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Monday, December 18, 2017

Baileys Irish Cream & Chocolate Mousse Reindeer Cake for Christmas!

Everyone needs a christmas pudding for dessert after dinner with family and friends, why not make it cute and a center piece of your dinner party! This cute reindeer cake will surely satisfy all your party needs. 

Showpiece? Check! Dessert/cake? Check! Chocolate? Check! Booze? Double Check!

This cake is made with layers of chocolate stout cake, Bailey Irish cream mousse and chocolate mousse. The chocolate mousse is rich and decadent, the soft and spongy chocolate stout cake and the boozy light and fluffy baileys mousse. 

If I were to make this recipe again, I would build the cake a little differently. I would cut the stout cake into thinner layers and layer mousse in between those thin layers to make it a 6 layer cake. This will make eating the cake much easier. Just an afterthought, you can try it this way too.

Part of this recipe uses box cake mix, you can totally make your own chocolate stout cake from scratch, but to save some time during a busy christmas dinner, we opt for a box cake!

In bizarre island, we are not fans of fondant/sugar paste/gum paste/all the varieties of dough like confection. We avoid using them when we can, sometimes it maybe unavoidable, but we try to come up with other ingredients to "substitute" it. 

We don't like using fondant for a couple of reasons:
1. It is "one-note" and does not add any flavour/texture that will enhance the dessert.
2. It does not taste good in large quantities
3. And because it does not taste good, people tend to discard it rather than eating it which leads to wastage.

There are some cases that we will use fondant but most of the time we will try other methods before resorting to it.

So after so much blabbering, I hope you like my take on an all edible, non-fondant Reindeer Cake! 


Chocolate and Baileys Mousse Cake
Yields 6 inch cake

Ingredients
Stout cake layer:
1 Box of cake mix
Stout Beer
Eggs
Oil/Butter

Baileys Mousse:
1 Egg yolk
1/2 Egg white
30g (8 tsp) Granulated sugar, (divide to 2 equal portions)
90g (3.2 oz) Baileys irish cream
3g (1/2 heaped tsp) Gelatin
110g (4 oz) Heavy cream, cold

Chocolate Mousse:
180g (6.4 oz) Dark chocolate
160g (2/3 cup) Heavy cream, cold
6g (1 heaped tsp) Gelatin
30g (2 tbsp) brew coffee
1 Egg white
40g (8 tsp) Granulated sugar

Candy coating/Chocolate
Assorted luster dust
4 Pocky sticks
3 Red M&Ms
[Get Printable Template here!! ]

Method
Cake Layer
1. Preheat 180°C (350°F)
2. Prepare the cake according to the box (Each cake mix is different, Follow adjustments below)
3. Replace stated amount of liquid (ie. water) with same amount of stout beer
4. Replace stated amount of oil with half oil and half melted butter
5. If you want a richer cake, add 1 more egg than the box states (We did not do this)
6. Divide the cake batter into 3 portions
7. Pour 2 portions into two 6-inch cake pan lined with parchment paper and bake for 30-35 min
8. Let it cool and level the tops to make it flat (Trim sides to a little smaller) Layers should be around 2cm
9. You can bake the leftover batter in 1 6-inch pan or in 6 cupcake tins
10. Wrap one slice of cake tight in acetate and put it in a ring mold (or you can use the same clean cake pan as above)

