Rhubarb custard cake. Photo / Melanie Jenkins
Auckland pastry chef Petra Galler’s divine new cookbook Butter Butter has a subheading of “Sometimes more is more” - we heartedly agree and think any of these wildly impressive beauties would be a fine way to celebrate the maternal influences in our life this Mother’s Day.
Serves 8
360g ground almonds
220g raw sugar
210g brown sugar
120g butter, softened
2 eggs
250g Greek yoghurt
1 tsp orange blossom water
½ tsp freshly grated nutmeg
1½ tsp ground cardamom
½ tsp flaky salt
2 oranges, zest only
70g pistachios, roughly chopped
Greek yoghurt, to serve
1. Preheat the oven to 170°C fan-bake. Grease and line a 20cm cake tin.
2. In a large bowl mix together the ground almonds, both sugars and butter. Using your hands, rub the mixture together until you have the texture of coarse breadcrumbs.
3. Spoon about one-third of this mixture into the prepared cake tin, pressing it down to form an even layer over the base; it should be about 5 mm (¼ in) thick.
4. Add the eggs, yoghurt, orange blossom water, spices, salt and zest into the bowl with the remaining almond mixture and mix by hand until smooth and combined.
5. Pour over the base and sprinkle the chopped pistachios around the border of the cake.
6. Bake for 45–55 minutes. The cake will colour up beautifully and the centre will have puffed up slightly and be a little firm to the touch. Allow to cool completely in the tin.
7. Serve at room temperature with a dollop of Greek yoghurt.
Serves 12
This is such a showstopper and I implore you to give it a go — I promise it’s not as hard as it may look. Medovik is one of the most popular desserts in Slavic countries and one bite of this layered beauty and you will see why — it’s eight gorgeous layers of incredibly moist honeyed heaven. There are only three components to this gravity-defying cake; the ginger-spiced discs, the burnt honey icing, and a little patience. It’s the perfect ‘rainy afternoon project’ bake and worth every minute of effort. Be aware that it must sit in the fridge overnight before serving; this is so the layers have time to soften and soak up all the gorgeous burnt honey icing.
Burnt honey icing
95g runny honey
750ml cream
1 tsp flaky salt
320g condensed milk, fridge cold
85g sour cream
150g mascarpone
Honey syrup
120g honey
100ml water
Cake layers
125g butter, roughly chopped
150g runny honey
125g brown sugar
500g plain flour, plus extra for dusting
1 tsp baking soda
½ tsp flaky salt
2 tsp each ground ginger, cinnamon
1 tsp mixed spice
3 eggs
2 tsp vanilla paste
1. For the burnt honey icing: Put the honey into a small pot and cook over a medium heat for 5–6 minutes or until it turns a couple of shades darker.
2. Remove the pot from the heat and pour in 150ml of the cream and the salt. Pour this mixture into a small bowl, cover and set aside in the fridge until fully cooled.
3. For the honey syrup: Combine the honey and water in a small pot and bring to a gentle boil. Simmer for 2–3 minutes until slightly thickened. Remove from the heat and allow to cool completely.
4. Preheat the oven to 180C fan-bake. Grease and line as many baking trays as you can fit into the oven at one time. Draw a 23cm diameter circle on the back of each piece of paper — this will act as a template for the cake layers.
5. For the cake layers: Put the butter, honey and sugar into a large pan, and cook for 5 minutes over a medium heat, or until everything is melted and the mixture is bubbling and smelling toasty.
6. Remove the pan from the heat and put aside to cool slightly, then pour into a bowl.
7. Meanwhile, in a separate bowl, whisk together the dry ingredients.
8. Put the eggs and vanilla into a jug and whisk briefly to combine.
9. Begin whisking the butter mixture, slowly pouring the eggs into the bowl; make sure you keep whisking to avoid the eggs from cooking. Add in the dry ingredients and mix well with a rubber spatula until fully combined. The finished result will resemble a slightly softer and more pliable gingerbread dough.
10. Working while the dough is still a little warm, divide it into eight equal portions. Working with one piece at a time, put a ball of dough onto one of the prepared pieces of baking paper, lightly flour and roll until it is very thin and just a little bigger than the template. The ideal thickness for the layers is about 4mm. Trim the dough back to the 23cm circle and put the trimmings aside; we will be using these a little later.
11. Once you have rolled out as many as you can fit in the oven at once, bake for 8–9 minutes or until slightly firm to the touch and browning slightly around the edges. The finished cakes will be like gingerbread biscuits but with a little more flexibility.
12. As soon as the cake layers are cooked, remove from the oven and brush them with the honey syrup. It’s really important to do this while the layers are still hot so they soak up all the syrup.
13. Slide the discs onto wire racks to cool and continue until all the discs are baked.
14. To finish, place all the offcuts and scraps on one of the lined trays and bake for 10–12 minutes or until fully dried out and a little crisp; we want them a shade or two darker than the discs.
15. To complete the icing, remove the honey mixture from the fridge and mix in the condensed milk, sour cream and mascarpone. Pour into a large bowl, add the remaining cream and whisk until medium peaks form; the icing will be far looser than a traditional icing or buttercream but should be firm enough to hold its shape.
16. To assemble, sandwich the honey cake layers with a little of the icing; just under a ⅓ cup should do it. Make sure you are stacking them as straight as possible. Spread the remainder of the burnt honey icing over the top and sides of the cake. Chill the cake in the fridge overnight so the cake layers soak up all that gorgeous icing.
17. When you are ready to serve, put the baked cake scraps into a food processor and pulse to form fine crumbs. Press the golden crumbs all up the sides of the cake to garnish.
Serves 8
I adore rhubarb and I adore this cake. It’s creamy, tangy and sweet; what more could you want? The tartness of the rhubarb is the perfect foil to the velvety smooth custard base and it’s oh so pretty upon completion. Make sure the rhubarb isn’t cut too small as this will make it more likely to get swallowed up in the batter.
160g plain flour
¾ tsp baking powder
½ tsp flaky salt
2 eggs
1 egg yolk
325g caster sugar
1 tsp vanilla paste
55g butter, melted and cooled
70g sour cream
4 tsp dark rum
1 lemon, zest only
360g rhubarb, trimmed and cut into batons
20g raw sugar
1. Preheat the oven to 170C fan-bake. Grease and line a 20cm cake tin.
2. Whisk the flour, baking powder and salt together in a medium bowl and set aside.
3. In the bowl of a stand mixer, whisk the eggs, egg yolk, sugar and vanilla until thick and pale; about 3–4 minutes.
4. With the mixer running on a low speed, add the butter, sour cream, rum and zest and mix until combined.
5. Working by hand now, gently fold through the dry ingredients.
6. Pour the batter into the prepared tin.
7. Arrange the rhubarb batons in tight lines on top of the cake; don’t press them into the batter, just lay them gently on the top so they don’t sink. Sprinkle with raw sugar and bake for 40–45 minutes until golden brown.
8. Cool in the tin for 10 minutes before transferring to a wire rack to cool completely.
Edited extract from Butter, Butter by Petra Galler, photography by Melanie Jenkins (Flash Studios), published by Allen & Unwin, RRP $49.99.
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