in stoking the urge for them right away.
Seeing as I didn't have apricots but had a heap of cheap peaches lying around, well, you know what I did. When life gives you peaches, you can decide to make a cake.
Peaches, like many other stone fruits, roast very well and there's very little you can do to improve on its flavour. So you might as well stick to the basics, a little sugar and little bit of booze and you have yourself a top notch dessert. It's amazing what wine does to a syrup. The booze of choice for this fare was a Seppelt Rutherglen Tokay that we bought on our last trip to the Hunter Valley- a sweet, honey flavoured dessert wine that was ideal for a fruit based dessert.
I have to say that the almond cakes didn't turn out as dark as they were pictured on the website, so I was a little worried I had made a mistake. But after tasting the cakes, there wasn't anything to worry about. Not sure why there was a lack of colour, but at least it wasn't lacking on taste. Two thumbs up for this recipe and perhaps a better and less illegal way of getting stoned.
Almond cakes with roast Peaches and orange blossom fool
Serves 6
Adapted from Australian Gourmet Traveller
SPECIAL EQUIPMENT: blowtorch (optional)
110g (½ cup) raw caster sugar
1 vanilla bean, seeds scraped
8 peaches, halved, stones removed
4 pieces of orange rind, removed with a peeler
80ml (1/3 cup) dessert wine
1 tbsp orange juice
3 tsp orange blossom water
300g crème fraîche
30g brown sugar, sieved
FOR THE ALMOND CAKES
120g (¾ cup) pure icing sugar, sieved
50g almond meal
35g plain all-purpose flour
¼ tsp baking powder
2 tbsp finely grated orange rind
2 eggwhites, lightly whisked
90g butter, melted and cooled
Preheat oven to 200ºC.
Using a blowtorch, scorch the peach skins until they blister. They should peel off easily.
Combine sugar and vanilla seeds in a bowl and scatter over the base of a roasting pan large enough to hold peaches snugly.
Place peaches, cut-side down, in a single layer in pan, pressing into sugar.
Turn peaches and scatter over orange rind.
Combine wine, orange juice and 2 tsp orange blossom water in a jug and pour around apricots.
Roast for 10 minutes or until just tender and golden.
Set aside to cool, then, using a slotted spoon, remove 4 peach halves from syrup and process using a food processor until smooth. Set aside.
MAKING ALMOND CAKES
For almond cakes, reduce oven to 170ºC.
Combine dry ingredients and rind in a bowl, add eggwhite and fold through until just combined.
Add butter, stir to combine, then divide among six shallow pie moulds, smooth tops and bake for 15 minutes or until golden and centre springs back when lightly pressed with a fingertip.
Cool in pans for 5 minutes, then turn out onto a wire rack placed over a tray.
Spoon a little apricot syrup over cakes and cool completely.
Combine crème fraîche, brown sugar and remaining orange blossom water in a bowl and whisk until thick and smooth. Fold through apricot purée to form a ripple effect. Top each cake with 2 apricot halves and a generous dollop of fool. Serve with syrup to the side.
