Category: Cake

Caramel Pecan Pumpkin Monkey Bread: Test 1

Source

https://www.barbarabakes.com/overnight-pumpkin-monkey-bread-with-maple-cream-cheese-icing/

Total time: 1 day 3 hours

Yield: 1 12″ bunt cake

Equipment

Standing mixer
12″ bunt pan
Food scale
Small mixing bowl

Ingredients

Pumpkin Bread

3 1/2 cups flour
7g yeast
2 tsp salt
1 tsp pumpkin pie spice
1/2 cup water
2 tablespoons unsalted butter
1 cup unsweetened canned pumpkin puree
1/4 cup granulated sugar
1 large egg

Glaze

1/2 cup butter
1 cup dark brown sugar
1/2 cup chopped pecans

Coating

1 cup packed dark brown sugar
2 tsp ground cinnamon
1 tsp pumpkin pie spice
1/4 cup ground pecans
1/2 cup unsalted butter (113g), melted

Instructions

Pumpkin Bread

  1. In a standing mixer I combined 1 cup of flour, yeast, salt, and pumpkin pie spice. I mixed these together with the paddle until blended.
  2. In the meantime, I added the water and butter into a small microwave proof bowl and microwaved until the butter was fully melted. This took roughly a minute on high. Unfortunately, when I was done the water/fat mix was too hot to add to the yeast so I waited till it cooled. You want it between 120 and 130 degrees Fahrenheit. Mine was at 126 degrees. I totally screwed up on this by the way, because my brain forgot what 4 vs 2 looks like and I used only 2 Tbsps of butter instead of the 4 suggested in the source recipe.
  3. Once the water and butter were at a non-lethal temperature, I added it to the flour mixture along with the pumpkin puree, egg, and sugar and let it mix with the paddle for 3 minutes.
  4. At this point I switched to the dough hook attachment and started adding flour bit by bit until the dough no longer stuck to the bowl at all. This was 2 1/2 cups for me on top of the first cup added in step 1.
  5. The dough was then removed from the standing mixer bowl and gently turned into a ball and added to a large well oiled bowl to rise for 60-90 minutes. I think I was on the longer side for mine but honestly, I started cleaning things and just looked over form time to time to see if it had doubled in size yet. I should also note that my house, even in the middle of winter was a lovely 73 degrees Fahrenheit and dough does rise well on my counter. If you live like a student and your home is chilly, consider putting the dough into your oven with the heat turned off but the oven light turned on. One more aside before we move on, when I took the dough out of the mixer bowl it was still a pretty wet dough. It was borderline sticky. The oil from the bowl helped me and the dough remain separate entities.

Glaze

  1. The glaze was made by just adding the brown sugar to the melted butter and whisking until incorporated. It’s really that simple and it will look for a while like these two will never come together but just keep going. This is a pretty good general rule in baking. If someone tells you to do something and it looks wrong, try mixing way longer!
  2. Finally I just added some chopped pecans, maybe even a lot of chopped pecans. This turned out to be very, very important because these beautiful pecans get a nice candy coating and became beautifully crunchy. Can’t go wrong with candied pecans guys.

Assembly

  1. Ok, so this is where it got long and a little tedious if you’re obsessive like me. I needed to take that lovely bread dough and divide it into 64 pieces. I like to weigh the whole dough and then divide it on a calculator and then weigh out each piece to the size I need. I did warn you about the tediousness. The shorter method is to just divide the dough in two, 6 times but then it won’t be perfect.
  2. In a small bowl, I mixed the coating ingredients sans butter.
  3. In another small bowl I melted the butter.
  4. Finally, this is where it got exciting again. I sprayed my bundt pan down with some baking PAM because I’m lazy and unwary of scary chemicals. You can definitely choose to coat it in butter or do whatever you do to keep thing from sticking to the pan.
  5. I took half of my glaze with those pecan gems and poured it into the pan in a nice little layer.
  6. Next, I grabbed my precisely weighed dough morsels and dipped them into that butter before tossing in the sugar-spice mixture. Then each coated dough nugget was placed in the bundt pan in evenly around.
  7. Once all of the dough has been used up and your pan is full of little dough balls, the rest of that glaze was poured on top. The dough was covered with plastic wrap with enough space for the expected rise but tight enough that the dough didn’t dry out.
  8. At last, the raw cake was thrown into the fridge to rise slowly overnight.

