Orange Mascarpone Cake from Hell

This week, the Fall Baking Challenge required us to bake a cake and I chose the Orange Mascarpone Cake. The Orange Mascarpone Cake was supposed to be my masterpiece but it became my master disaster. According to the recipe, this cake should take 1 hr and 30 minutes to make. It took me little over 5 hours and it still ended up a tiny little monster. So much went wrong! I would've given up if I hadn't already spent all those ingredients on it.

Yep, that's my miserable little cake right there. I will explain how it got so sad.

The first thing that went wrong was entirely on me. Going by the quantities of the ingredients, this recipe assumes a regular sized springform pan. I used a small springform pan but forgot I had to adjust the quantities to it. The result was that the cake turned out a whole lot thicker (higher) than usual cakes: after baking it for 25 minutes I took it out of the oven, removed the pan from the bottom, and let it cool. Only after my first try at the cream did I discover (by slicing the cake open horizontally) that it wasn't done yet. (In my defense, we didn't have skewers for a test.) So, back in the oven it went! It took another 40 minutes for it to be completely done.

By then I'd already gone to the supermarket for another batch of mascarpone, because, yes, that cream had proved a real bitch to make! 

Firstly, the syrup that goes into the cream. (I'm even rolling my eyes at the memory of it.) One sheet of gelatin, the recipe said.

The recipe lies!

I boiled the orange juice for the syrup, added the sheet of gelatin, and let it cool. It certainly looked nothing like syrup (just a thick sort of orange juice) but I figured this might be precisely what the recipe intended. So I mixed it in with the cream and got nothing but an incohesive mess of watery, orange mascarpone.

Hence, off to the supermarket I went to get more mascarpone.

My second attempt at making the syrup went fairly well (with no less than 12 (!) gelatin sheets). To let it cool, I put the pan in a dish with cold water in the sink. Meanwhile, I sliced open the cake and sprinkled it with orange-flavored liquor. Then I turned to the sink to wash my hands, opened the tap... and let all the cold water run right into the orange syrup that was cooling there. Well, fuck.

A third attempt at making the syrup commenced. Another 300 ml of orange juice and 12 more gelatin sheets later I had a proper syrup, which I let cool on the stove this time. Meanwhile, my mixture of mascarpone and powdered sugar was waiting in the fridge, beautifully white and smooth and sweet.

After the syrup had cooled I mixed it in with the mascarpone. It looked fine at first, but as I was spreading it onto the cake it began to... well, it became lumpy, like you see in the photo. And I wasn't sure if that happened because the mascarpone was cold and the syrup was at room temperature (like it was supposed to be), or because it was around 30°C (86°F) today, or if there was any other reason like leprechauns pissing in my food behind my back. But it makes no difference. In the end, what was supposed to happen (according the recipe, but apparently not according the laws of nature) did not happen. Even my bake-savvy sister had no solution.

Additionally, the candied orange slices were too large even for my 'high cake'.

Summed up, that's 5 unusually dedicated hours to a disaster of an Orange Mascarpone cake from someone who doesn't even like oranges that much. The irony isn't lost on me.

But there's more. I had to try the cake too, of course.

Turns out, it's not even good!

The cake is a bit on the dry side, although to be fair it's not so dry it puts off. Perhaps it's a matter of taste. I like cakes that are a bit more moist. 

But it's really quite bland, too; a bite is much of the same. All the flavors used are orange. The cake is flavored with orange peel, the layers are covered with orange liquor and orange mascarpone, and then the cake is covered with the same mascarpone. Perhaps it would have been nice to use chocolate (or anything else) as an extra flavor.

So. Would I recommend you this cake?

Yeah. Sure. Knock yourselves out. Feel my pain and weep.

(Don't do it.)

But - on the bright side - I really liked the candied oranges, if only because they're so photogenic.

I love how even the peel becomes tasty if you candy it.

Candied Oranges:

Ingredients:

• 2 oranges
• 200 grams sugar
• 300 ml water

Directions:

1. Mix sugar with water and bring to a boil. Wash the oranges, slice them thinly, remove seeds. Put slices in the hot sugar water and turn heat low. Leave for 30 minutes.
2. Pre-heat oven to 100°C or 212°F. Drain slices and put them on a parchment lined baking sheet. Dry in the oven for 45 minutes.

