January Daring Bakers: Biscuit Joconde Imprime Entremets

Don't worry, you don't have to be able to pronounce the name in order to enjoy the beauty and taste of this month's Daring Bakers Challenge.  It's french, and the french know their desserts, so smile and nod and dig right in!

But, first things first.  I had no reason to be nervous about my interview with the Master Gardeners selection committee on Tuesday.  The panel was kind and wonderful...and they let me in!  Hooray!!! I now have about 200 hours of training to go through, two years as an intern, and then I'll have earned my way into the program.  I am so excited, and can't wait to get started.  The first class isn't until the end of February, so I'll have to contain my excitement for a little while longer, so let's just move on to the cake.

The January 2011 Daring Bakers’ challenge was hosted by Astheroshe of the blog accro. She chose to challenge everyone to make a Biscuit Joconde Imprime to wrap around an Entremets dessert.

 A biscuit joconde imprime is sponge cake with a design baked right into the cake itself. Two separate batters are made, each with it's own flavor and/or color.  The first batter is either piped or spread onto the sil-pat into any type of pattern desired. I used my decorating bag and piped out a crazy swirl of blue batter on the sil-pat, then added polka dots, and then stopped myself before things swerved too much further out of control.

After the first design is frozen, a second layer of batter is spread over top the first layer. 

This the joconde imprime is then baked, and strips are cut out to line a springform pan.

In hindsight, I should have put the bottom layer upside down.

The joconde imprime was the required part of the challenge.

How to fill the dessert was left up to each Daring Baker...and, since this was my own birthday cake, I felt really free to put whatever flavors of filling I wanted to on the interior.

For the bottom layer, I made a raspberry/blueberry mousse.

Atop this layer, I spread a layer of rosewater gelee.  Unfortunately, the mylanta pink liquid seeped through the joconde imprime, leaving unsightly botches on the outside. 

However, it was my own cake and I chose not to feel too bad about it!

Atop the gelee, I glopped on a layer of orange water infused stabilized whipped cream.

The final layer was a blueberry rosewater sauce.

I loved making this challenge, and I loved the result.  The rest of the family just about gagged on the rosewater flavoring, but I relished the new flavor.  This challenge really brought out the best of so many other Daring Bakers.  The artistry of the imprime was astounding, and the flavor combinations that people came up with were mind blowing as well.

Someday soon I'm going to have to try the chocolate version of the joconde recipe, maybe filled with chocolate mousse and topped with caramel?  What about marshmallow fluff and peanut butter?  Perhaps the world's fanciest strawberry shortcake?  The sky is the limit with this dessert! 

Even if I still can't pronounce it exactly right...

August Daring Bakers: Baked Alaska!

Blog-checking lines: The August 2010 Daring Bakers’ challenge was hosted by Elissa of 17 and Baking. For the first time, The Daring Bakers partnered with Sugar High Fridays for a co-event and Elissa was the gracious hostess of both. Using the theme of beurre noisette, or browned butter, Elissa chose to challenge Daring Bakers to make a pound cake to be used in either a Baked Alaska or in Ice Cream Petit Fours. The sources for Elissa’s challenge were Gourmet magazine and David Lebovitz’s “The Perfect Scoop”.

It's been a long haul this past two weeks!

The good news is, I get to keep my hand! The bad news is that I only started being able to use it, and cautiously at that, starting today. I still have some numbness and lots of swelling, but I'm out of the tunnel and definitely in the light. If you want to get truly disgusted, just do a little Google search on Infectious Flexor Tenosynovitis, but you might want to wait until after you've looked at the yummy food pictures below!

So starting today, I was finally able to type and I was also able(finally!!)to get back in the kitchen and do some cooking. Just in the nick of time, too, since today is the August Daring Bakers reveal date. Baked Alaska was this month's challenge, and I have to say it made a wonderful cake to celebrate the day with!


The first part of a Baked Alaska is a cake base--in this case we made a brown butter pound cake. How good was this? The batter was divine licked straight off the beaters, and cake is pretty great as well. Think pound cake, but with a sort of nutty caramel tweak. Yeah. Good. Of course I forgot to take a picture of the cake before I leveled it. Also, see the myriad of little holes? That's a combination of hurrying and trying to figure out how to hold spatula in a hand that's not working right.


The second part of the cake is ice cream. I followed (loosely, verryyyy loosely) the recipe for fresh strawberry ice cream that came with my ice cream maker. Instead of strawberries, I used a mixture of raspberries and blueberries. Along with vanilla, I added a nice little shot of Chambourd. Macerating the fruit? Who has the TIME for that???? And finally, instead of adding half the berries here and half the berries there, I just dumped the whole lot of them in at once.

So, you know, about as good as I ever follow any recipe!

The final layer of a Baked Alaska is the meringue. I love meringue. A. Lot. So, I was really glad to have a ton of egg whites left over that have been hanging out in the freezer for a few weeks. I thawed those and discovered to my dismay (naah, utter delight!) that I had approximately 50% too many for the recipe. I made it all up and I used it all up! Yay for meringue!


I was really scared when it came time to assemble the whole cake. My ice cream hadn't had time to freeze solid, so I was really concerned that the cake guts would melt before the skin was bronzed. No worries, though. I had plenty of time to use my kitchen torch and take plenty of pictures, too!


This brief interruption brought to you be gratitude. Hey Bet?! How long ago was it you gave me the torch for Christmas? Still one of my favorite gifts ever!!!! Thank you!!!!!!

Okay, back to business.

The business here being trying to get the cats off the table so I can take photos! Move your furry hind-end, Sky! Hurry, the sun is going down!

What, you too?

That's it! I'm going back to bed!