Baking

  1. After a long day the previous day, I loved how easy the next day was. The cake was removed from the fridge to let it come to room temperature. All in all it probably sat on my counter for 2-3 hours. Around 3 hours I realized it’s not going to rise anymore (might not be so great) and I chose to preheat the oven to 350 degrees Fahrenheit. The cake was baked for 35 minutes and then removed to cool

Notes

I know, I know I just gave you so many notes in the recipe but I have some more things to confess. After I baked this thing, I turned it out for photos and then resisted eating it somehow, put it back in the pan, covered it, and threw it in the fridge for another 24 hours. Yes, I am apparently capable of self control. Hear me out though, this was meant for a friendsgiving party so what could I do? Before eating I warmed it up in a 350 degree oven for 15 minutes before turning it out on a plate and letting people at it.

Results

Guys, this cake lived through the night ONLY because everyone was so crazy full from dinner, but it was picked at for many hours into the night with lots of love. It come out gooey, glossy, warm, tender, and those pecans…you heard about them already for good reason.

Down side, the bread dried out a bit but I’m not sure if that’s because of the butter mixup or the reheating. I guess I’ll just have to try this recipe again. Woe is me!

Notebook

Caramel Pecan Pumpkin Monkey Bread

Caramel Pecan Pumpkin Monkey Bread

Introduction

You know this recipe is good just by how many words are in the title. Monkey bread is generally just chunks of bread stacked together in a pan and baked to create a pull-apart cake. To me, monkey bread is also gooey, delicate, and luxurious. You know it’s luxurious by how much butter coats this thing.

Experimental Findings

What do you mean by “how much butter coats this thing”?

I’m going to come clean, this monkey bread is very tasty but what makes it so good is that it has a full 2 sticks of butter and nearly 2 1/2 cups of sugar. Worth it!

How was the bread itself?

It was good but not great. Test 1 wasn’t as tender as I would have liked. This could be due to insufficient butter in the dough or maybe because I reheated it 24 hours after baking before I ever got to taste it. I will just have to try this one out again.

Tests

Caramel Pecan Pumpkin Monkey Bread: Test 1 – A luxurious addition to my waistline

Rum Babas: Test 2

Source

Rum babas

Total time: 2 1/2 hours

Yield: 12 small cakes

Equipment

Medium bowl
Rubber spatula
3 Tbsp cookie scoop
Mini bunt pan with 12 wells
Sauce pan

Ingredients

Babas

220g bread flour
7g yeast
1/2 tsp salt
50g granulated sugar
2 large eggs
1/4 cup milk
100g butter, softened

Rum Syrup

1/4 cup rum
200g water
220g granulated sugar

Instructions

Babas

  1. The flour and sugar were combined in the bowl of a standing mixer along with the salt and yeast, added on opposite sides of the bowl to avoid too much direct contact. I am not sure if this is really significant but some people say that salt can retard the yeast’s activity and so avoiding direct contact is good. I have never seen this to be a problem with dry yeast personally. The ingredients were then mixed together.
  2. In a separate bowl, the milk and eggs were whisked until homogeneous.
  3. The egg mixture was added to the flour mixture and mixed using a dough hook on medium low speed. This dough will be very sticky and so lends itself better to mixing with the dough hook than by hand. I allowed to mixer to run for 10 minutes until the dough looked smooth and elastic.
  4. I added the butter to the dough with the mixer running and let the mixer knead the dough until smooth and shiny again.
  5. The dough was allowed to rise for an hour and a half until doubled in size.
  6. The oven was heated to 350 degrees F
  7. Once risen, the dough was mixed again to release the air and divided into the mini bunt cake molds. My mold holds 12 individual bunts. These are quite small. Each can hold about 3 Tablespoons of batter. A 3 Tbsp scoop is very useful here and dividing the dough with a scoop means the cakes are more even and have fewer seams where the dough meets.
  8. Once doled out, the dough was allow to rise again until molds were filled nearly to the top.
  9. They were bake for 20 minutes.

Rum Syrup

  1. All of the ingredients were added to a small pot and brought to a rolling boil.
  2. The syrup was then cooled to room temperature.

Assembly

  1. When everything is cooled and ready to be assembled, I aided the syrup saturation by pricking the bottoms of the cakes with a fork and then letting the cakes absorb half of the syrup before flipping and repeating. I let my cakes then strain on a cooling rack for an hour before packaging them away.
  2. You can top these cakes as you please. Options include whipped cream and fruit or just fruit compote. There are nearly endless possibilities here but I opted for simle whipped cream and some canned and fresh peaches with a sprig of mint.