So, wanna test the limits of your sanity? Here's the recipe verbatim (well, not actually verbatim, I had to translate it):

Orange Mascarpone Cake From Hell

Serves: 10 (it says)

Takes: 1 hr & 30 min. (bahaha)

Ingredients:

• 6 eggs
• 200 grams sugar
• 180 grams + extra to dust
• salt
• butter
• 300 ml orange juice
• grated peel of 2 oranges
• 1 gelatin sheet (you're on your own, kid)
• 500 grams mascarpone
• 50 grams powdered sugar
• about 5 tbsp. orange liquor

Directions:

1. Pre-heat oven to 175°C or 347°F. Split eggs. Beat yokes with 150 grams sugar and the peel of 1 orange until creamy. Beat eggwhites until stiff while gradually adding 50 grams sugar.
2. Mix first half of the eggwhite mixture in with the yokes mixture. When mixed well, stir in the other half. Sift 180 grams of flour and a pinch of salt into the egg mixture and stir well, so you get a smooth batter. (Until here I was still quite pleased with how it was panning out.)
3. Scoop the batter into a greased (butter) and dusted (flour) springform pan and bake 15-25 minutes or until golden-brown and done. Take cake out of the oven and let cool 5 minutes. Then take cake out of the springform pan and let cool more.
4. In a sauce pan, mix orange juice with the rest of the orange peel and let boil until you have about 100 ml left. Meanwhile, soak the gelatin (however many or few you dare to use) in cold water, squeeze to drain them, and stir them into the orange juice. Let cool to room temperature.
5. Mix mascarpone with powdered sugar and mix in the 'orange syrup' (or 'gelatin mixture', or 'devil's brew'). Cut the cake horizontally in three layers and sprinkle each layer richly with the orange liquor. Then spread one-fourth of the mascarpone mixture on the top of each layer and put the cake back together. Cover the entire cake with the rest of the mascarpone mixture. Let stiffen in fridge, then decorate with candied oranges.
6. Get out of the fetal position and pick yourself up from the kitchen floor. Come on. Get yourself together.

So, to sum it all up? Never. Ever. Again.

But if you do try it, you brave soul you, I salute you.

Art Fair & Home Town Sightseeing

Today was a beautiful day, with a blue sky, a breeze, and a sunny 29°C. The weather invited to do pretty much anything outdoors, including a visit to an annual art fair and a bike ride through some of Zuid-Holland's finest bits. Lucky me I got to do both!

The art fair I visited takes place each second Saturday of September in a small city called Capelle aan den IJssel. At this fair, some sixty artists from all over the Netherlands sell their work, which varies from paintings to statuettes to jewelry to hats. It's not very big - I believe it takes fifteen minutes to see it all - but the art is worth a look (and sometimes a purchase).

It's all so very pretty! But the artwork that really moved me enough to pause me in my tracks and stare (and of which I have no photos), were a series of fairly sinister paintings of mice. Sounds weird, right? They were really good, though. In one painting the mouse sat next to a block of cheese on which it had nibbled. The block, however, wasn't cheese but a grey block of concrete, set in front of a dark, almost stormy sky. In another painting the mouse sat large as a castle looming on a grey hill top of crumbs, again in front of a dark sky. What the artist had done well, I think, was make something so innocent appear so ominous and sinister. I would've loved one for in my home, were it not that I prefer not to be reminded of doom, death, and monstrous mice each day.

From an app I recently installed I got the route for the bike ride. Quite aptly, the app is called Route. (Not sure it works abroad as well.) Using it was a first for me. I wanted to let it surprise me, so I picked a route based only on its proximity and number of miles - and I must say I was not disappointed.

The directions took me through the Kralingse Bos ('Kralingen Forest'), which is not a forest in the traditional sense but also not quite a park. On the government website it is described as a 'green recreational area' and I suppose that fits, since it contains cycling paths, horseriding paths, walking paths, windmills, a small lake, boating clubs, playgrounds, restaurants, and more. I was quite pleased with the route, since it took me past the Bos's windmills and deer camp.

After the Kralingse Bos, the route took me through a bit of Rotterdam to lead me a long way past the Rotte, which was lovely. Lots of people had come to the area to walk, cycle, fish, boat, rollerskate, walk their dogs, or jump off the bridges to swim in the water. And with the city a good few miles away, everything smelled green. I enjoyed the scents and the wind in my hair and loitered at my leisure, sometimes pausing to take photos or have a snack. (At some point I even came across a cute little fixer-upper for sale, which I would absolutely buy if I had the time and money.)

At the end of the afternoon I returned home happy and a bit sore, but inhaling all that Dutch beauty was great - and as a bonus I got a tan so thick it'll probably last me a few months. 

A wonderful day it's been, and I look forward to exploring more of this little country by bike.

Banana Bread with Pecans and Dates

This week's challenge was a first for me as I've never made a sweet bread before (I also hardly ever eat them). So, I pretty much picked a recipe at random and went for the banana bread with pecans and dates. It sounded nice and it looked nice in the picture, so I just had a go with it.

