Sweet Meringue Plum Cake

I always wait so impatiently for plum season. I do love preparing plum cakes, they're always so delicious (even though I'm not really a plum-fan ;) )! I know I've waited too long to share this cake with You, but I hope that - at least for some of You - it is not too late :) Besides, it is possible to use frozen plums ;)

This is another wonderful and elegant cake from KwestiaSmaku, which I share with You today and also I do recommend to try this one, right after the very best plum cake, which You can find here.

Ingredients:

• 250g of flour
• 50g of sugar
• pinch of salt
• 1 teaspoon of baking powder
• 200g of margarine
• 4 egg yolks
• 1kg of plums (without kernels, cut into halves) fresh or frozen (need to be defrost)

Budyń/Custard (it is possible to double the amount of custard in this cake):

• 1 packaging of vanilla custard (40g)
• 500ml of milk
• 2 tablespoons of sugar

Meringue:

• 4 egg whites 
• 200g of sugar
• 3 teaspoons of potato starch 

Optionally - one of these:

• A handful of hazelnuts, to sprinkle the top (I skipped it)
• almond flakes (to sprinkle the fruit) 
• shredded coconut (to sprinkle the fruit or to mix with meringue)

Preparation:

Dough:

1. Start preheating the oven to 170C.
2. Prepare a rectangular baking pan (around 26x36 cm), grease it and put baking paper all over it.
3. Take a big bowl, put flour, sugar, salt and baking powder inside. Mix. Add cold butter and knead till you get crumbles.
4. Add egg yolks and knead again.
5. Distribute evenly all over the bottom of previously prepared baking pan and bake in preheated oven for around 20 minutes, till it becomes gold.
6. Take it out from the oven.

Custard + plums:

1. Prepare the custard as the instructions on a packaging says (using 500ml of milk + 2 tablespoons of sugar). 
2. When the custard is ready, pour it all over the previously baked bottom.
3. Add plums, cover the entire cake bottom with them (there is no need to wait till the custard cools down). Make 2 layers of plums, one on another.
4. Optionally - sprinkle with almond flakes or shredded coconut if desired. Set aside.

Meringue + finishing the cake:

1. Take a mixer and its bowl, put egg whites inside, beat, adding sugar gradually, till it stiffens (around 10-15 minutes). At the end, sieve potato starch inside and mix till smooth.
2. Here - if You haven't and You do fancy to do it - you can mix in some shredded coconut.
3. Distribute the meringue all over the top of the plums.
4. Bake for 20 minutes, setting the temperature as previously, on 170C.
5. After 20 minutes, decrease the temperature to 60C, turn on the hot air cooking, (optionally sprinkle the top with hazelnuts) and bake for another 20 minutes.
6. Take out from the oven.
7. Bon Appetit! :)

Rafaello vol.2

I had some packs of crackers left and I needed a cake, extremely quickly with short preparation time. So I decided to upgrade the basic recipe and here it comes! It is definitely better than the previous one :)

Ingredients: (for a small rectangular pan, otherwise there's not enough cream, but You can double the ingredients and make double cream, then You'll also need more crackers)

• 1 litre of 3,2% milk
• 2 vanilla powdered custards, 40g each (or double the recipe for this budyń, recipe here ;) )
• 2 tablespoons of potato starch
• 3/4 glass of sugar
• 2-3 vanilla sugars (16g each)
• 1-3 tablespoon of Amaretto Syrup
• 1 egg yolk
• 250g of margarine
• 100g of shredded coconut 
• 2-3(3-5 if bigger pan) packs of crackers (rectangular shape)
• 330 ml of 36% cream  (or artificial, powdered one)
• 1/3 glass of powdered sugar

Optional ingredients:

• almond flakes, for sprinkling the top

Preparation of budyn/custard:

For those of You, who has powdered custard, follow the steps below, if You can't buy powdered budyn/custard then follow all the steps in that recipe, just remember to double all the ingredients.