Notebook

Rum Baba

Rum Baba

Introduction

The rum baba is a delicate yeast based cake soaked in a rum syrup. I’ve also heard them called Sabrina cakes or sometimes called a Savarin cake depending on the shape. Savarin is shaped like a bundt cake while a baba is shaped like individual little buckets though I’ve seen them as small rings as well. For mine, I like to make them into individual little bunts as they’re beautiful especially when served with fresh whipped cream and some fruit.

Experimental Findings

How am I supposed to knead this very sticky, very hard to handle dough?

You’re supposed to either do it in a standing mixer or get very sticky my your hands. Yes, seriously.

What’s the verdict?

The best description I got of my first test was that it tasted like a wet ginger cake. This is not what a rum cake should ever taste like. So skip the spices, keep it simple.

Any other tips?

Yes! Firstly, it would be easier if you make double the syrup in test 2. You need to really really soak these babies. Second, don’t wait too long to soak them and don’t have them sitting around the fridge too long before serving. They’re best when freshly soaked.

Tests

Rum Baba: Test 1 – Wet ginger cake
Rum Baba: Test 2 – Delicious rum cake

Kiev Tort

Introduction

This cake is referenced as being a more traditional version. It is comprised of two meringue layers only, without any sponge cake in between. The meringue, when dried properly, is crisp but not teeth shattering. Light and airy, this cake makes a great end of meal dessert. The buttercream here is also heavy in egg yolks which makes it rich, flavorful, and more delicate.

Experimental Findings

Do I really need to age the eggs overnight?

Not really. I have done this recipe both ways and had no issue with getting the egg whites to whip into very stiff glossy peaks. Will it help if you’re running into meringue issue? Maybe.

Golly gee, that’s a lot of sugar!

Don’t over think it. This is the perfect amount for this cake. Meringue baby!

Tests

Kiev Tort: Test 1 – Already pretty perfect

Jewish Honey Cake: Test 3

Source

https://www.allrecipes.com/recipe/219008/moist-holiday-honeycake/

Total time: 1 1/2 hours

Yield: 2 9″ x 5″ loaves or 1 12-cup bundt cake

Equipment

12-cup bundt pan or two 13″ x 9″ loaf pans
PAM baking spray
Large bowl
Whisk
Medium bowl

Ingredients

3½ cups all-purpose flour
1 Tbsp baking powder
1 tsp baking soda
½ tsp salt
4 tsps ground cinnamon
1/2 tsp ground cloves
1/2 tsp ground allspice
1 cup corn oil
1 cup honey
1½ cups granulated sugar
½ cup brown sugar
3 eggs
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
Juice of one orange diluted to 1/2 cup
2 Tbsps instant espresso
1 cup boiling water

Procedure

  1. I preheated the oven 350 degrees Fahrenheit.
  2. In a large bowl, the flour, baking soda, baking powder, salt, cinnamon, allspice and cloves were sifted together.
  3. I prepared my coffee by mixing the espresso powder with 1 cup of boiling water. I still think this is a better option than normal coffee or even fresh brewed espresso because the powdered espresso lacks the acidity of the fresh coffee options.
  4. In a separate bowl, I mixed together the oil, honey, sugars, eggs, vanilla, coffee, and orange juice.
  5. The wet mixture was added to the dry, mixing slowly from the center to incorporate the flour without lumps. This resulted in quite a thin batter. Do not let this scare you, it’s completely fine.
  6. I chose to use 2 loaf pans but a bunt cake pan would work well here as well. I greased my load pans with PAM baking spray and divided the batter between the two pans evenly.
  7. The cakes were baked for roughly 60 minutes and checked with a knife to make sure the center was done baking. The knife should come out clean and the cake should not be overly wiggly.
  8. (Optional) In previous tests I found that the cake had a crust I didn’t care for. This was easily fixed by allowing the cake to sit in a sealed container while cooling.

Results

This was the best result. It had all the elements I wanted. It was deeply spiced and rich. The honey still came through though and the whole cake was moist, lovely, and surprisingly delicate.

