Autumn birthday cake for great grandfather’s 80th birthday

Caroline’s great grandfather turned 80 and we were all asked to bring a cake for the party. I planned something spectacular, but as the case often is in this house, things didn’t go according to plan, so I had to down scale and improvise.

My father and my husband kindly volunteered the comment that the look was boring and that they had expected something more creative. I will suggest that they are spoiled when it comes to cakes!

The cake was a chocolate/nut cake:

4 egg yokes whipped light with 75g brown sugar. Add 150 g chopped chocolate, 50 g chopped hazelnut, 50 g chopped pistachio nuts, orange zest from 1 orange and 25 g flour. Gently add 4 egg whites beaten stiff with 75 g brown sugar. Bake in a well-greased baking tray with baking paper at the bottom for approx. 1 hour at 170 degrees.

A there were quite a big number of guests, I have 2 1/2 time the above-mentioned amounts.

Once out of the oven pour ginger syrup over the cake: orange juice, sugar and ginger.

Once completely cooled covered in nougat and marzipan.

Princess cake – for newborn girl

One of Caroline’s little friends from kindergarten, Bille, became a big brother this week. That’s a big thing when you are 4 years old, and Caroline suggested that we should make Bille a cake to take home to his newborn sister. I could think of no good excuse for not making a cake.

The cake consisted of two layers of chocolate mousse between three layers of thin cocoa cake sheets and covered in 1:1 ganach and marzipan. The decorations including the princess crown were made out of fondant.

Thin cocoa cake sheets:

2 eggs whisked white with 80 grams of sugar + 40 grams of flour, 30 grams of cocoa powder, a pinch of salt, ½ tea spoon vanilla sugar and ½ tea spoon baking powder. Spread out on baking paper covered baking tray and bake for 6-8 minutes at 200 degrees).

Chocolate mousse:

150 grams of chocolate melted in water bath. Add 2 egg yokes. Carefully add 2 egg whites whisked stiff with 1 table spoon sugar. Whip 2 dl cream and add to chocolate.

1:1 chocolate ganach:

200 ml of boiling cream poured over 200 grams chopped dark chocolate. Let sit for a little while, then stir until smooth. Let chill until it has the same feel as soft butter. Cover the cake and let chill before covering the cake in marzipan or fondant.