1. Take a glass, fill 3/4 of it with milk. Add powdered custard and potato starch. Stir till smooth (no clumps please!)
2. Take a pot, put all the remaining milk in there, add sugar, start boiling. Stir from time to time to help the sugar dissolve. Bring to boil and add the mixture from the glass. Lower the heat, stir energetically till it turns thick. Cool down.

Now, when the custard is ready: 

1. Using a stand mixer, mix butter with egg yolk, adding cooled down custard, one tablespoon after another.
2. Add Amaretto syrup, gradually, mixing and tasting after every tablespoon to check how strong the Amaretto taste is for You.
3. Add shredded coconut, mix till it links.
4. Take a rectangular pan - preferably a rectangular springform pan (no baking paper inside is necessary, in both cases).
5. Put one layer of crackers and start adding some part of the cream, to cover the entire crackers layer.
6. Put another layer of crackers and cream - repeat till all the ingredients are used, the last layer are crackers.

Now prepare the whipped cream:

1. Before preparing the whipped cream make sure your cream is really, really cool (I always put it in the freezer before beating, for around 10-15 minutes). 
2. Take a mixer and its bowl, put cream inside, start mixing. After a while add powdered sugar and something to stiffen it (powdered whipped cream/smietan-fix). 
3. Beat for around 10 minutes (depending on the power of a mixer it might take more or less time, keep paying attention not to make butter).
4. Distribute whipped cream all over the top.
5. Cover the cake with foil, put in the frigde for at least 3 hours.
6. Bon Appetit! ;)

Plum Dumplings

That's a very delicious, quick, easy and light dinner :) Soft, sweet, might be served with butter, sugar or shredded coconut. Children love it! It is definitely worth trying! :)

Recipe comes from my Grandmum :)

Ingredients:

• 10 boiled potatoes
• 2-3 pinches of salt
• around 300 g of flour
• 500 g of plums
• 1 egg

Extra ingredients:

• butter
• sugar
• shredded coconut

Preparation:

1. Take a middle-size clean pot, fill with water, add some salt (2-3 pinches).
2. Add potatoes and boil them till soft (10-15 minutes).
3. In the meantime, wash the plums, throw away the kernels, cut the plums into halves.
4. Take a pot, pour water inside, start boiling.
5. Take a big bowl, put boiled potatoes inside, smash till you get a smooth 'dough', cool down.
6. Add flour, and egg, knead till you get a dough, which is not extremely sticky and you can form a ball (which is why I put 'around' 300g of flour - depending on your potatoes - some of them come out more sticky after boiling, some of them less = in some cases you might need more/less flour). Make the ball flat. Put one half of the plum in the middle of the dough, add 1/2 teaspoon of sugar, close(it needs to be done very precisely), forming a ball again.*
7. When the water in the second pot is boling, put your dumplings inside, boil for around 5-7 minutes.**
8. Take them out of the water (they cannot remain in the water).
9. Here you can distribute extra ingredients over boiled dumplings - some butter to melt or sprinkle them with sugar/shredded coconut.
10. Bon Appetit! :)

* It is not necessary to add sugar, you can make them without any sugar (but they might come out sour, especially if the plums are sour, so I do recommed adding it).

** If the dumplings 'swim' on the top of the water, they're ready.

Rafaello

Finally! :) After few considerations and reading many descriptions about this cake, I finally decided to prepare it :) Prepare - not bake, because it is a non-baking cake! ;) (and I really, really love such cakes - time&energy saving ;) ). I prepared it, mixing all the ideas for this cake I found on the Internet. I must honestly admit that all the people who tried it enjoyed it a lot. To my great surprise, among many (from my point of view) better cakes, this Rafaello was the one that disappeared first. 

And - this is another cake, after greatest-of-them-all Gourmet Sensation and it's brother Gourmet Sensation vol 2. which really gets better with time! (second day, amazing!) 

I do recommend! Easy, not expensive, wonderful cake, both in its appearance and taste :)

Though, surprisingly, this cake might be even better - try the second version of Rafaello here.