Baileys Mousse Layer
1. Combine egg yolk and half of the sugar, whip to pale and thick
2. Heat Baileys (reserve 15ml/1 tbsp) to simmer and slowly temper the egg yolk mixture with it
3. Heat the mixture in a double boiler and thickens slightly(until the mixture reaches 60°C)
4. Remove from heat and pass it through a sieve to remove lumps, set aside
5. Pour the reserved baileys(15ml/1 tbsp) over the gelatin and mix until absorbs
6. Set it a side to bloom
7. Combine remaining sugar and egg white, whisk it until frothy
8. Place the bowl over a pan of barely simmering water and heat, whisking constantly, until the sugar has dissolved
9. Remove the bowl from the heat and beat it until cooled with stiff peaks
10. In another bowl, whip the cold heavy cream to soft peaks
11. Microwave the bloomed gelatin until dissolved
12. Add it into the baileys mixture and stir until all combine
13. Mix in the meringue with a whisk until no lumps can be seen
14. Fold in the semi-whipped cream
15. Pour mousse into mold, on to the first layer of cake and gently tap it once to remove big air pockets
16. Add the second layer of cake and slightly press it down
17. Cover and refrigerate until firm, around 3 hours

Chocolate Mousse Layer
1. Combine heavy cream and chocolate, microwave gently until melted and fully incorporated
2. Pour coffee over the gelatin and mix until absorbs
3. Set it a side to bloom
4. Combine sugar and egg white, whisk it until frothy
5. Place the bowl over a pan of barely simmering water and heat, whisking constantly, until the sugar has dissolved
6. Remove the bowl from the heat and beat it until cooled with stiff peaks
7. Microwave the bloomed gelatin until dissolved
8. Add it into ganache mixture and stir until all combine
9. Mix in the meringue with a whisk until no lumps can be seen
10. Fill 6 small heart molds with chocolate mousse, cover and freeze until solid
11. Remove the firm cake from the tin and remove the acetate
12. Re-lined the mold with acetate and place the cake into the middle (There should be a small gap around the whole cake)
13. Pour mousse and guide the mousse into mold, make sure the mousse have fill all the sides
14. Rap the mold a few times lightly to make sure the top is smooth and the sides are filled
15. Cover and freeze until solid, around 6 hours
16. Unmold cake and remove the acetate and let it defrost in the fridge overnight
17. Unmold the mousse hearts and let 2 stay in the freezer and the rest defrost with the cake

Decorations
1. Melt candy coating/ temper dark chocolate
2. Pipe “eyes, nose” on a piece of acetate and place acetate into a tin to set it curve
3. Pipe “leaves” on another piece of acetate and let it set
4. Pipe “antlers” on a large piece of acetate and place 2 pockys on each antler to make a support, let it set
5. Once all the chocolate/candy decos are fully set, dust them with their respective colours of luster dust
6. Remove the cake from the refrigerator
7. Microwave the 4 heart mousse for 5 sec and fill it in a piping bag with a star tip
8. Use the mousse and adhere the inner ear to the 2 frozen hearts mousse
9. Pipe a few stars on the cake and push in the hearts upside down to make ears
10. Push a knife into where you want to position your antlers to make cavity
11. Pull out the knife and put the antlers in its place
12. Pipe more stars to cover the seams
13. Push in the holly leaves in place and put 3 m&ms to look like berries
14. Keep it covered and refrigerated until you are ready to serve

Tips
I. The raw egg yolks in the mousse should be heated to 60°C (138°F) to be safe if you are not sure about it please buy pasteurize eggs
II. While heating with the bain-marie, you need to stir constantly to prevent the egg yolk from scrambling
III. There will be leftover cake from the cake batter, depending on different box mix. Usually box mix makes 2 8-inch round cakes but we are only using 2 6-inch to make a more petite cake
IV. If you can’t find pocky biscuits, you can other stick-like foods or just use skewers but remember you can’t eat skewers
V. If you don’t have time to freeze, unmold and defrost to decorate, you can just refrigerate for 3 hours and unmold it to decorate straight away but the downside of this method will not have a smooth outlook when the acetate is pulled off the mousse
VI. You can use different kinds of candy coating colour to achieve the decorations, we used lusters so we only have to temper/melt 1 ingredient and save on some piping bags

Links to supplies
6 Inch Cake Pan
Pocky Sticks
Electric Hand Mixer
Cake Leveler





Hope you guys enjoy this weeks [How To's]

See you next week :)

 xo D

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