Tuesday 29 May 2012

Three-Flavoured Layer Cake with Chocolate Ganache


Coincidentally I had made a layer cake last week to celebrate my daughter’s birthday and thought it would be great to submit this for Bake-Along No. 25 – Bake-Along 1st Anniversary Layer Cake.  Happy birthday Bake Along, and here’s to many more wonderful bakes in future!
I seldom make layer cakes because all that cream and ganache isn’t something I want my family to eat all the time and because my frosting skills are in need of improvement. However, exceptions are made for birthdays where the effort put in is more important than how the cake looks.
My daughter wanted all her favourite flavours on her cake so I made three 9 inch layers with a different cake recipe each and stacked them together. The three layers are Oreo butter cakesteamed moist chocolate cake and vanilla cake (recipes below).
The three cakes are layered with strawberries, whipping cream and chocolate ganache. The cake is then covered by a thick later of chocolate ganache. I really do not want to think how many calories there is in each slice.
I did not take a picture of the outside of the cake as I could not get the ganache to cover up the uneven sides due to my lousy stacking skills. Next time I should probably use buttercream to frost my cake as that would help hide my mistakes. Nonetheless, the cake was really quite delicious and the birthday girl (and rest of the family) ate it happily!
Oreo Butter Cake (8 inch)
Ingredients
  • 225g cake flour (or Top Flour)
  • 1 tsp baking powder
  • ½ tsp baking soda
  • ½ tsp salt
  • 85g unsalted butter, cut into pieces
  • 170g sugar
  • 2 eggs, beaten
  • 1 cup(240ml) nonfat unsweetened yogurt
  • 1 tsp vanilla essence
  • 80g Oreo cookies, roughly crushed (I use mini Oreos)
Method
  • Preheat oven to 180C and grease or line a 8-inch round tin.
  • Sift together cake flour, baking powder, baking soda and salt.
  • Cream the butter and sugar until light and creamy. Dribble in eggs slowly, about 1 tbsp at a time, beating constantly for about 2 mins.
  • On LOW speed, beat in 1/3 of the flour mixture until just combined. Beat in ½ of the yogurt. Then beat in 1/2 of the remaining flour mixture, followed by the remaining yogurt, and vanilla extract. Finally beat in the remaining flour mixture.
  • Lastly, fold in the crushed cookies.
  • Pour into prepared tin and bake for about 40 – 50 mins till skewer inserted comes out clean.
  • Cool in pan for 5 mins. Unmold and cool completely.
Steamed moist chocolate cake (8 inch)
Ingredients
  • 1/2 cup light oil
  • 225 g castor sugar
  • 200 ml fresh milk
  • 2 eggs, lightly beaten with a folk
  • 110 g plain flour
  • 60 g good quality unsweetened cocoa powder
  • 1/2 tsp baking powder
  • 1/2 tsp baking soda
  • 1/2 tsp vanilla extract
  • 1/4 tsp salt
Method
  • Heat up your steamer or wok before making the cake.
  • Line and grease a 9-inch pan.
  • (A) Combine castor sugar, fresh milk and instant coffee in a saucepan. Stir over low heat until sugar is dissolved. You do NOT need to come to a boil. Once all ingredients are combined, turn off the fire and leave it on the stove to cool.
  • (B) In the meantime, sift the flour, cocoa powder, baking powder and baking soda and salt into a large mixing bowl.
  • Once (A) is cooled*, add the beaten eggs, vanilla extract and oil, and mix thoroughly. Finally, pour the entire mixture into the cocoa/flour and stir till well combined. The final batter should be runny. It is very important that (A) is cooled before you add the eggs, else you will cook the eggs and end up with custard.
  • Pour the batter into the prepared pan and place it in the steamer. Make sure that your cake tin is NOT touching the water. Cover the top of the pan loosely with a sheet of aluminium foil.
  • Steam over medium heat for 45mins.
  • Cool the cake in pan before turning out for further decoration.
Vanilla cake (6 inch)

Ingredients
  •  1 1/4 cups cake flour
  • 1 1/4 teaspoons baking powder
  • 1/2 teaspoon baking soda
  • 1/2 teaspoon salt
  • 2 eggs
  • 3/4 cup sugar
  • 1 1/2 teaspoons pure vanilla extract
  • 1/2 cup oil (vegetable, canola or extra light olive oil)
  • 1/2 cup buttermilk
  • (or 1/2 cup milk plus 1/2 teaspoon white vinegar or lemon juice- add acid to the milk then set aside for 5 minutes before using)
 Method
  • Preheat oven to 180C.
  • In a medium bowl, add cake flour, baking powder, baking soda and salt.  Stir together with whisk, and set aside.
  • In the bowl of an electric mixer, add eggs and beat 10-20 seconds.  Add sugar and continue to beat on medium speed about 30 seconds.  Add vanilla and oil, beat.
  • Reduce mixer speed to low and slowly add about half of the flour mixture.  Add half of the milk, then the rest of the flour and the rest of the milk.  Beat until just combined.  Scrap down the side of the bowl.
  • The batter will be thin.   Pour batter into cake tin and bake for about 40 minutes till a skewer inserted into the centre comes out clean.
  • Cool in pan 1-2 minutes, then remove cake from pan and finish cooling on a wire rack.

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