Dulce de Leche Cake
What do my Dad and the Queen have in common? Admittedly its not much, and is of course very tenuous, but the one thing that links the two is that they both celebrate their birthday’s twice, well they did this year at least. My Dad turned 60 in October and we already had one party for him but this past weekend the whole family came to the house and we had another, and what’s a birthday party without cake? Nothing, my thoughts exactly. Last time around I went with the Boston Cream Pie from “Sky High Cakes” and after that success I decided to delve back into the book for another recipe. We settled on the Dulce de Leche cake which turned out as another wonderful recipe, seriously tasty and surprisingly light. After settling on the recipe I felt pretty confident with it until, in typical fashion, I over thought the process. The cake is a genoise and after doing my regular reading online about a recipe, it turns out a lot of people have a quite a bit of trouble with this type of cake. I consulted Martha, Gourmet, Rose Levy Beranbaum, and anyone else I could find for tips and thankfully, in the end, everything came out fine, if not the exact perfection I had hoped for.
Dulce de Leche Cake
“Sky High Cakes” by Alisa Huntsman and Peter Wynne
8 Eggs
1 1/3 Cups Packed Light Brown Sugar
1 2/3 Cups Cake Flour
1 Tsp Ground Cinnamon
3 Tblsp Unsalted Butter, melted and cooled to lukewarm
1. Preheat oven to 350F 176C. Line the bottoms of 3 8-inch round cake pans with parchment or waxed paper but don’t grease the pans.
2. In the mixer bowl beat the eggs lightly. Gradually whisk in the sugar. Set the bowl over a pan of barely simmering water and whisk constantly until the mixture warms to body temperature (making sure the sugar melts and according to my reading the mixture should measure 113F). Remove from the heat and with the mixer beat on medium speed until the mixture holds slowly dissolving ribbons when the beaters are lifted (again according to my research don’t be tempted to beat on full speed because the hole texture of the cake will be too loose, takes about 10-12 minutes).
3. Put the flour and cinnamon in a sifter and sift about 1/3 on the top of the egg mixture. Gently fold in and then repeat twice more to incorporate the rest of the dry goods, only folding until there is no trace of flour.
4. Drizzle the melted butter over the batter and fold in, taking care not to deflate the batter or leave pockets of unfolded butter (I came across conflicting advice about this stage, Martha suggests pouring around the edge of the bowl, and Rose Levy Beranbaum suggests beating a small amount of the batter into the butter first and then folding this into the main batter. I planned on folding Rose’s suggestion but promptly forgot when it came time to fold in the butter). Divide the batter evenly among you 3 prepared pans.
5. Bake for about 15 mins, or until a wooden toothpick inserted into the middle comes out clean. Cool completely in the pans then run a blunt knife around the edges of the cakes and turn out onto a wire rack and peel of the paper.
Rum Syrup
1/4 Cup Sugar
1/2 Cup Water
1/4 Cup Rum
1. Boil the sugar and water over medium heat until the mixture reduces to 1/2 cup. Add the rum off the heat and allow to cool before using. (I ended up making a vanilla syrup replacing the rum with about 1 1/2 Tblsp vanilla extract)
Dulce de Leche Cream
1 1/3 Cups Whole Milk
1/2 Cup Sugar
1/3 Cup Light Corn Syrup
1 Small Cinnamon Stick
1 One-Inch Piece of Vanilla Bean, split lenghtwise
3 Cups Heavy Cream
1. Place the milk, sugar, corn syrup, and cinnamon stick in a medium saucepan. With the tip of a knife scrape the vanilla seeds from the bean and put them along with the pod into the pan. Bring to a simmer over medium low heat, stirring to dissolve the sugar. Continue to simmer, stirring occasionally and scraping the bottom of the pan, until the liquid has turned a light amber colour, about 45 minutes.
2. Reduce the heat to low and cook, stirring more frequently as the milk darkens and the mixture thickens, until the colour reaches a rich milk caramel (medium brown), about 45-60 mins. Watch carefully at the end as it can burn quickly. Remove the vanilla pod and cinnnamon stick and pour into a medium bowl. Cool slightly then cover with plastic wrap, pressing it into contact with the surface to prevent a skin developing. Let cool completely. If like me this was a disaster and you end up with an, albeit tasty but useless, firm caramel then do as Alisa suggests and skip this and the previous step and substitute with 2/3 cup pre bought dulce de leche in the next step.
3. In a large chilled mixer bowl with chilled whisk, combine the dulce de leche and the cream (if cheating like me add the vanilla beans from the ingredients list as well). Beat on low speed to fully combine then raise to medium-high and beat until stiff peaks form.
To Assemble
1. Place one cake layer, flat side up, on a cake stand or serving plate. Brush with one third of the syrup to moisten evenly. Cover the layer with just over 1 cup of of the Dulce de Leche cream spreading evenly to the edge. Repeat with the next layer. Top with the third layer. Moisten with the remaining syrup and the frost with the remaining cream (I did a quasi crumb coat first as my edges were quite crumby). Using either a cake comb or the edge of a serated knife, run it around the side of the cake to give a grooved pattern. Top with english toffee of Daim bar bits.
Due to the fact I had a lot of of other things to make I made the cake layers a couple of days ahead and triple wrapped them in plastic and stored them in the fridge. They kept perfectly and made the assembling on the day a breeze.
Me and my Dad
