Wednesday, April 15, 2015

The Polish Princess Cake





                            Warning: Do not read this story until you have baked your Princess lol




Zounds!    What little monster is growing in my oven? A Princess? Indeed, it would not appear to be so.

*To answer that very question, I now offer a fine reward of the difficult-to-obtain frozen sour cherries, or cranberries, to the first person who can solve the riddle of the problem of my Polish Princess Cake #1 featured above. 

For all of the members of our clan, this will be a throwing down of the glove, and will most likely pique Mr. Tony and Mr. Raymond, who do enjoy a puzzlement. Therefore, I shall offer no clues regarding the problem of Cake #1.



Above, the mis en place was in order for the cake. The photos below picture the mixing -














The next picture is the one that caused me to look at the batter a little askance since I had noticed as it was going into the pan it 
almost filled it. I made sure to wipe around top edge as Rose does.





Since I was curious I watched the cake more closely than usual. At first I was delighted to see her happily rising, - rising, - and rising ~~~~~~~ to the top of the pan ~ over the top of the pan - Nooooo!
ooooo!

I removed it after poking and finding soup inside - back into the oven - several times. Finally I gave up and began to just peel back the crust such as it was. You can see.

There was no salvation. I eyed it with disdain and summarily set it into the trash.   Hence the riddle -- The cause of the problem?

                                                # # # #


Cake #2:  The next day I began again, recalling Peggy remaking the whipped cream. Once again, mis en place, and so forth - the lonesome syrup was still a bright spot sitting there waiting with delightful fumes emanating from it.



With the first cake I had not gotten to the pastry cream stage so this was a new adventure.

I didn't quite recall what Peggy said about the stages of the cake, so I just attempted to follow directions. All of the many. I find that I sometimes get confused about small things. I won't list them. Perhaps sometime I should list a few just to see if anyone else wonders about things I wonder about.

I had to syrup the day after I made the new cake, but I thought that okay. Bottoms up. I always eye the sopping cake with a jaundiced eye, but the recipe reminds to put 1 /3 syrup on the bottom and the remaining enormous quantity onto the top through the sieve of poked holes. I have never had a problem with genoise, but this was odd, a sponge. However - I even remembered to put the blasted 3T of warm water in the batter at the last moment. The cake appeared happy so all was well. But the syrup worried me. Still. Anyhow, not to belabor a point - more ...


I made the pastry buttercream: I measured the pastry buttercream. Put the bowl on the scale and took out some cream to leave 530 g. in the scale bowl. I thought the amount in the other bowl looked odd. It was. I ended up with about 400+ in each bowl. Hmm. I am not good at math and could not even consider Rose's formula, so I decided I would just take 530g and make what I liked best for the top - the chocolate-raisin pastry buttercream and put the lesser amount of cocoa-walnut as the center layer. I will swear I did not eat the other part of that cream.

Next day. More 'Compose the Cake'. Yay. Faith springs eternal, don'tcha know -- Soften the smaller bit, slowly mix, add cocoa, it becomes granular - Omg. And I am sick from eating it, I could care less if it is granular, especially since the granules are baby butter bits and I loooove it. So, I mixed in the walnuts and that was the middle layer come hell or highwater. Goopy. Onto the cake. Back into the fridge. Cake still seeping its delicious syrup. Was fresh out of Polish Vodka, used Swiss Kirschwasser.

later sliced
The next day. I attempted the impossible [again]. I needed a collar to elevate the 2 3/4" tall sides to 3 inches. Heavy duty foil. After wasting a roll or two, I knew it was not happening and the sponge is becoming very unsettled and syrup oozing. I spent over an hour trying to make it happen. If I got it off, I couldn't get the sides back on. But a flash! Aha! Remember that enlargeable ring? It worked! It held the cake on the glass bottom - and a collar. Hallelujah! Back to the fridge.


Next day. No miracle. The chilled buttercream is like a rock. Thaw the larger amount of the buttercream and mix slowly, although I will admit to a moment of fury during which I zapped it on high, but it did not get granular, just goopy. I folded in the raisins and chocolate and added it to the top with its grated chocolate

Chilled again ..

On the third day, I think, this morning as a matter of a fact, I got it out for its portrait and, as my daughter did when she had her first portrait made, it threw a full-blown tantrum and collapsed into a sodden mass. I shored it up and took another picture to fool you. I cut a couple of portions and took the rest of it to work where one lady ate a piece, pronounced it delicious, which it was, and said it didn't matter that it was the consistency of porridge. It was still in the office kitchen when my husband came to take me home to watch Dancing With the Stars, which I think I like infinitely better than baking obstinate cakes. Perhaps I would be batter at it.

Having been shored up ...

In full regalia


                                    At least the plate is royal.




