Chocolate and Raspberry Sponge Cake
Author: Irish Bees Don't Do Mondays
A blog for me, about the things I like. After Effects, Procreate, Illustrator, Photoshop, Drawing, Painting, Paper Cutting, Sewing, Embroidering, up-cycling old furniture. Whatever grabs me in the moment/
Dandelion seed cake
This cake is scrumptious. It’s a rich chocolate sponge made with raw, organic cocoa, fresh, home-made raspberry compote and covered in thick ganache with dandelion seed heads for decoration. I love dandelion clocks. The translucent, ethereal effect when light filters through them is quite beautiful.
Dandelions are completely edible. From the flowers to the root and are frequently used in herbal remedies. You have to be careful where you pick them from. These were picked from my back garden so not exposed to car exhaust and I never use chemical insecticides or weed killer (bee friendly). Finally, they are inserted in closed-bottom straws into the cake and removed as soon as I’d finished taking pictures of the cake.
To preserve the heads and stop the seeds from flying away, I made a solution of sugar with boiling water, let it cool then poured it into a spray bottle and sprayed the heads. The sugar solution acts like glue and fixes the seeds in place.
It was an experiment on my part. I’ve used hair spray to take pictures of dandelions and for floral arrangements and knew they could be ‘glued’ into place… but hairspray is full of chemicals that are not food safe.
I think I over-exposed the seed heads and focused on the tallest dandelion rather than the cake but it was my first attempt.
Passionfruit curd
The bug to bake something got me again today, mainly because it’s a chilly day.
I decided to make a three-layered lemon sponge cake with lemon buttercream and passionfruit filling.
The passionfruit curd has to be made first because it needs plenty of time to cool down and thicken up.
Mr Bee loves lemon curd and loves passionfruits… so it was fingers crossed that he would love passionfruit curd. Top news! He does. It’s as easy as any other curd to make but does use a LOT of passionfruits.
And leaves the kitchen looking like a crime scene. You wouldn’t expect passionfruit curd and crime scene to sit in the same sentence but there you are.
The sponges are out of the oven and nicely cool so nearly time to make the buttercream.
I’m wondering whether to add a few tablespoons of elderberry cordial to the buttercream. I’ll decide when I come to do it.
Think I’ll give the cake a yellow to pale yellow ombre effect with maybe fondant daisies on top or maybe meringue kisses as I have a bowl of egg whites to use up. Italian meringue… mmm.
I’ll leave you with a shot of some sweeties I got from my Tai Chi class last night. There was a spread of cakes, sweeties, fruits and nicey things left over from a childrens’ easter craft group and I took a few of these little panda guys:
There are two panda balls in each packet. I thought they’d be ‘nehhh’ but actually, they’re filled with wafer/choc mix which is really nice.
Put me in mind of the chef from South Park… anyone remember his recipe for chocolate salty balls? Ha ha!
The happy little pandas reminded me… Kim Joy from the GBBO has a cookbook coming out in August! I pre-ordered from Amazon today. I loved Kim Joy’s quirky woodland animals and her surreal world of baked goodies. Can’t wait for August!
Crochet leaves pattern
Here’s a quick and easy crochet pattern for you (please note: American terminology).
Stitches:
DC: Double crochet
HDC: Half double crochet
DC: Double crochet
Leaf Pattern
CH 5 then Slip stitch into the first chain to make a ring
Round 1
CH 3 then make the following stitches into the ring:
5 DC, CH 3, 5 DC
Join with Slip stitch in third chain of the initial 3 chain
Round 2
Ch 3
2 SC in each of next 5 DCs
Into the 3-chain space: 2 HDC, CH 3, 2 HDC
2 SC into each of next 5 DCs
Slip stitch into the first chain of this round
Stem
Chain 5 then slip stitch into each of the chains starting with second chain from the hook.
Hope you have fun making them!
Cake for Easter
The cake is made from three layers: Chocolate fudge cake to give it a rich, chocolatey undertone, and two layers of vanilla spongecake.
I used French buttercream (vanilla) to sandwich the layers together then covered the whole cake in rough smudges of normal buttercream (vanilla).
Easter treats
Can’t believe Easter has been and gone. Seems like Christmas was only a month or so ago.
The garden is starting to bloom:
I tempered a bar of Aldi chocolate – which is really nice – and made the egg above. I stuck on some fondant flowers and… ooh la la. A lovely little egg.
I bought a few egg ‘boxes’ to fill with little chocs from Ikea and other places.
Lemon and Elderflower Sponge Cake
A light sponge made with organic lemons and free range organic eggs (let’s try for happy chickens!).
The flowers are made from a blend of normal roll out fondant icing with Tylose kneaded in and left overnight to cure. (I used 250g roll out icing and 1 tsp Tylose which made up a generous amount of ‘sugar paste’, far more than needed for these flowers).
