Easter Nest Shortbread Cake

I’m sitting right here with a warm tea by my side. I’m freezing. It is so freaking cold here in Europe. My brother and I have a cold and in the middle of our sneezing session, we decided we needed a shortbread cake.

Easter Nest Shortbread Cake2

I have already showed you the family recipe à la Mama . THis one here is the Easter version of it. Prepared in a round pan and without Nutelly in the whipping cream. Tasted just as good.

Easter Nest Shortbread Cake3

I am very proud of this nest which is made of edible Easter grass and marzipan eggs breeded by a chocolate hen. I bet her chicken will be chocolate covered marzipan! :D Hope you have nice holidays, despite the temperatures. xoxo

Easter Nest Shortbread Cake1

Bulgarian Shortbread Cake

(makes about 10 pieces)

400 g (14 oz) shortbread
1 l (4 cups + 4 tbsp) milk
2 pck. Chocolate pudding powder
6 tbsp. sugar

500 ml (2 cups) heavy cream

sprinkles, decoration (optional)

Place one layer of cookies in a round cake pan. (Everything about 10“ is okay.)

Prepare the pudding as written on the package with the milk and sugar. Pour a part of the hot pudding on the cookies, which is enough to cover them and smooth it down. Place another layer of cookies on top of the pudding. Put one more layer of pudding on top. Continue like this, until you have no more pudding, the last layer must not be cookies.

Let the cake cool completely. Prepare the topping in the meanwhile.

Beat the heavy cream with a mixer until it is stiff. When the cake is cooled, place the cream on top and smooth down. Decorate as you like. Let the cake chill for at least one hour in the fridge.

Serve and enjoy :)

Easter Nest Cherry Cupcakes

This week, a packet of almond flour found its way to my home. Muhahahahahahah. Finally. I had a so-so first try on macarons, which tastet great, I think, but did not develop feet and did not look very photogenic, either. So you are not getting a picture of this now. Maybe someday, when I succeed. But almond flour is a multitalent and can be used in many recipes.

Easter Nest Cherry Cupcakes3

I came across a blueberry muffin recipe this week in a Dr. Oetker book called simply “Muffins”, which was way too simple for me to try it. But as I have experienced that Dr. Oetker’s doughs mostly turn out very soft and airy, I changed the whole thing a little and made fresh, modern cherry muffins.

Easter Nest Cherry Cupcakes4

I did not use chopped hazelnuts, but almond flour. I’m sure it works just as well with the same amount of less fine ground almonds. With the right cupcake wrappers they become a nice Easter treat :) As a decoration, I piped chocolate frosting on Top and placed mini chocolate eggs inside the nest. I won’t give the frosting recipe to you, because it is not developed enough… But the cupcake recipe is.

Easter Nest Cherry Cupcakes2

Easter Nest Cherry Cupcakes1

Easter Nest Cherry Cupcakes

130 g (1 cup + 1 tbsp) flour
130 g (1 cup + 1 tbsp) almond flour or ground almonds
2 tsp baking powder
4 eggs
130 g (1/2 cup + 1 tbsp) sugar
200 g (1 cup – 2 tbsp) butter, softened
100 ml (1/2 cup – 2 tbsp) milk
1 tsp vanilla extract

150 g (5 oz.) cherries, fresh oz frozen

Line a muffin pan with paper molds. Preheat oven to 180 degrees C (350 degrees F).
Put all ingredients except cherries in a mixing bowl. Beat until the batter is smooth. Add the cherries and mix just a little until they are spread evenly in the dough.

Fill the muffin molds up to 2/3 and bake for about 25 minutes. After taking them out of the oven, the cakes will flatten a bit. But in return, you get moist, soft and fruity dough. Mhhhh.

Curd Cream Puffs

Curd Cream Puffs

Mhhhmhhhhmhmmmhmmmhhmm… Pate à Choux filled with cream and topped with sugar glaze and funny sprinkles. This weekend’s treat turned out so cute. I must admit I had my head in the clouds at the beginning. This batter needs concentration and good timing, which I usually have, but this Friday it was different. After saving money for so long, I fonally got my NIKON D5200! Best gift to myself ever! :D

Curd Cream Puffs

I had prepared the dought and it looked quite good, piped it onto the baking sheet and… I noticed i had forgotten the baking powder. Oh crap. Scraped down all the heaps of dough into a bowl again and stirred in the powder. Shame on me.

Curd Cream Puffs

Nevertheless, it turned out quite well, they baked as they should, became so large and puffy. My brother decorated them with store-bought royal icing and put sprinkles on top. Oh yeah. I must tell, that the combination was perfect for our European tongues, the cream filling alone was not sweet enough, but the sugar glaze made it perfect. Now I can’t help but give you the recipe for these babies…

Pate à Choux

50 g (1 2/3 oz.) butter/margarine
250 ml (1 cup + 1 tbsp) water
1 pinch salt
150 g (1 1/4 cup) flour
4 large or 5 medium-sized eggs
1 tsp baking powder

Cream filling:

250 g (8 oz.) curd (40% fat)
250 ml (1 cup) heavy cream
3 tbsp powdered sugar (or to taste)

Topping:

royal icing
sprinkles

Preheat oven to 200°C (400°F).
Bring water, butter and salt to a boil in a medium saucepan. Add all the flour at once and stir with a wooden spoon until the dough forms a ball and detaches from the edges of the bowl.

Danubian Waves Eclairs

Remove the pan from heat and stir in 1 egg at once, using kneading hooks.

Danubian Waves Eclairs

Let the dough cool for 3 minutes. Stir in one egg after the other, incorporate each one very well before you add the next one. Stir in the baking powder in the end.

Fill a piping bag (large round or star tip) with dough and pipe heaps onto a baking sheet covered with wax paper.

Bake for exactly 30 minutes. DO NOT OPEN THE OVEN TO LOOK!

Cut a hole into the lower part of the puffs and let them cool.

Beat the heavy cream until stiff, then add the curd and stir until smooth. Stir in the powdered sugar. Fill the puffs with cream using a piping bag.

Dacorate. Eat.