After my recent disaster with a Chocolate Mousse Cake, I was a little hesitant to take on a special bake for my Birthday. On top of that, we had a massive snow storm the day of my Birthday which required me to shovel snow a couple of times during the day as I was baking this. Despite both issues, I took on the challenge and was very happy with the end result.
Initially, when I was looking for a cake to bake for my Birthday, I came across this by accident. I remembered seeing them make a Prinsesstarta or Princess Cake on an episode of The Great British Baking Show. It was quite a challenge, even for those experienced home bakers. What really attracted me to this cake though, was the filling of raspberry jam and custard cream. Two of my most favorite things. Below is a link to the recipe I used, if you are interested and would like to try it yourself.
https://www.pbs.org/food/recipes/prinsesstarta-princess-cake/
I have quickly learned in my baking adventures that you know a cake is going to be a challenge, when the directions are more than one page. In this case there was twenty four steps and the ingredients and directions are spread over three pages. This terrified me at first, but I promised myself I would try to expand my cake making skills this year, so I wanted to take it on. Knowing, it was an involved process, I decided to make the custard and jam fillings the evening before. This also gave them a chance to firmly set overnight. If you have the time, I would suggest you do this as well.
When mixing the cake, I sifted the cornflour, flour and baking powder all in at once over the sugar and egg mixture. I did this, as it seemed to say this in the instructions, unless I misread them. I would suggest, folding in this mixture in two parts however. Otherwise it might result in over mixing the cake as you try to incorporate everything at once. I was gentle in my folding in of the mixture, but I did find it a challenge not to over mix.
The assembly of the cake I expected to be more difficult. I actually found that to be pretty straight forward. The key thing with the first layer of sponge is to pipe a thick border of custard around the edge to keep the jam in as you see in the picture to the left. This helped when adding the custard cream on top of the jam to keep everything in place. The next layer just has custard cream which was then followed by the whipped cream. The directions make it sound allot harder than it actually is don’t be as terrified as I was initially.
When using the remaining whipped cream to shape the dome on top of the cake, I added a teaspoon of cornflour to the cream which is not mentioned in the recipe. I did this to help stabilize the cream. I find whipped cream does not hold its shape well unless you stabilize it. I am glad I did this, as I got an firmer dome shape when I put on the marzipan as the cream was more stable and able to hold that weight better.
I never made marzipan before, so this was a new experience too. I mixed it initially using my stand mixer as directed and finished off mixing it on the counter. As they suggest in the recipe, do not use liquid food coloring, gel or paste is best. I added a couple of tooth picks of gel coloring and was able to get a nice rich kelly green color. The recipe called for making the rose on top of the cake with fondant. I however decided instead to make mine of marzipan by coloring some red. I think it came out well, what do you think based on the picture below? It’s up to you if you want to use fondant, but I didn’t want to buy it just for that and the recipe calls for more marzipan that you will actually use to cover the cake.
Overall the cake will take you about 4-5 hours, so it’s not a cake to attempt if you are in a hurry. Luckily besides the issue with the folding in of ingredients for the sponge, I did not run into any challenging or unexpected issues. Below are some pictures of the final cake. It was a wonderful birthday cake and I am glad I took on the challenge. I was so proud of myself. I shared pictures with some Swedish fiends who also were actually very impressed. I like the sponge so much in this cake, I think I will use It for some other cake creations in the future. It is so light and delicate and held very well for a few days in the fridge, as we could not eat it all at once. If you have any questions or comments on my bake, please use the comment box below. I would be happy to help if I can. Now onto to next baking challenge.