Easter is just over a week away and the shops are full of wall-to-wall chocolate eggs.
I had a go at making some of my own. Melted chocolate must be tempered before you can use it in molds.
Tempering chocolate the seeding way
Take a ‘measure’ of chocolate, say, 300g.
Put 100g (a third) to one side and chop it finely.
Put the 200g in a bowl and microwave in 30s bursts, stirring between bursts, until the chocolate reaches a temperature of 46 – 48ºC and the chocolate has fully melted.
Start adding handfuls of the remaining chopped chocolate into the melted chocolate and stir until it’s blended together.
Keep doing this until the chocolate has cooled down to a temperature of 30 – 31ºC.
The chocolate will then be tempered (just eat any chopped chocolate left over!).
Pour the chocolate into molds and leave to cool
Tempered chocolate retains the shine and snap of the original shop-bought chocolate.
I bought a couple of little molds from Søstrene Grene for around 1.50, I think. The chocolate eggs were perfect. I used one to pipe royal icing flowers and writing which turned out quite charming in a homely way but didn’t survive long enough for pictures.
Amazon sells foil for wrapping chocolate and am thinking it might be nice to make a few personalised eggs with some little chocs inside – like Moser Roth mini bunnies.
Help the bees
To find out more about helping our buzzy little friends out, have a read of this easy guide: Irish Times.
Vanilla Mocha Cupcakes
The sponge is chocolatey and malty and fluffy as soft clouds. The buttercream is a duo of vanilla and mocha that complements the sponge beautifully. The silver balls are crispy silver shells from Tesco, filled with chocolate so lots of complementing going on… ‘Ooh, you’re nice’ ‘So are you!’ 🙂
I used an 868 Open Star nozzle and played around for different effects:
I’m quite besotted with this star nozzle:
I had a bowl of egg whites in the fridge from the day I made lemon curd so used them up making Italian meringue.
I had 5 egg whites and poured them directly into my stand mixer.
I put 400g of sugar (granulated) with 100ml of water into a saucepan and put it on the heat after an initial quick stir – no stirring at all after this first swizzle round. Leave the sugar to dissolve and reach a temperature of 110º (you MUST use a sugar thermometer).
As soon as it gets to 110º, switch the stand mixer on a medium speed to start whisking the whites to break down the proteins in the albumen.
Meanwhile, keep a close eye and check on the temperature of the sugar. As soon as it reaches 118º, take it off the hob and bring it over to the mixer and gently pour it down the side of the mixing bowl.
Take care not to pour it into the centre as the whisk will fling it around and you could get scalded/burned.
The sugar cooks the egg whites while the mixer whisks it to a smooth, glossy, peaks. Leave it whisking until the bowl is cool. You can add a teaspoon or so of vanilla flavouring at this point and whisk that in.
Finally, pop the meringue mix into a piping bag with the nozzle of your choice and pipe onto parchment paper on baking trays.
Place in the oven on a very low heat, around 80º, for 45 mins to maybe an hour.
When done, they should lift off the parchment easily.
They should be crispy on the outside but still have squidgy, gooey softness on the inside.
I love the elegant ‘swan’s neck’ the nozzle produced as it was pulled away.
Just love the 868 – it’s my nozzle star!
Lemon velvet cake with mascarpone frosting
I made a lemon velvet cake with Mascarpone cheese frosting and home-made lemon curd filling. You can use another brand or type of cream cheese, Philadelphia (available in Ireland and UK) is a good one to use but it’s not in the same league as Mascarpone for sheer creamy, smooth luxury. Most cream cheeses are made from whole milk.
Mascarpone is made from double cream. Whichever cheese you go with, it’s an easy frosting to make and if you find buttercream too sweet, cream cheese frosting is for you.
Mascarpone cheese frosting
150g softened unsalted butter,
240g cream cheese
840g icing sugar
Sift the icing sugar into a large mixing bowl, add the butter and Mascarpone and beat together till blended and smooth. Done. Pipe or smooth the frosting over your cake with a spatula and sandwich cake layers together with it. Truly gorgeous.
One word of *caution*; cream cheese frosting gets soft fairly quickly in warm weather so it’s best to eat the frosting while it’s very fresh or make/keep the cakes in a cold atmosphere. You can also freeze Mascarpone frosting for about a month but you’ll need to give it a thorough beating after letting it defrost at room temperature.
Still enjoying dark photography, as you can see from the photo. The initial shot was a little darker so I upped the exposure and increased the white balance to lift it a bit.
Remember the flowers? I posted a How To Make Pineapple Flowers a while back having made a big load and used them to decorate the cake. They give the cake an almost antique quality, reminiscent of an aged auntie’s flowery bonnet.
Mr Bee said not to bother hanging the washing out this morning as it was going to rain. He said it was the equivalent of “painting the devil on the wall” which means “tempting fate”. He was right. It lashed down.
No More Mondays 