Two Birthdays

It is the holidays, I love Christmas time. Full of joy. Two birthdays and three desserts. Few days ago was my nephew’s 4th birthday and two days ago my birthday. I wanted to do the classic tiramisu, which I love the most, it is my favourite dessert.

The two others cakes I found in the magazine Taste Italia, December/Christmas issue.  I have chosen these cakes because they weren’t classic, they had nice ingredients and their pictures in the magazine were so mouth-watering.

The first cake was a semolina cake with orange syrup. I liked the cake; every bite was full of orange flavor.

 The other cake was an almond chocolate cake with ricotta filling. It was a rich, dense, moist cake. My sister liked it alot.

Semolina cake with orange syrup

( I used all- purpose flour instead of plain flour. And vegetable oil instead of light olive oil, because the one I had, have a strong olive taste)

- 250g semolina flour

- 60g all-purpose flour

- 80 ml vegetable oil

- 220g caster sugar

- 2 large eggs

- 2 tsp baking powder

- zest of 1 orange

- 250 ml orange juice

Preheat the oven to 180 C. Grease and line a 24 cm round tin. With an electic whisk, mix the eggs with 120g sugar in a large bowl, til thick. Add the oil, orange zest, 80ml orange juice, both the flours and the baking powder. Mix the ingredients together, the pour into the tin. Bake for 35- 40 min.

While the cake is cooking, make the syrup by combining the remainder of the orange juice and sugar in a pan. Bring to boil for 5 min. When the cake comes out of the oven pierce the top all over with a toothpick and pour over the syrup. Cool before serving.

Enjoy.

Chocolate cake

For the sponge

- 4 eggs, separated

- 150g golden caster sugar

- 3 tbsp cocoa powder, sifted

- 225 g ground almonds

- 1 tsp baking powder, sifted

For the filling

- 500 g ricotta

- 3 tbsp honey

- 100g dark chocolate, grated ( 70% cocoa)

Preheat the oven to 200C. Butter and flour a 24 cm round cake tin. Stiffly whisk the egg whites in a bowl. Whisk together the egg yolks and sugar in a separate bowl until creamy. Fold the egg whites into the yolks mixture in three goes, then gently fold in the cocoa, ground almonds and baking powder.

Transfer the batter to the tin and bake for 35 minutes. Leave it to cool in the tin. For the filling, place the ricotta and honey in a food processor and blitz until smooth.

Remove the collar from the cake tin. Slice the cake in half widthways. Reserving a couple of tablespoons of the ricotta cream, spread the rest over the base and place the top layer on top. Spread the reserved cream in a thin layer over the surface of the cake and scatter over the grated chocolate.

If keeping the cake longer than a few hours, cover, chill and bring to room temperature for around and hour before serving.

The ricotta will keep the cake moist.

Enjoy.

About these ads