Ingredients: (for a small rectangular pan, otherwise there's not enough cream, but You can double the ingredients and make double cream, then You'll also need more crackers)

• 1 litre of 3,2% milk
• 2 vanilla powdered custards, 40g each (or double the recipe for this budyń, recipe here ;) )
• 2 tablespoons of potato starch
• 3/4 glass of sugar
• 2-3 vanilla sugars (16g each)
• 1 teaspoon of vanilla extract
• 1 egg yolk
• 250g of butter
• 200g of shredded coconut (150g for the cream, 50g to sprinkle the top)
• 2-3(3-5 if bigger pan) packs of crackers (rectangular shape)

Optional ingredients:

• almond flakes, for sprinkling the top
• 1/2 glass of vodka or 
• 1/2-3/4 glass of advocaat (if You wish to add any alcohol, I would recommend this one)

Preparation of budyn/custard:

For those of You, who has powdered custard, follow the steps below, if You can't buy powdered budyn/custard then follow all the steps in that recipe, just remember to double all the ingredients.

1. Take a glass, fill 3/4 of it with milk. Add powdered custard and potato starch. Stir till smooth (no clumps please!)
2. Take a pot, put all the remaining milk in there, add sugar, start boiling. Stir from time to time to help the sugar dissolve. Bring to boil and add the mixture from the glass. Lower the heat, stir energetically till it turns thick. Cool down.

Now, when the custard is ready: 

1. Using a stand mixer, mix butter with egg yolk, adding cooled down custard, one tablespoon after another.
2. Here is a good time to add alcohol and mix.
3. Add shredded coconut (leave around 50g for sprinkling the top), mix till it links.
4. Take a rectangular pan - preferably a rectangular springform pan (no baking paper inside is necessary, in both cases).
5. Put one layer of crackers and start adding some part of the cream, to cover the entire crackers layer (yes, I realize how hard it is to distribute the cream, You can use many techniques to make it easier - for example: put some lumps and try to link them or distribute the cream through syringe and then smooth it with a spoon)
6. Put another layer of crackers and cream - repeat till all the ingredients are used, the last layer is cream.
7. Sprinkle the top with shredded coconut or/and almond flakes.
8. Cover the cake with foil, put in the frigde for at least 3 hours.
9. Bon Appetit! ;)

Tropical Pavlova

I have no idea why I was hesitating for such long time... this is absolutely gorgeous... It exceeded all my expectations :) not only its appearance on the table is wonderful but the taste is just overdelicious! sweet meringue with tropical fruits! this is a real feast for senses ;) I do recommend! :) 

For those afraid of baking a meringue - here is a tip - you can buy a ready-made one in a good bakery ;) And they are probably available in a few sizes - you can make a couple of small pavlovas or one, very big :) all of them will be same delicious :)

Recipe for the meringue comes from this website, the rest is my idea, as Pavlova might be prepared in plenty different ways and will always taste good :)

Note: meringue and lemon curd might be prepared earlier. But - lemon curd must be stored in a closed box, in the fridge.

Ingredients:

Meringue:

• 4 egg whites from 4 big eggs 
• 250g of sugar 
• 1 teaspoon of potato starch 
• 1 teaspoon of white or rice vinegar 

Lemon curd:

• 3 eggs 
• lemon zest and lemon juice from 3 lemons 
• 100g of powdered sugar 
• 100g of cool butter 

Whipped cream:

• 500 ml of 36% cream 
• 2 tablespoons of powdered sugar 
• 1-2 packages of powdered whipped cream (to stiffen the whipped cream, or polish smietan-fix*) 

* remember to stick to the proportions while using powdered products. If powder package says it is enough for 200 ml of cream/milk (no difference), and you're using 500ml of cream - add 2 packages.

