By Michelle Anderson
Cake Decorating Expert, about.com
My mother was Indonesian
Dutch and she spent her childhood learning to make amazing exotic food.
The desserts she created were always unique and my friends were
enchanted with the intense spices and interesting ingredients. This was a
cake that she only made three times in my whole life and I remember
each time like it was yesterday.
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This cake takes patience and work but it would be a
truly amazing unique choice for either an event cake or wedding cake. It
could be frosted with a lovely light icing and decorated beautifully
for almost any occasion. The slices served need to be very small so it
should be accompanied by a lovely ice cream or fresh berries if you cut
it up for dessert.
This cake is also known as Spekkoek and it is
buttery, spicy and sweet. You can actually brush melted butter onto each
finished layer before you add the next batch of batter. This obviously
takes the taste to another level of decadent. You can also create
different colors of batter or add chocolate
to half your batter to make pretty stripes. You might want to try the
original recipe first to get the hang of the technique before
experimenting.
Ingredients
- Step 1 Ingredients:
- 6 large egg whites
- 1 teaspoon pure vanilla extract
- 1 cup confectioner’s sugar
- 16 large egg yolks
- Step 2 Ingredients
- 1 cup unsalted butter, at room temperature
- 1/4 cup condensed milk
- 1 cup cake flour
- 1 tablespoon ground cinnamon
- 1 teaspoon baking powder
- 1 teaspoon ground nutmeg
- 1/2 teaspoon ground ginger
- 1/2 teaspoon cardamom
- 1/4 cup rum or brandy
- butter, for greasing the cake pan
Preparation
- In a large bowl, beat the egg whites and vanilla extract together with an electric hand mixer until they come to soft peaks.
- Add the confectioner's sugar in tablespoons until it is all incorporated and stiff glossy peaks are formed.
- Add each egg yolks one at a time, scraping down the sides and beating between each yolk. Set the bowl aside.
- Preheat the oven to 400 degrees F and place an 8-inch by 8-inch cake pan in the oven to preheat as well. You will be changing the oven to broil just before baking the cake.
- In a medium bowl cream the butter and condensed milk together.
- Fold the butter mixture into the egg mixture very carefully until just incorporated.
- In a small bowl sift the flour, baking powder, nutmeg, ginger, and cardamom together.
- Fold the flour mixture into the egg mixture alternating with the brandy in 5 batches, starting and ending with the flour mixture.
- Take the cake pan out of the oven and very carefully grease the bottom and sides. Put the oven on broil.
- Put 4-5 tablespoons of cake mixture into the cake pan and spread it evenly. Place the pan under the broiler for about 5 minutes or the top is a nice golden brown. Remove from the oven and poke out any air bubbles and gently flatten the layer with a fondant smoother.
- Spread another 4-5 tablespoons of batter evenly over the first layer and place the cake pan back in the oven. Repeat the entire process until you have no more batter left.
- Remove the finished cake from the oven and flip it over to pop it out of the pan to cool.
- When the cake is completely cool take a serrated knife and cut off the sides of the cake to reveal the layers.
