Daring Bakers Challenge July 2011 Fraisier

Daring Baker’s Challenge July 2011

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Jana of Cherry Tea Cakes was our July Daring Bakers’ host and she challenges us to make Fresh Frasiers inspired by recipes written by Elisabeth M. Prueitt and Chad Robertson in the beautiful cookbook Tartine.

(You can find the recipe here:  57_Fresh_Fraisiers-DB_July_2011.)

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For this challenge, we needed to make the chiffon cake and pastry cream from the recipes provided.  From there we could take it in any direction.  (By the way, the cookbook, Tartine, is fantastic.  I have made a few items from it and all have turned out wonderfully.)

*So…  Fraisier is similar to Fraise which is strawberry in French.  While I love strawberries, cherries have also just come into season.  I decided to make a Black Forest version because cherries are in season.

First, I made the chiffon cake.  In order to give the cake just a tiny bit more chocolate burst, I decided to add chocolate extract, as well as the vanilla extract and the cocoa called for in the recipe.

I also didn’t want to bother with dividing the cake and so used 2 cake pans.

While the cake cooled, I made the pastry cream.  This is an incredibly involved pastry cream.  It’s actually a lightened one – that is, whipped cream is folded into the pastry cream base and the pastry cream is mixed with a melted gelatin.  The gelatin is what eventually holds the whole cake together.

Note that in order to cool the pastry cream quickly, I spread the it on top of plastic wrap on a small baking sheet.  Then I covered the top of the pastry cream with another layer of plastic wrap (to prevent a skin from developing).  Using the method of mixing the gelatin into the pastry cream over the bain marie was good, but I had to whisk a lot in order to make sure that the pastry cream was perfectly smooth.

*The cherries took a long time to pit and cut in half.  When I tried to put them around the edges, they didn’t stay up.  So, I piped a thin layer of the pastry cream.  I ended up facing the cherries with the rounded side outward because it just looked better.

To decorate the top, I whipped together some stabilized whipped cream.  Then I spread some on top and piped little rosettes to hold the whole cherries (with stems) that I had kept for decoration.  (I saw a picture of a black forest cake with the whole stemmed cherries and it just looked dramatic.  It made sense to try to re-create it.)

Note that I didn’t use plastic wrap to line the edges.  Instead I had professional plastic strips that are a bit sturdier.  They allowed me to use a slightly bigger spring form pan and just pull the strip tight around the cake (holding it on the outside with duct tape.)  Worked perfectly….

Result:  The cake was tall and miraculously stayed together when cut.  It was extremely dramatic.  While the black forest cakes on the web seem to have denser chocolate cake and vary in decoration widely, I enjoyed thinking about changing the Fraisier to fit the bill.  Everyone really liked this version – They thought that the cake had enough chocolate flavor and the whole thing was a lot lighter than it looks.  That is, for a summer cake, it was perfect – light (not heavy, as a butter cake would be), fruity, and creamy (but not overwhelming like a full-fat custard).

*Summary: While this is quite an involved production, each of the pieces was not difficult (and the pastry cream could be simplified).  I could see myself making it again with the strawberries.  It was a fantastic, light summer dessert and everyone liked it.

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