Eggless Battenberg Cake

This month's Daring Baker's Challenge was Going Batty For The Jubilee. Mandy of What The Fruit Cake challenged the bakers to make a battenberg cake. Battenberg cake is traditionally flavoured with almonds and the four squares - two pink and two yellow represent the four princes of Battenberg. The strips are glued with apricot jam and covered with marzipan. The first Battenberg cake was made to celebrate the marriage of Queen Victoria's grand daughter to Prince Louis of Batterberg. When I read about the cake and saw the snap of the cake, I was very much interested in trying it out. To be frank, I struggled a lot before making this cake. The first time I tried the cake with almond meal and when I prepared an eggless version the cake crumbled. The next attempt was the sponge with condensed milk. I didn't know what went wrong but I got a dry cake. But I could prepare the strips. Then I made an eggless marzipan with almond meal. When I rolled it out, it started cracking. So when I wrapped the cake in marzipan, it was a total mess. But it tasted great. So I thought of skipping this challenge. But suddenly yesterday, I got some confidence and I set out to make the cake for the third time. This time I prepared two cakes-one a coconut cake and another a nutty rose cake. I used mixed fruit jam for gluing and candy clay to cover the cake. You can see the snap and know that I succeeded in my third attempt. It was very tasty. The cake was packed with a lot of flavours and it tasted great the next day.



Ingredients:
For The Coconut Cake:
Flour-1 1/4cups
Butter-1/2cup
Granulated Sugar-3/4cup
Baking Soda-1/2tsp
Baking Powder-1/2tsp
Unsweetened Coconut Powder-1cup
Yogurt/ Curd-1/2cup
Milk-1/2cup
Vanilla Essence-1tsp

For the Rose Chironji Cake:
Flour-1 1/4cups
Butter-1/2cup
Granulated Sugar-3/4cup
Baking Soda-1/2tsp
Baking Powder-1tsp
Yogurt/ Curd-1/2cup
Milk-1/2cup
Rose Milk Essence-1/2tsp
Chironji Seeds-1/2cup

To Assemble The Cake:
Candy Clay/ Chocolate Plastique-300gm
Fruit Jam-1/2cup

Procedure:
Preparing Coconut Cake:
  1. Preheat oven to 175C.
  2. Mix flour, baking soda and baking powder in a bowl.
  3. Cream butter and sugar in another bowl using a hand mixer.
  4. When fluffy, add curd and beat until creamy.
  5. Add milk and essence and mix well.
  6. With a wooden spoon, mix the flour into the butter sugar mixture gently.
  7. Add the coconut powder and mix.
  8. Grease and dust a 7” square cake tin with butter and flour.
  9. Pour the batter into the tin.
  10. Place the tin in the middle shelf and bake for 30-35minutes or until a tooth pick inserted comes out clean.
  11. Place on wire rack for 5 minutes.
  12. Invert the cake onto the wire rack and allow it to cool.

Preparing the Rose Chironji Cake:
1.      Preheat oven to 175C.
2.      Mix flour baking soda and baking powder in a bowl.
3.      Cream butter and sugar in another bowl using a hand mixer.
4.      When fluffy, add curd and beat until creamy.
5.      Add milk and essence and mix well.
6.      With a wooden spoon, mix the flour into the butter sugar mixture gently.
7.      Add a teaspoon of flour to the chironji seeds and mix weel to coat. Add this to the cake batter and fold.
8.      Grease and dust a 7” square cake tin with butter and flour.
9.      Pour the batter into the tin.
10.  Place the tin in the middle shelf and bake for 30-35minutes or until a tooth pick inserted comes out clean.
11.  Place on wire rack for 5 minutes.
12.  Invert the cake onto the wire rack and allow it to cool.


Arranging The Cake:
1.      From each cake cut out two strips of equal width and height.
2.      Heat the jam until thin.
3.      Apply the jam on one side of the rose cake strip and join the coconut cake strip to it.
4.      Repeat it to the other pair.
5.      Now apply jam on top of the first pair and place the other pair inverted on it so that two identical strips lay opposite to each other.
6.      Now place the candy clay in between two cling wraps and roll it into thin rectangle enough to cover the whole cake.
7.      Remove the top cling wrap.
8.      Apply jam in the middle and place the assembled cake on it.
9.      Apply jam to the remaining parts of the candy clay.
10.  Gently bring one side of the candy clay with the wrap over the cake.
11.  Press to glue them together.
12.  Remove the wrap partially.
13.  Bring the other end of the candy clay so that it wraps the entire cake.
14.  Place it on the first fold.
15.  With a knife trim out the excess candy clay at the joining point and smoothen the joint.
16.  Remove the wrap from the second fold.
17.  Fold the clay on both the faces so that the cake is fully covered.
18.  Place it for 30minutes in refrigerator.
19.  Now place the cake seam side down on a serving plate and remove the cling wrap.
20.  With a blunt knife draw criss cross lines on top.
21.  Now trim both sides and remove excess candy clay and cake pieces.
22.  Keep it covered for 10-12hours.
23.  Slice it and serve.




Prepare two cakes.



Cut two identical strips in each cake



Join a pink cake with an yellow cake with jam.



Arrange the two strips so that they form a checker board pattern. Use jam to glue.



Roll out the candy clay between two cling wraps.



Apply jam in the centre and place the cake on it.



Apply jam to the remaining sides. Bring one side over the cake and slightly remove the wrap.



Bring the other side to the top and let it overlap the first side.



Fold the candy clay onto the cake at both the edges.



Remove the wrap from top and refrigerate.



Place seam side down on a cutting board and remove the wrap.



Trim both the edges.



Slice it and serve.

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