Tea for two and two for tea!

I'm sorry it's taken me so long to get to work in the kitchen and give you something to read about. Truth being told, I sorta gave baking a break after suffering a defeating loss at the hands of Food Gawker. This splendid idea of getting my blog onto Food Gawker was suggested and I tried. 5 times at that. All rejected within 24 hours of submission. And all the time it was lighting, composition and exposure issues. Do I honestly want to go all out to do food photography?
Well, not really. It's just too expensive. And anyway, considering it isn't my job, I think my photography is just for fun.

Doesn't make getting rejected any nicer. :((

Now, initially I was looking for a Coffee Cake recipe to go with my left over coffee cream filling from the macarons but I'm so glad I settled for an adaptation of this delightful recipe from Joy of Baking! Such a treat. :)

Ingredients

Cake Topping

1. 1 cup pecans toasted and chopped coarsely
2. 1/4 cup light brown sugar
3. 1/3 cup mini chocolate chips
4. 3/4 teaspoon ground cinnamon
5. 1 tablespoon all purpose flour

Cake

1. 2 cups cake flour
2. 1 teaspoon double acting baking powder
3. 1/4 teaspoon salt
4. 140gm softened butter/margarine
5. 3/4 cup granulated sugar
6. 2 eggs
7. 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
8. 160ml plain yogurt

Coffee Cream

1. 2 egg yolks
2. 50g super fine caster sugar
3. 1 tablespoon cornflour
4. 2/3 cup milk
5. 1 vanilla bean split length ways
6. 2 tablespoons of softened unsalted butter/margarine
7. 100ml heavy cream
8. 2 teaspoons instant coffee granules dissolved in 1 teaspoon of boiling water

Method

1. Combine all ingredients of cake topping and mix well
2. In a large bowl, beat the softened butter/marg until a creamy consistency
3. Add sugar and beat until fluffy
4. Add eggs and beat until well combined
5. Sift the rest of the dry ingredients into a separate bowl and set aside
6. Measure out the yogurt and set aside
7. Preheat oven to 180C and grease the pans (I used two 7" loose-bottom pans and baked in 2 batches resulting in 4 cakes in total)
8. Mix the flour mixture (in 3 additions) and yogurt (in 2 additions) into the cake mix alternating starting and ending with the flour mixture
9. Mix all until well combined
10. At this point the mixture should weigh a total of 800gm
11. Spoon 200gm into each tin and spread the mixture out evenly
12. On top of the 2 bottom layers I sprinkled about2-3 tablespoons of the crumble mixture on each cake, and then divide the rest of the crumble mixture evenly on top of the other two layers
13. Bake in the middle rack of the oven for 20 minutes or until a skewer inserted comes out clean.
14. Remove from oven and leave to cool for about 15 minutes before removing from pans
15. Now make the cream!
16. Put egg yolks, cornflour and sugar into a heat proof bowl and whisk together until well combined
17. Heat the milk and vanilla bean in a non-stick pot until it just about starts to boil
18. Remove from heat and pour immediately over the egg mixture whisking constantly until smooth
19. Pour mixture back into the pan and stir constantly on low heat until the custard comes to the boil and thickens
20. Strain custard into a clean bowl and add butter, stirring until melted
21. Stir coffee mixture into custard and leave to cool
22. Refrigerate when cooled
23. Whip the cream until it will hold soft peaks before stirring into the chilled custard
24. Keep refrigerated until ready to spread on top of the bottom layer cake and sandwich with the layer covered with more crumble

Just for the record, I thought the recipe wasn't enough of a challenge and might not taste that good but honestly? It's pretty awesome. Especially the crumbly top. A keeper. :D

Love,

Amy.

p.s. if you're not so keen on making a filling, just follow the JOB recipe.