Cooking Lesson #66— Strawberry-Custard Cake

Strawberry-Custard Cake

                                          (Not a Short Cake)
How you doin’? Living in California, I have access to fresh strawberries within hours of when they are picked. I bought a flat of fresh-from-the field strawberries this weekend and they were so sweet and delicious. But a full flat was way too many for two to eat over a weekend so I had to find a way to use them before they spoiled. I thought strawberry shortcake.
 
Here was my dilemma—I really dislike those spongy little circles with the shelf-life of plutonium that you buy in the supermarket. I also don’t really care for split sweetened biscuits that go stale once they cool down. Split, day-old muffins don’t do it for me either. I started to think, how can I improve on something so great as just eating fresh strawberries? Voilà! That’s French for “Eureka.” How about a Strawberry-Custard Cake topped with whipped cream and a fresh berry? And, here it is… the perfect fresh summer dessert.
 
Sometimes when you are cooking or baking tragedies occur… even to professionals. Read the After-The-End-Story at the end of this post—it was a comedy of errors.
 
Prep time:  35 minutes
Bake time:  23 to 30 minutes
Additional time:  2 hours for macerating the strawberries
Yield:  8 servings:
 
Ingredients
For the berry filling
2 pounds fresh strawberries, sliced / reserve 8 beautiful, ripe strawberries for topping.
1/2 cup granulated sugar
 
For the cake
1 cup all-purpose flour
2 tablespoons cornstarch
1-1/2 teaspoons baking powder
5 eggs, separated
1 teaspoon pure vanilla extract
1-1/4 cups granulated sugar
 
For the whipped cream
1 cup heavy cream
2 tablespoons confectioners' sugar
 
Directions
To make the strawberry filling

1. Place the sliced strawberries into a mixing bowl and stir in 1/2 cup of sugar. Cover, and refrigerate 2 hours to overnight. Stir the strawberries occasionally. The longer they sit in the syrup, the more syrup you will have.
2. Make the My Way Basic Pastry Cream / custard filling (see recipe below)

To make the cake

1. Set an oven rack in the center of the oven.
2. Preheat your oven to 375⁰F.
3. Generously butter and flour a 9” x 13” baking dish.
4. In a large mixing bowl, whisk together the flour, cornstarch and baking powder.
5. Beat the egg yolks in a separate small bowl together with the vanilla extract until smooth; set aside.
6. Whip the egg whites with an electric mixer until very stiff. Slowly add the 1-1/4 cup sugar to the egg whites, a few tablespoons at a time, until the sugar is incorporated and the whites are stiff.
7. Gently fold in the yolk mixture until almost fully blended into the whites.
8. Gently fold in the flour mixture until just combined. It’s okay if a few small lumps of flour remain.
9. Deposit the batter into the prepared baking dish.
10. Bake in the preheated oven for 23 to 30 minutes or until a cake tester inserted into the center comes out dry and clean.
11. Cool in the pan for 5 minutes, then invert the cake onto a sheet of waxed paper and cut into 8 equal pieces.

To make the whipped cream

1. While the cake is cooling, whip the heavy cream with the confectioners' sugar to soft peaks.

To assemble the strawberry not-shortcakes

1. Cut each cake square in half horizontally and put the bottom halves onto dessert plates.
2.  Deposit about 2 to 3 tablespoons of the custard on the bottom pieces of cake and smooth it out.
3. Spoon the strawberries and syrup over the custard. It’s okay if things start to run over the cake and onto the plate.
4. Place the cake tops over the custard and strawberries.
5. Spoon on another tablespoon of custard and then top with whipped cream.
6. Place one of the reserved whole strawberries on top of the whipped cream or on the side of the plate.

                                                          My Way Basic Pastry Cream
                           As found in my cookbook--Choclatique-150 Simply Elegant Desserts
A classic pastry cream is used in bakeries and restaurants to fill cakes, pies, tarts, and pastries. Over the years, I have come to judge great pastry chefs on the quality of their pastry cream and have never found this criterion to let me down. What I like about this pastry cream is that when “as is,” you can eat it like a pudding. I am always disappointed when I order dessert in a restaurant only to discover that the pastry chef uses using some kind of plastic, gloppy packaged custard mix. What’s so hard about doing it my way?

Prep time:  10 minutes
Cook time:  10 minutes
Cool time:  20 minutes
Yield:  2-1/2 cups

Ingredients
2 large egg yolks
1 large egg
1/3 cup plus 1/4 cup granulated sugar, divided
1/4 cup cornstarch
2 cups whole milk
2 tablespoons unsalted butter, softened
1 teaspoon pure vanilla extract
 
Directions

1. In a medium mixing bowl, whisk together the egg yolks and egg.
2. In another bowl, whisk 1/3 cup of the sugar with the cornstarch. Slowly stir into the eggs until creamy and smooth.
3. In a heavy saucepan, heat the milk and the remaining 1/4 cup sugar over medium heat until boiling, stirring continuously.
4. Drizzle the milk into the egg mixture in a slow, thin stream, whisking constantly, to temper the eggs so that they do not cook.
5. Return the mixture to the saucepan and stir constantly over low heat until thickened, 3 to 4 minutes.
6. Remove the pan from the heat and whisk in the butter and vanilla until the pastry cream is smooth and blended.
7. Lay a sheet of plastic wrap directly on top of the pastry cream to prevent a skin from forming.
8. Let the pastry cream cool for about 20 minutes and then refrigerate until ready to use. The pastry cream will keep fresh for up to 2 days. Whisk well before using.

ChefSecret:  To flavor the pastry cream, whisk 1/2 cup chocolate syrup into the pastry cream with the butter. You can also whisk in 1/2 cup of caramel sauce to make caramel pastry cream.

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Strawberry Custard Cake Parfait

After-The-End-Story:  You know, sometimes stuff happens and that was the case with this recipe. For some reason, the cake wouldn’t easily come out of the baking dish. And, you guessed it—it broke apart and crumbled. I did manage to get at least one good piece for the picture—and I ate that soon after the photo was taken.
My very formal and strait-laced pastry chef in Paris once told me there would be days like this. So, in these cases, you can always make trifles. In my case I made parfaits—a couple of spoonfuls of custard, a broken lump of cake or two, strawberries, and repeat ‘till you reach the top of the glass leaving room for whipped cream.
Since this cake can be a bit temperamental and if you have a fear of failure, replace the whole cake recipe with a boxed version of yellow cake mix… replace the called-out oil with melted butter.

ChefSecret:  Try making different fruit fillings using other berries and ripe stone fruit. Just follow the same direction above.

#Dessert #Strawberry #CustardCake #StrawberryShortcake #Baking #PerspectivesTheConsultingGroup #QuarantineKitchen #Covid19

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