Recipe

Ingredients

Biscuit Cake (notes)

• 6 Eggs
• 100g Flour
• 120g Cornstarch
• 200g Sugar
• 4Tbsp hot Water
• 1 1/2 Tbsp Instant Coffee

For the soaking

• A cup of cold black coffee (notes)

Mascarpone cream

• 500g Mascarpone
• 800g Heavy cream
• 4Tbsp Icing Sugar
• 4tsp Instant Coffee
• 2Tbsp hot Water

Instructions

1. Beat the eggs until they have become fluffy.
2. Sift in the cornstarch, flour and sugar.
3. Make sure to mix well with an electric mixer to avoid clumps.
4. Integrate the instant coffee into the hot water before adding it into the batter.
5. Preheat the oven to 180ºC
6. But baking paper into a cake form and butter it.
7. Fill batter into the cake form.
8. Bake the cake for 30 minutes or until a toothpick stuck in the middle comes out clean.
9. Once the cake is done, take it out of the oven and use a long bread knife to cut it into three layers.
10. Leave the layers to cool while you prepare the mascarpone cream.
11. Use an electric mixer to mix the mascarpone and the heavy cream together.
12. Sift the icing sugar into the cream and mix well.
13. Separate the cream in two.
14. Mix the coffee into one of the halves.
15. Put the cream into the fridge for 30 minutes or until it is solid enough to be piped.
16. Place the cream into a piping bag with a round nozzle.
17. Use a baking brush to soak the cake base with the black coffee.
18. Pipe circles or spirals in both colours on the cake.Cool the cream before decorating the cake.

19. Place the creams into piping bags with star nozzles and pipe the decorations.
20. Pipe the top in circles changing the colours.
21. For the side, start piping from the bottom and pull the piping bag up without lifting the bag to form the pattern of the white cream in the image below.

22. Place the cake in the fridge for several hours or until serving.

Notes

Biscuit cake: This is a tricky type of cake. It is easy to get something wrong. In fact, I have had huge trouble with it before. Sometimes it is not completely done in the middle. So make sure to do the toothpick trial exactly in the centre and don’t take the cake out too soon. If you take it out and put it back in too many times, it will collapse and become dry. Make sure the eggs are correctly beaten so you get the right texture. It should be fluffy on the inside.

Coffee: There is a distinct difference in the taste of instant coffee versus a good blend. This coffee’s main taste is coffee. So it is important to use a good coffee for the soak. Instant coffee is best for cream or the cake itself but I much prefer using coffee made with a coffee machine rather than instant coffee for the soak. It has a stronger more distinct taste to it.

Heading to Italy

Overview

Focaccia is a typical Italian recipe believed to have originated before the Roman Empire was formed. Some historians also hold the believe it originated in Ancient Greece. It is important to acknowledge that unrisen flat bread has also long been made throughout the Middle East. However, it can be confirmed that recipes similar to this one can be found in Turkey, France, Spain and Greece. It is also speculated to be the origin of pizza dough. Despite its rich history, it is an easily approachable recipe. It can be varied by adding toppings before baking or filling the finished bread with cheese or ham.

Recipe

Ingredients

• 500g Flour
• 300ml Water
• 60ml Olive Oil (extra for greasing the pan and for the top)
• 2tsp Sugar
• 2tsp Salt
• 1package(25g) Fresh Yeast
• Sea Salt and Rosemary

Instructions

1. In a metal bowl, warm the water until lukewarm and add the sugar. Take the water off the heat. Crumble the yeast into the water and mix well. Let the mixture set for 5-10 minutes to proof the yeast.
2. Put the flour in a large mixing bowl and add the salt on one side. Pour the yeast mixture on the other side. Try to make sure that yeast and salt don’t touch directly until it is totally unavoidable! Salt turns yeast off. Add the oil.
3. Use a fork to mix the mixture until you can knead it by hand. Knead until obtaining a smooth dough.
4. Cover the dough with a tea towel and let it to rise for 45 to 60 minutes.
5. When the dough has risen, oil a baking pan and tilt the dough into it. Spread the dough until it is about 2cm thick.
6. Make deep holes in the dough and fill them with a bit of rosemary. Sprinkle the focaccia with salt and cover it with a tea towel. Leave to rise for another 20 minutes.
7. When the dough has finished rising, sprinkle a bit of oil over it.
8. Bake the focaccia on 200ºC for 20 minutes or until golden.
9. Cut and serve warm with a bit of olive oil and salt.

Variations

Focaccia, being bread, can be eaten in a thousand and one ways. With ham and cheese filling or with tomatoes and olives intead of rosemary and salt on top. Anything you like can be added to it. It has a lot of room for your creativity and prefferences.

You can also vary the choice of flour. For example, you can use 250g of spelt flour and 250g of plain flour. That combination is nice with a cheese and onion topping or cherry tomatoes and black olives.