I stuck to all the directions except one: to bake the bread for 40-45 minutes. I was reading a book and forgot the time... oops! The bread baked 5 minutes too long, and the top got a bit dark. It doesn't look perfect but it still tastes good - some of the edges are just a bit crispy!

(On a side note I should mention that your house will smell delicious for as long as the bread is in the oven.)

The bread has a rough texture, with little chunks of dates and pecans. The flavor is the typical banana kind of sweet (no added sugars), but still savory enough to call it a bread and not a pound cake. Personally, I liked the braided bread of last week better but that's just because I'm more a fan of savory food and soft dough.

This banana bread is actually perfect for afternoon snacks or to add to your breakfast (perhaps with a thin spread of butter on it). It's also very healthy. As I mentioned, it has no added sugars: it contains only 380 calories! (But the calorie count will go up per next week I reckon, though!)

Anyway, the recipe:

Banana Bread with Dates and Pecan Nuts
Serves: 10
Takes: 15 min + 45 min baking + 1 hr 30 min waiting.

Ingredients:

• 400 grams bananas
• 100 grams dates without seeds
• 140 grams unsalted pecan nuts
• 250 grams wheat flour
• 2 tsp. baking powder
• 2 tsp. cinnamon
• a pinch of salt
• 100 grams butter (room temp.)
• 2 eggs
• 125 crème fraîche
• greased pound cake mold (about 30 cm or 11.8 inch)
• skewer

Directions:

1. Preheat oven to 200°C or 392°F. Mash the bananas and cut the dates in small slices. Save about 10 pecan nuts and coarsely chop the rest.
2. Sift flour, baking powder, cinnamon and salt into a bowl. In another bowl, beat butter with an electric mixer until smooth. While beating, add eggs one by one, and next the crème fraîche. Scoop into the flour mixture.
3. Add banana purée, dates, and chopped nuts into batter and knead to mix well. The dough will get a bit thicker and more cohesive, which is good. The scoop the dough into the pound cake mold and smoothen it with a spoon. Press the 10 pecan nuts you saved into the top. Bake 40-45 minutes, until golden-brown and done.
4. After 40 minutes, check if the bread is done by sticking a skewer into it. If the skewer comes out clean, the bread is done. Let cool 30 minutes, take out of the mold, and let cool another hour.

Braided Bread with Chia Seeds

Like many of us, I don't bake as much as I'd like. Baking takes time and life tends to distract, so I usually just end up collecting recipes and not doing anything with them. So, I was pretty excited when I discovered the Fall Baking Challenge on Swap-Bot. For this (email) swap we are challenged to bake one item each week for 8 weeks. It's a proper excuse to bake up something delicious on a regular basis.

The first item of the challenge was this: a savory bread. I chose the braided bread mostly because it looked pretty enough to merit the effort of taking photos of it and sending the recipe to my swap partners. It turned out to be a real hit: it's not just pretty, but also delicious and wholesome. Perfect to serve family and friends for lunch, dinner, or as a snack. My family had some for all three.

The dough of this bread is soft, almost sweet, and neutral enough to go with anything. It is perfect to go with sweet sandwich toppings, garlic butter, or just to dip it in your soup. The best part about it is that it looks fancy, but it's actually very easy to make and it doesn't take long at all. I put all the directions in the recipe below. 

Have fun and enjoy!

Ingredients:

•  500 grams of flour
• 2 tsp fine sugar
• 7 grams of dried yeast
• 45 grams of butter (room temp.)
• 2 tsp fine sea salt
• 2 eggs
• 250 ml lukewarm water
• chia seeds

Directions:

1. In a bowl, mix flour, sugar, yeast, butter, water, salt, and 1 egg. Knead until dough is elastic and cohesive.
2. Shape dough into a ball and put in a greased bowl. Cover with plastic foil and let rise for 1 hour, or until dough has doubled in volume. 
3. Knead dough and divide in 5 equally large pieces. Roll each piece into a string of more or less 30 cm (11.8 inch). If the dough is too wet or sticky, dust the working surface with some flour. It will stick to the dough and make it easier to handle.
4. Put the strings on a parchment lined baking sheet and press them together on 1 side. Braid the dough until you've reached the end of the strings and press them together there, too.
5. Pre-heat oven to 200°C or 392°F. Split the 2nd egg and whisk the yoke (you don't need the egg white). Brush or gently rub the yoke onto the bread and sprinkle with chia seeds. 
6. Bake bread 20-25 minutes in the center of the oven. Let cool for 30 minutes.   

How to braid the dough:

1. Bring the outer right string to the left and place it in between the 2 outer left strings.
2. Now, bring the outer left string to the middle. When it's there, take the string left of it and put it over it. 
3. Then begin again by taking the outer right string and putting it in between the 2 outer left strings, and so on.