Notebook

Honey Jewish Cake

Jewish Honey Cake: Test 2

Source

https://www.allrecipes.com/recipe/219008/moist-holiday-honeycake/

Total time: 1 1/2 hours

Yield: 2 9″ x 5″ loaves or 1 12-cup bundt cake

Equipment

12-cup bundt pan or two 13″ x 9″ loaf pans
PAM baking spray
Large bowl
Whisk
Medium bowl

Ingredients

3½ cups all-purpose flour
1 Tbsp baking powder
1 tsp baking soda
½ tsp salt
4 tsps ground cinnamon
1/2 tsp ground cloves
1/2 tsp ground allspice
1 cup corn oil
1 cup honey
1½ cups granulated sugar
½ cup brown sugar
3 eggs
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
Juice of one orange diluted to 1/2 cup
1 cup strong brewed tea

Procedure

  1. I preheated the oven 350 degrees Fahrenheit.
  2. In a large bowl, the flour, baking soda, baking powder, salt, cinnamon, allspice and cloves were sifted together.
  3. In a separate bowl, I mixed together the oil, honey, sugars, eggs, vanilla, tea, and orange juice.
  4. The wet mixture was added to the dry, mixing slowly from the center to incorporate the flour without lumps. This resulted in quite a thin batter. Do not let this scare you, it’s completely fine.
  5. I chose to use 2 loaf pans but a bunt cake pan would work well here as well. I greased my load pans with PAM baking spray and divided the batter between the two pans evenly.
  6. The cakes were baked for roughly 60 minutes and checked with a knife to make sure the center was done baking. The knife should come out clean and the cake should not be overly wiggly.

Results

Cutting the cloves with all spice worked like a charm. The spices are well balanced now. The addition of tea instead of the coffee was more significant than I expected. It brought a good amount of brightness to the recipe. The tea is not a bad way to go but I think I would prefer the depth and richness of the coffee flavor in this recipe. I also didn’t really like the crust that this cake developed while baking. Some tasters disagreed but for me, cake loaves should not have a crust.

Notebook

Honey Jewish Cake

Jewish Honey Cake

Introduction

This is the honey cake I grew up with as a child in Israel. Sweet, moist, and heavily spiced. Great autumn bake and compliments the apple season nicely for the Jewish New Year.

Experimental Findings

So which test yielded the best cake?

I preferred the cake with both cloves and all spice as well as the coffee rather than the tea. The cloves on their own were somewhat overpowering so cutting them with all spice is a good idea. The coffee versus tea question is trickier. I personally feel that the coffee gives a deeper, richer flavor which is what I want from this cake. That said, the tea bring some brightness which is pleasant in its own right.

What about the alcohol mentioned in the source recipe?

I chose to omit it at the time because I just didn’t have any in the house. I suspect it would be delicious and it would be worth it to give it a shot. Maybe test 4 will look into that

Tests

Jewish Honey Cake: Test 1 – Cloves and Coffee
Jewish Honey Cake: Test 2 – Cloves, Allspice, and Tea
Jewish Honey Cake: Test 3 – Cloves, Allspice and Coffee

Jewish Honey Cake: Test 1

Source

https://www.allrecipes.com/recipe/219008/moist-holiday-honeycake/

Total time: 1 1/2 hours

Yield: 2 9″ x 5″ loaves or 1 12-cup bundt cake

Equipment

12-cup bundt pan or two 13″ x 9″ loaf pans
PAM baking spray
Large bowl
Whisk
Medium bowl

Ingredients

3½ cups all-purpose flour
1 Tbsp baking powder
1 tsp baking soda
½ tsp salt
4 tsps ground cinnamon
1 tsp ground cloves
1 cup corn oil
1 cup honey
1½ cups granulated sugar
½ cup brown sugar
3 eggs
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
Juice of one orange diluted to 1/2 cup
2 Tbsps instant espresso
1 cup boiling water

Procedure

  1. I preheated the oven 350 degrees Fahrenheit.
  2. In a large bowl, the flour, baking soda, baking powder, salt, cinnamon and cloves were sifted together.
  3. I prepared my coffee by mixing the espresso powder with 1 cup of boiling water. I think this is a better option than normal coffee or even fresh brewed espresso because the powdered espresso lacks the acidity of the fresh coffee options.
  4. In a separate bowl, I mixed together the oil, honey, sugars, eggs, vanilla, coffee, and orange juice.
  5. The wet mixture was added to the dry, mixing slowly from the center to incorporate the flour without lumps. This resulted in quite a thin batter. Do not let this scare you, it’s completely fine.
  6. I chose to use 2 loaf pans but a bunt cake pan would work well here as well. I greased my load pans with PAM baking spray and divided the batter between the two pans evenly.
  7. The cakes were baked for roughly 60 minutes and checked with a knife to make sure the center was done baking. The knife should come out clean and the cake should not be overly wiggly.

