Cardamom Cream Cake - Adapted Recipe

This recipe was adapted from the NY Times Cardamom Cream Cake here: http://cooking.nytimes.com/recipes/1017901-cardamom-cream-cake

I have two very good friends who happen to mother and daughter, and also happen to have their birthdays right around Valentine's Day. I don't much celebrate Valentine's, but after a discussion about some chocolate cardamom cream cupcakes I made years ago (original recipe), I decided it was time to test out my cake baking and decorating skills to bring them both a tasty birthday treat.

Milk Syrup:

• 2 cups whole milk
• 1/2 teaspoon decorticated cardamom
• 6 TBS sugar
• 1 1/2 tsp rose water or one drop rose candy oil (found at most baking boutique shops)

I made the milk syrup first, which consists of reducing whole milk with cardamom (I used decorticated cardamom seeds in lieu of the pods), adding sugar and reducing further, then straining and mixing in rose water.

I made the filling and frosting the next day, and before making the cake, so as to let them chill while I baked.

Filling:

• 2 1/2 cups strained ricotta (I wrapped the ricotta in cheese cloth, put it in a strainer, and placed a heavy bowl bowl on top for a few hours).
• 1/2 cup heavy cream, which I didn't have so I went with 1/4 cup half & half, and a 1/4 cup of unsalted butter
• 3/4 cup confectioners sugar
• 1 tsp rose water or one drop rose candy oil flavoring

The filling basically just requires you to beat the ingredients together until smooth and creamy, then add the rose water or oil and beat for a few minutes more. I don't have a stand mixer, so unfortunately my filling came out with something less than a smooth consistency but it still tasted fantastic. I like to start with the ingredients at room temperature so that they mix better, then chill after combined.

Frosting:

• 1 1/2 sticks (12 TBS) butter, softened
• 1 cup confectioners sugar
• 1 tsp rose water or one drop rose candy oil flavoring
• 1/2 tsp ground cardamom
• 1 cup marscapone
• 1/4 cup honey Greek yogurt

Again, this is basically a mixer dance of getting everything creamed together without letting the marscapone "curdle" (it's not actually curdling that is occurring, but the resulting texture is similar). One trick I learned is to make sure all the ingredients are at the same (room) temperature and mix until only just combined.  The butter, sugar, rose water, and cardamom get creamed together first, then I add the yogurt and very last is the marscapone since it tends to be the most sensitive to separating. I didn't have this problem, but I have heard that if your frosting begins to separate or "curdle," heating the mixing bowl or putting in a double boiler over low heat will get you back to the correct consistency.

The cake:

• 1 1/2 sticks (12 TBS) butter, softened
• 3 cups all purpose flour
• 4 large egg whites
• 1 cup whole milk - I ran out so I topped off what little whole milk I had with some of the milk syrup. Delicious.
• 1/2 tsp vanilla extract
• 1/2 tsp rose water or one to two drops rose candy flavoring oil
• 1 1/2 cups sugar
• 1 TBS plus 1 tsp baking powder
• 1 tsp ground cardamom
• 1/4 tsp salk (kosher or ground sea salt preferably)

Heat oven to 350*F. Grease and line cake pans. This recipe does either two standard 9 inch rounds or in my case, 5 small heart shaped pans that were the perfect size for a single layer a piece. I bought the set at the local bakery boutique shop.

Greasing and lining the pans basically just means spray the pans with cooking spray, or as I did it, wipe the pans with coconut oil, add a cut out of parchment, grease the parchment, then toss with flour to coat the inside of the pan.

Whisk together the egg whites, milk, vanilla, and rose water. In a separate bowl stir together the dry ingredients.  To the dry ingredients add the butter and a little bit (about a third) of the milk mixture and mix until fully combined and smooth. Add the remaining milk mixture in about three batches, mixing thoroughly between additions.

Add the batter to the pans, keeping in mind that they will rise a little bit. Bake for 25 to 35 minutes, or until a tester comes out clean and the center springs backs ever so slightly when gently pressed. Let cool in the pan for about 20 minutes then unmold and finishing cooling.

Drizzle syrup over cakes and then assemble.

Chocolate lining:
1 sheet edible decorating paper, cut to size to fit around cake border
1 pound melting chocolate

This part is tricky because if you wrap the cake too soon after laying down the chocolate, a lot of the chocolate will pool down like it did for mine. If you wait too long, the chocolate will set and crumble when you try to wrap the cake.

Bring the water of a double boiler to a rolling boil and remove from heat. Add chocolate to top part of double boiler and stir until fully liquid. Take the edible decorating paper, rough side up, and carefully pour the melted chocolate in as thin a layer as possible over the sheet. DO NOT SPREAD. Spreading the chocolate will smear the decoration - you can kind of see it in the picture of my cake.

Let the chocolate set for a few moments, making sure that it is still soft enough to mold. While the chocolate is setting, drizzle the top of the cake with any remaining melted chocolate. Take the sheet of paper and chocolate and wrap the cake.  Let the chocolate finish setting. For this I put the whole thing, cake and all, into the refrigerator for 15 minutes. Remove cake from where it is chilling and peal away the paper, leaving only the chocolate and design behind.

Serve and enjoy!

Note: This cake is fantastically tasty and very rich. There is the danger of texture issues from using ricotta and marscapone in the filling and frosting (and for me in only using a hand mixer since I still don't have a stand mixer), but that is small beans compared to how wonderfully tasty the resulting cake is.

Result: Standing ovation.