Whipped Cream Cake

Gathering the ingredients for this cake was very simple. Whipping cream, eggs, vanilla, sifted together dry ingredients, and superfine sugar.

Mise en Place

I made my own superfine sugar by processing regular granulated sugar in the food processor, since I didn’t have any superfine handy.

Bringing the cake together starts with whipping the cream to stiff peaks. My bowl for my stand mixer had the sponge for the heart of wheat bread from The Bread Bible sitting in it, so I decided to use the hand mixer on this cake. It wasn’t like it was going to be difficult.

Whipped Cream

The next step was gradually beating in the eggs & vanilla, hoping to emulsify the mixture into something resembling mayonnaise in consistency. Once you get to that point, you gradually beat in the supah-fine sugar.

Mmmm.. tastes like ice cream

At this point, the mixture tasted like vanilla ice cream. I suppose that shouldn’t be surprising, since that’s basically what it is, although if you froze this, you’d end up with a weird mouth feel, considering how high the fat content is. Next you gently fold in the flour mixture in two additions.

Spread it evenly into the pan.

Ready for the oven

After about 30 minutes in the oven and ten minutes cooling in the pan, you are awarded with a beautiful sight:

Ta-da!

My husband laughed at my pictures. “Brown on Gold on Brown. I call this my monochrome art installation.” I told him if he didn’t like them, he should start taking my pictures for me while I bake, like Jim does for Marie. He told me he’d get me some white poster board for my background. :/

I first started by making the fondant for covering the cake about a week ago. On the actual day of baking, I started by making the ganache, since it has to rest for a couple of hours before using.

Ganache Mise en Place

Process the chocolate until finely chopped.

Chopped up Chocolate

Scald the cream, and add it to the chocolate with the processor running. The result is a perfectly smooth creamy ganache.

Completed Ganache

Next step was making the biscuit roulade. While the oven was preheating, I toasted my almonds for the ganache.

Toasted Almonds

Chopped Nuts

Mise en Place for Biscuit

The biscuit starts by beating together egg yolks (and a couple of whole eggs) with sugar until they’re thick and light in colour.

Thick and Fluffy Egg Yolks

Then you add the cocoa that has steeped in hot water, then add the flour in a couple of additions.

Adding the Flour to the Yolks

Set the above mixture aside, and make the meringue (after you’ve cleaned your bowl & whisk attachment).

Components for Meringue

I think I may have overbeat my whites, but that didn’t seem to bother anything.

I think it's stiff.

After carefully folding the whites into the egg mixture, spread the batter in your prepared pan.

Buiscuit Roulade ready for the oven

I took a bunch of pictures of the cake when it came out of the oven, because I wasn’t convinced it would ever look this pretty once I took it out of the pan.

Baked Biscuit

It came out perfectly! And I successfully rolled it up to cool!

I can't believe it came out of the pan

Ok, so now I’ve got everything ready. Cooled biscuit, half the ganache with almonds in it, half without, meringue mushrooms, and chocolate fondant. The division of the ganache was an idea Hanaa had suggested in a comment on Marie’s blog. Leave some of the ganache without nuts, to keep them from poking through the fondant.

Ready for Assembly

First, spread the almond ganache on the unrolled biscuit.

Spread with Ganache

Next, roll it up. I think maybe I should have chilled it a few minutes here to keep it from running out.

Too much Ganache?

Cover the roll with a thin layer of ganache, to give the fondant something to adhere to.

Ready for Fondant

Roll out the fondant. I use a Wilton mat that I got for one of the Wilton decorating courses I took.

Rolled Fondant

Cover the log with fondant. I had a few wrinkles, but I wasn’t too worried about it, because I was planning another thin layer of Ganache.

Fondant Covered

Here is my finished cake. I did the final assembly at my aunt’s house, because she’d mentioned that she’d managed to get everything done for Christmas, except for dessert. So, Christmas afternoon, I brought her a treat.

Finished Cake!

I was highly entertained by the packaging. I don’t think I’ve ever received anything marked “EXTREMELY URGENT” before in my life.

This may very well be something I will soon come to regret, but I’ve signed up for the Heavenly Cakes Bake Through.  The newest cookbook from Rose Levy Beranbaum was officially released today, and the publishers have decided to promote it via an online “Bake Through”.  The reviews I’ve seen for Rose’s Heavenly Cakes are overwhelmingly positive, and if it’s anything like The Cake Bible or The Bread Bible, I know it will be an excellent addition to my baking library.

Marie at The Heavenly Cake Place has made her way through about 20 or so of the cakes already, as a preview to the book’s release.  Now that the book is out in the wild, Marie has invited the rest of us to join in the fun.

I’m just hoping I didn’t misread some instruction somewhere, and I have actually signed up properly, and am one of the first 10, so I can get an autographed copy to bake from!