Results

This cake was delicious for sure but at first bite it felt like the cloves were overpowering. This intense clove flavor mellowed out by the second bite as my mouth adjusted but I would prefer to cut the cloves with some allspice to reduce that bite.

Notebook

Honey Jewish Cake

Kiev Tort: Test 1

Source

Delicious Ukrainian Cake

Total time: 1 day and 3 hrs

Yield: 1 9″ round cake

Equipment

2 9″ spring-form pans
Standing mixer
Medium bowl
Sauce pan
Cooling rack
Parchment paper (9″ rounds)
PAM for baking

Ingredients

Meringue cake

12 Egg whites
2 1/2 cups granulated sugar, divided
1 cup all purpose unbleached flour
1 Tbsp vanilla
1 lb hazelnuts

Buttercream

1 lb unsalted butter, softened
12 Egg yolks
1 cup granulated sugar
1 1/2 cups whole milk
2 tsps vanilla
1/4 cup cocoa powder
2 Tbsps cognac

Procedure

Meringue cake

  1. I toasted all the hazelnuts in the oven at 350 degrees F for roughly 20 minutes. They were then removed them from the oven and allowed to steam in a towel for another 15 minutes. The skins were rubbed off as much as possible using the same towel. Yes you will have some skin stick but who cares! Hazlenuts were coarsely chopped reserving a few for decoration.
  2. Two 9″ round pans were lined and greased with PAM. I would try butter next time as the PAM actually ended up burning. It didn’t hurt the cake too much but it made me uncomfortable to know that the edges of my cake were darker than ideal.
  3. In the standing mixer, I whipped the egg whites until foamy and slowly added the half cup of sugar while continuing to whip. Then came the vanilla and the eggs were whipped to very stiff and glossy peaks.
  4. While the eggs were whipping, I mixed together the remaining 2 cups of sugar, flour, and 1.5 cups chopped hazelnuts in a medium bowl.
  5. Once the egg whites were ready, they were gently but thoroughly fold into the dry mixture.
  6. The batter was divided evenly between the two pans and baked at 350 degrees F for 2 1/2 hours, checking periodically to see that it’s not browning too much. Seriously, I really mean it. 2 1/2 hours is the requirement. You shall bake for 2 1/2 hours. 2 1/2 hours is the length of your baking. In the meantime you can make the buttercream and clean up the mess you just made.
  7. When done, cakes were removed from the pans and cooled fully on cooling racks, overnight, under a towel is best.

Buttercream

  1. This recipe needs to cool for a while so I highly recommend doing it on the same day as the cake baking and refrigerating overnight.
  2. Milk and sugar were added to a sauce pan and heated until the milk is scalded but not boiling as it may burn the milk.
  3. While the milk was heating, in a separate bowl, I whisked the yolks until quite stiff and light yellow.
  4. Half of the milk was poured into the yolks slowly while continuing to whisk the eggs. Then the egg yolk mixture was added back into the remaining milk and place back on the heat.
  5. The eggs and milk were cooked, stirring constantly, until the custard thickened.
  6. The custard was removed from the heat, strained to remove any potential lumps, and allowed to fully cool to room temperature. Ok now you can go to bed. This was the important part, now it’s cooling. It will wait for you to wake up tomorrow.
  7. Once cool, butter was added a little at a time until fully incorporated, then the vanilla and cognac were added. Leave cocoa for later and don’t put away that mixer!

Assembly

  1. I placed a small dollop of buttercream on a cake board and place the first meringue cake right side up over the dollop. The buttercream helps the cake stay put on the board.
  2. A generous layer of the buttercream was spread over the first cake layer and the second cake layer was placed upside down over the cream. Be sure your buttercream reaches all the way to the edges of your cake. When the second layer was placed I added a little more cream along the seam and smoothed it to the sides of the cake.
  3. I kept the cake in the fridge while I prepare the chocolate buttercream. A small portion of the buttercream was reserved for decoration. To the rest, I added the cocoa and whipped until smooth, dark, and even.
  4. Once the cream was ready, the cake was retrieved from the fridge and coated the whole cake in the cocoa buttercream. Decorate as desired. I used the remaining hazelnuts to coat the sides and a few whole nuts as the base for flowers and other decoration.

Results

I don’t say this often but this cake is incredible and I would change nothing. It is crisp but light, the buttercream doesn’t feel like eating a stick of butter, and the whole experience is pleasantly boozy. What more could I want from a cake?

Notebook

Kiev Tort