30 comments:

  1. Joan, you posted early! Your polish princess is looking regal indeed! Looks fabulous and delicious!

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    1. I keep seeing remarks that sound a bit like scolding and apologetic for having done so. Am I missing some rule about posting early? Actually I did so bec I misunderstood princess to be last week, but things happen.

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    2. LOL! No..not scolding..I'm not the blog police.. hee hee..

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  2. Goodness faithy it's a joke - take a look at the story lol

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  3. Zounds! Your sponge has a muffin top! Was it too many eggs? There are a lot of yolks in that container.

    I love your 'moment of fury'. I have a lot of them when I'm cooking. Then despair.

    Well your polish princess looks pretty. The 'kindly' porridge remark is priceless!

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  4. lol - no cranberries for you. Thanks so much for your empathy ; )

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  5. Joan, I counted about 10 egg yolks in the photo instead of the 4 to 6 called for. Also, did you use the 3 inch high cake pan to make the cake? I suspect not as you showed making the collar for molding the shorter pan. If my diagnosis is correct, please don't send me the cherries or cranberries!

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  6. Oh. My. Gosh. !!! This has to get some sort of award for being The Best write up EVER! Did you use self rising flour? I will give you my tip used many times during the Heavenly Cakes baking days; when a cake throws a tantrum rip it to pieces and turn it into a trifle. No one is ever the wiser and they think it's a beautiful dessert in a crystal trifle bowl!

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  7. If I had to guess, I'd say you somehow combined the batter for the strawberry shortcake with that for the polish princess, based on the number of eggs, as Rose pointed out.

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    1. lol - i went and looked and that batter for strawberries was one page back. Good Grief Charlie Brown - I couldn't have -- omg.

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  8. Or did you reverse the amount of egg whites with yolks?

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  9. Oh my goodness. Love your post. What a naughty cake, giving you so much trouble. I agree, the porridge comment is priceless!

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  10. Thank you all for being so much fun with my antics! The later sleuthing will become even more critical because they can narrow down by considering your ideas first. We look out for our ruling Tai Chi Master, ButterYum, Hanna, Sugar Cakes, the tricksters T and R. Along with Jen and Nancy and all host of others Alpha!!!!! XO

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  11. Am I allowed to have another guess? I've been studying your pictures and having just made the cake myself, it looks like you have 3 times as much batter as I had. Did you double the flour? And if not can someone make the correct guess and put me out of my misery.

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  12. Joan: I love your post, and I don't care what you did--you made it look delicious anyway (somehow), and that's the REAL test of a great cook! :-)

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  13. Replies
    1. Actually the pieces that fell off the sides were wonderful crunchy abstract cookies and were tasty!

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  14. Good heavens, what an uncooperative cake...but a wonderful description of the battle. A wild guess: did you double the recipe then forget to bake it in two pans? You certainly had way more batter than Rose said you should in the recipe.

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  15. Aw shucks, you are so much fun. Yes, Nancy. I've been waiting for you to show up with a time-line or excel sheet. I am so un-left-brained that I couldn't get past my for for sure explanation, and now I am not to cock-sure after all. I think there is something that is going to totally humiliate me, but I will let it ride for a few more minutes.
    In the meantime, I will share with you another one of my gaffes. I had intended to make a puzzle for Raymond with all of his mystery stuff. Remember when we did the caramel buns and were to roll the dough towards us using a ruler? My riddle for Raymond was to be 'find out what was lost in the baking and where was it found?'
    Well, I had rolled it toward me inside the dough! Only Patricia knew about it and we rolled on the floor. I never did have fun with Raymond about it, but in the face of this no-princess, I thought we could laugh a little more.... ; )

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    1. Oh Joan I laughed so much at the ruler in the caramel bun dough. It would have made it hard to cut into buns! it's those hilarious moments that balance out the ones of frustration.

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  16. Thanks, PhyllisCaroline. lol. Can't wait to see your great Princess!!

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  17. Thanks, PhyllisCaroline. lol. Can't wait to see your great Princess!!

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  18. Hi Joan, maybe you drank more of the vodka than you put in the syrup! Just a thought. Your plate is beautiful, and your cake looks perfectly presentable. I had fun reading your post. Thanks!

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  19. Lol - yes one might certainly make a few mistakes while being "in the syrup" and then again on the other side... Wheeee
    Thank you for stopping by!

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  20. I can't quite figure out how you got all those egg yolks (unless they're quail eggs), unless you used 6 eggs plus 74 grams of yolks and 90 grams of white. That would give you a total of 10 to 12 egg yolks, which looks like what you have and might give you an exploding batter too. However you got from Cake A to Cake B, the second cake looks great. I'm always impressed when people just start over again after something doesn't work out.

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  22. good job for not giving up, and it look great and yummy.

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  23. Going to miss your wit and good fun. Take care. Hope to see you back.

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