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.
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.
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
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 :)
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
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.
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.
Remove the pan from heat and stir in 1 egg at once, using kneading hooks.
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.
Hey there, has the sun tickled your nose yet? Yep, spring is on the way. And I have got something springlike for you right here… Spring is the time of love – and I fell in love with these:
Eclairs. Damn. I love European treats. Now, pate à choux has always been interesting to me. So puffy, light, airy… So I decided to try it.
I wanted to combine it with something German and chose the cherry-chocolate-cream combination from Danubian Waves Cake. I bet if the Danube flew through France, the French would have made this treat.
There are many myths I have heard about pate à choux. In fact, it is very easy. You just have to follow the instuctions EXACTLY. DO NOT OPEN THE OVEN TO LOOK – the air in the dough will shrink and it won’t rise again. So please be patient with it. Make sure your oven has the exact temperature before you put the pastry in. If you do so, everything should go to plan.
If you are searching for airy, Euopean, low-carb, low-fat treats, give this recie a chance to tickle your taste buds. :)
éclairs recipe adapted from “Mmmh… Erdbeeren”
pastry cream adapted from Sprinkle Bakes book
(makes about 20 éclairs)
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
Chocolate Pastry Cream:
2 tbsp cornstarch
250 ml (1 cup) whole milk
1 egg
2 egg yolks
6 tbsp sugar
2 tbsp butter
1 tbsp vanilla extract
45 g (1 1/2 oz.) semi-sweet chocolate
40 cherries
120 ml (1/2 cup) heavy cream
100 g (3 1/3 oz.) chocolate, for coating
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.
Remove the pan from heat and stir in 1 egg at once, using kneading hooks.
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 with a large star tip with dough and pipe 10 cm (4´´) long stripes onto a baking sheet covered with wax paper.
Bake for exactly 30 minutes. DO NOT OPEN THE OVEN TO LOOK!
Let cool after baking. Then cut into halves with clean scissors.
Let cherries drain in a sieve. Beat heavy cream until stiff. Set aside.
To prepare the pastry cream, dissolve cornstarch in 1/4 cup of the milk. Add the egg, then the egg yolks one at a time to the milk mixture.
Combine 3/4 cup milk and sugar in a saucepan and bring to a boil while whisking.
Whisk the egg mixture and add 1/3 of the hot milk. Return the remaining milk to medium-low heat. SLOWLY add the egg mixture to the saucepan, whisking constantly. You do not want to boil the eggs. While whisking, bring the mixture to a boil. Remove from heat and combine with butter and vanilla. Melt semi-sweet chocolate in the microwave and stir in.
Transfer the cream into a bowl and let cool to room temperature.
To avoid askin on top of the cream, press a sheet of plastic wram directly on its surface.
Spread heavy cream at the bottom of the inside of the éclairs. Cut the cerries into halves and put 4 halves into each éclair. Spreag pastry cream on top of the cerries and close the éclairs.
Melt chocolate in the microwave and sptread in zigzag with a teaspoon over the éclairs.
Let chocolate dry and have a bite! You won’t regret it.