Top:

• Tropical fruit (any, tinned or fresh) 
• peach 
• mango 
• passionfruit 
• lychee 
• pineapple 
• guava 
• ... :) 
• a handful of shredded coconut, to sprinkle the top 

Preparation:

Meringue:

1. Preheat the oven to 120C (without convection, just this time) 
2. Prepare a baking sheet, cover with baking paper. Draw a circle (diameter: for M size eggs - 18 cm, for L size eggs - 20 cm). Put aside. 
3. Take a mixer and its bowl, put egg whites inside, start beating. After a while, start adding sugar, one tablespoon after another, stiring precisely all the time. The beating should take 10-15 minutes, not less. The meringue after the beating should be stiff and shiny. 
4. When done, add potato starch and vinegar and beat for another few minutes so that it links. 
5. Using a spoon or spatula, distribute the meringue on the baking sheet, on the drawn circle. Pull up the sides. (please don't play with it much, just few good moves, because the meringue might be destroyed). 
6. Put in the oven and bake for 30 min in 120C. After that time, lower the temperature to 100C and bake for another 3 hours. 

Lemon curd:

Lemon curd requires a 'bath' so it is necessary to have a suitable pot and a bowl, that can be put one on another.

1. Chop the butter into smaller pieces. 
2. Take a pot, put some water inside, start boiling it. 
3. Take a bowl that matches the pot, put eggs inside, beat. 
4. Add lemon juice, lemon zest, powdered sugar and stir till everything links and there are no lumps. 
5. Now put the bowl on the top of your pot (make sure the bowl stands out from the pot so that you don't get burn) and slowly keep heating up the mixture (don't boil it). 
6. Keep adding the butter, one piece after another, stiring after adding. 
7. When all the butter is melted in the mixture, turn off the heat and put the bowl with lemon curd somewhere aside, to let it cool down. 
8. Then put your lemon curd in the fridge so that it stiffens more. 

Finishing:

1. Prepare fruit. If fresh - wash, peel (if necessaroy) and chop. Dry them on a paper towel. Put aside for a while. If tinned - half of the job is already done - just chop and dry. 
2. When the meringue is baked and cooled down, distribute cooled down lemon curd all over the top. 
3. Now, prepare whipped cream going through the steps below:
   
   Whipped cream: 
   1. Before preparing the whipped cream make sure your cream is really, really cool (I always put it in the freezer before beating, for around 10-15 minutes). 
   2. Take a mixer and its bowl, put cream inside, start mixing. After a while add powdered sugar and something to stiffen it (powdered whipped cream/smietan-fix). 
   3. Beat for around 10 minutes (depending on the power of a mixer it might take more or less time, keep paying attention not to make butter).
   
   
4. Distribute whipped cream all over the top. 
5. Just for the sake of safety, dry all the fruit again on a paper towel, before putting them on the meringue with whipped cream (as the juice from fruit may destroy both whipped cream and meringue). Make any pattern you wish out of the fruit. 
6. Sprinkle with shredded coconut. 
7. Store in the fridge. 
8. Bon Appetit! ;) 

Bajadera

Bajadera. What is it? Well - that's a fantastic, last second idea which always works, always tastes delicious as it is chocolate sweet, soft and moist. 

I do recommend, especially when you have no time and your oven is tired as it is a non-baking recipe ;)
But - if You have time and enjoy baking, decorating, creating sweet wonders - see also Bajadera Reindeers.

Quite changed recipe comes from this website.

Ingredients:

• 400g of dried pound cake (preferably lemon or vanilla flavoured)
• 120g of mascarpone cheese
• 80g of nutella
• 350g of milk chocolate
• favourite mincemeat (including for example nuts, almonds; or  baking cocoa)
• some plastic small sticks
• sprinkles for decoratation

Optional ingredients:

• 10-25ml of Rum
• dried fruit - but in very small pieces

Preparation:

1. If your pound cake isn't dried enough, it is a good idea to crumble it into very small pieces and put it in the preheated oven(over 180C) for a couple of minutes.
2. Take a mixer and it's bowl. Put mascarpone cheese and nutella inside. Mix till smooth.
3. Put dried pound cake to the bowl and mix everything till smooth. 
4. Here is the time to add and mix optional ingredients if desired.
5. Cover with foil and cool down in the freezer for 45 minutes.
6. During that time, prepare a rectangular bakewell pan or loaf tin or - something that you can put in your freezer. Put some baking paper on its bottom.
7. Take the dough out from the freezer and start making small balls, put each of them in previously prepared pan/tin.
8. Put back in the freezer for another 30 minutes.
9. During that time prepare small paper muffin cases and sprinkles around you.
10. Also, take a pot, put chocolate (in small pieces) inside and melt on a very low heat.
11. Take one ball from the freezer, dip 1/3 of a stick inside a ball and dip in the chocolate, so that it covers the entire ball, take out from the chocolate, wait till the excess of chocolate falls down.
12. As the ball is very cold, the chocolate will stiffen on it very fast, so as soon as you take it out from the chocolate pot, take out the stick, put it on a muffin case and decorate.
13. Store finished bajaderas in the fridge.
14. Bon Appetit! ;)

Piña Colada Cake

Well I decided to make a birthday gift for myself. What could it be? Self-made cake seemed to be a perfect idea :) And so it was :) Soft sponge cake, refreshing pineapple, mouth-watering, sweet cream and tongue tickling shredded coconut. What else do a palate need? ;)

Recipe comes from Kwestia Smaku.

Some useful tips on 'before baking':

• It is better to use fresh pineapple, not tinned one.
• While mixing the sponge cake, remember to mix only in one direction!
• It is possible to prepare the sponge cake one day earlier.
• Actually, preparing the entire cake one day earlier is a fantastic idea - the cake is getting better and better with time! 
• A good idea to cut the sponge cake is to use a thread.
• It is possible to prepare that cake in non-alcohol version - don't impregnate the sponge cake with anything.
• If the coconut liqueur is unavailable, it is also a good idea to use rum.
• Instead of ricotta cheese it is possible to use ground curd cheese.
• About coconut milk: shake before opening the tin. If there is a transparent liquid - highly probably this coconut milk is useless and preparing the coconut cream will be impossible. It needs to be white, milk-like liquid, as the title says: 'coconut MILK' not 'coconut water'.

Ingredients:

Sponge Cake:

• 7 eggs
• 1 glass of sugar
• 1 glass of flour
• 1/3 glass of potato flour

Pineapple Mousse:

• 2 pineapples
• 2 tablespoons of coconut liqueur
• 2 flat tablespoons of potato flour

Coconut Cream:

• 1 (400ml) tin of coconut milk
• 1/4 glass of coconut liqueur
• 1 glass of sugar
• 500g of mascarpone cheese
• 250 g of ricotta cheese

Impregnating the sponge cake:

• 6-9 tablespoons of rum

Decoration:

• Shredded coconut
• pineapples leaves (if they are in good visual condition)

Preparation:

Sponge cake:

1. Take a springform cake tin, grease it and put the baking paper on the bottom. Grease the sides of the tin.
2. Take a bowl, mix flour with potato flour inside.
3. Start heating the oven to 170C.
4. Take a mixer and its bowl, separate egg whites from yolks so that egg whites are inside the mixer's bowl and yolks are - for example - in a glass.
5. Stir the yolks. Put aside and leave the spoon inside the glass.
6. Start beating the whites on a low rotation for 2 minutes. 
7. After those 2 minutes start adding sugar (gradually, one tablespoon after another).
8. Continute beating the whites on the highest rotation till stiff and shiny (around 7-10 minutes).
9. Without stopping the mixer, start adding the yolks (gradually, one spoon after another - another goes when the previous links perfectly with egg whites).
10. Stop the mixer.
11. Divide flours into 3 parts and add first part to the mixer's bowl. Stir very gently (not to destroy the foam) with a spoon till it links. After that, add the second part, stir and the third - stir again. (It is very important to stir slowly and precisely cause very often, in the middle or on the bottom of the bowl there is unlinked flour).
12. Pour the dough into previously prepared springform cake tin and bake for around 35 minutes in 170C.
13. After that time take it immidiately out of the oven, and throw on the kitchen's surface. Cool down.
14. When the cake is cold take a knife and cut the sides very near to the springform cake tin side, so that the cake can be taken out easily from the springform cake tin.
15. Now cut the sponge cake into 3 parts - using a knife or a thread.

Pineapple Mousse:

1. Cut the pulp, throw away the skins and hard, middle parts of both pineapples. 
2. Take one pineapple, cut the pulp into cubes and put inside a pot, add liqueur and start heating on a low heat for around 30 minutes, stiring from time to time not to let it burn. 
3. Cut the second pineapple into cubes as well and put aside.
4. Mix (using for example a blender) the boiled pineapple, add the second pineapple cut into cubes and start heating again. 
5. Take a glass, put a little water inside. Add potato flour, stir.
6. Add potato flour from the glass to the pot with pineapples. Boil till the mousse becomes really thick, like a jam.
7. Cool down.

Coconut Cream:

1. Take a pot. Put coconut milk and liqueur inside, add sugar and stir till the sugar melts.
2. Boil on an average heat for around 30-40 minutes till the substance getsreally thick (like a gum).
3. Cool down a little bit (it can't be cooled down completely cause it will be impossible to use it).
4. Take a bowl, put mascarpone and ricotta cheese inside. 
5. Using a mixer, mix it on a slow rotation. One spoon after another, keep adding coconut 'gum' while still mixing everything on a very slow rotation and make sure it links with both ricotta and mascarpone.

Preparing the cake:

1. Put the bottom sponge cake piece on a desired plate (it won't be possible to change the plate after preparing!).
2. Sprinkle with rum, put 1/2 of the pineapple mousse on it and 1/3 of the coconut cream. 
3. Put another piece of sponge cake on it. Sprinkle with rum, put the rest of pineapple mousse on it and 1/2 of the coconut cream (leave 1/2 of the coconut cream for the sides and the top of the cake).
4. Put the last piece of sponge cake on the top, sprinkle with rum, put coconut cream all over the cake - top and sides and sprinkle with shredded coconut (unlimited technique).
5. Decorate the top of the cake with the pineapple leaves - if possible.
6. Keep closed in a cake box, in the fridge.
7. Bon Appetit! :)

Summertime cheesecake

A very tasty mix of 2 recipes + my own creativity :) 

Fresh, light, non-baking cake, perfect for a summertime coffee in a green, blossoming garden.

One recipe comes from this website and just the 'appearance' idea from this one.

Ingredients:

• 4 packagings of ladyfingers
• 2 tins (400 g each) of coconut milk
• 1 kg of creamy quark (the one for cheesecakes)
• 1/2 - 3/4 glass of sugar
• 6 teaspoons of gelatin
• strawberry jelly
• strawberries, blueberries for decoration

Optional ingredients:

• 80 ml of Malibu liqueur
• whipped cream

Preparation:

1. Take a spring pan. Grease it, put baking paper on the bottom. Put some ladyfingers on the bottom (only one tier).
2. Open the tins with the coconut milk. Fill the entire glass with part of it and the rest of the coconut milk pour to the bigger bowl, add quark, sugar and liqueur. Stir.
3. Take the glass with coconut milk and pour it to the pan. Add gelatin and heat on low heat, stiring all the time till the gelatin melts. Do not boil.
4. Take a big bowl, put the coconut milk with gelatin inside and partially add the mix from the other bowl with quark, stiring all the time so that everything links. Pour it to your springpan with ladyfingers on the bottom.*
5. Put it in the fridge for 10-20 minutes. Keep checking what's going on. If ladyfingers are on the top, using a spoon, plundge them in. The quark-substance gets thicker.
6. Leave the cake in the fridge. Prepare the jelly as the packaging says. 
7. Stir, cool it down, so that you get cold liquid.
8. Pour the jelly on your cake. Leave, so that it solidifies. (Keep checking by shaking gently the spring pan)
9. Put the fruit on the top. You can add whipped cream on the top as well.
10. Keep in the fridge, so that it completely solidifies (5 hours - entire night)
11. After that time, open the sides. If the cake is sticky - then just stick the ladyfingers. If not - apply some whipped cream on the sides and then stick the ladyfingers.**
12. Bon Appetit :)

* Don't worry if ladyfingers don't stay on the bottom after adding quark-substance.