more green tea chiffon cake - two birthdays and a baby shower

We were in Tahoe for the past week so I didn't do any baking, but the weekend before we left was a busy baking weekend!  I had two cupcake orders, and two cakes to bake.  The first cake was to celebrate my mom and my brother's birthdays, both of which are in March.  And the second cake was for a coworker's baby shower.  I decided to make matcha green tea chiffon cake for both events, since it was still fresh in my head from my first attempt, and it was also a chance to improve on it.

My mom and brother's birthday cake came first.  I fell back on piping my usual basketweave sides and rope borders (since my experiments with the previous cake didn't go so well).  I'm still new to piping with whipped cream though, and I found that instead of the clean smooth lines I get with buttercream and cream cheese frosting, I get fuzzy wobbly lines with whipped cream.

To decorate the top, I arranged fresh strawberry halves in a flower pattern to keep it simple and clean, and to provide a pop of color.  To finish it off I piped a birthday message with melted chocolate.  Everyone seemed to like the cake, as it was light and airy, and not too filling nor too sweet.

For the second cake, I didn't start on it until 11pm the night before the baby shower!  This time I made sure to time myself, as I was curious to see how long it would take me.  I finished baking, cooling, and decorating the cake by 2:30am, from start to finish.

This time I felt much more comfortable piping with whipped cream, and my basketweave sides came out much more even.  And instead of piping a rope border on the top and bottom like I did with the birthday cake (which I felt made the cake look really short), I did a simple shell border only on the top, and left the bottom alone (to make the cake look taller).

My initial idea was to pipe a duckie or a onesie in the middle of the cake, but it had gotten really late and I was tired, and I didn't feel like mixing colors, so I just decorated the top with fresh strawberry halves once more, and piped the congratulations message in melted chocolate.

Hope everyone enjoyed the cake(s)!

matcha green tea chiffon cake

My friend Diana's birthday was on Valentine's Day, and since she loves green tea I decided to make her something with matcha green tea powder.  Since I've been experimenting with chiffon cakes lately (see here and here), I baked her a two-layer green tea chiffon cake.

To keep it light, I filled and frosted it with whipped cream that I made with heavy cream, matcha green tea powder, and powdered sugar.  I wanted to try something different from my usual basketweave cakes (see here, here, and here), so instead I piped simple vertical lines along the sides, and piped a beaded border.  I wasn't too happy with the results though - since I was piping with whipped cream (instead of buttercream), the lines were not smooth (and resembled worms, in my opinion).  Next time I'll try this with buttercream or royal icing, or maybe just a larger sized tip for more of a "columns" effect.

To tie in with Valentine's day, I decorated it with chocolate hearts that I piped onto waxed paper, and assembled into a "bouquet" in the middle of the cake.

As a finishing touch, I dusted the middle with just a touch of green tea powder.  At first I liked this effect, since the chocolate became speckled with green, but after a little while the green tea powder melted into the whipped cream below it and started to look like green mold :( Sorry Diana!

In the end, the cake was tender and light, and perfect after a big birthday meal of artisan pizza.  Hope you had a happy birthday Diana!

mini coffee chiffon cupcakes with cocoa whipped cream

After last week's experiments with chiffon cake, I thought to myself, what would chiffon cake taste like in cupcake form?  So I decided to find out.

I made the same coffee chiffon batter (since I looooooove coffee), and baked it up as regular cupcakes and also as mini cupcakes.  The results were drastically different.

The mini cupcakes turned out great!  They were light, fluffy, and springy.  The regular cupcakes, however, sank in the middle.  The texture was still nice, but they just didn't look very nice.  I'll need to play with the baking times on those in the future.

So I decorated the minis with cocoa whipped cream, dusted the tops with cocoa powder, and topped it with little chocolate hearts that I had piped onto waxed paper.

Happy Valentine's Day!

Cocoa Whipped Cream

1 cup heavy cream, cold

1/2 cup confectioner's sugar

pinch of salt 

1 teaspoon vanilla extract

In the bowl of a standing mixer, whip all the ingredients together at high speed until stiff peaks form. Use immediately, or store covered in the refrigerator (and re-whip before using).

Mini Coffee Chiffon Cupcakes

3/4 cup coffee

1 cup flour

1 tablespoon baking powder

1 cup granulated sugar

1/2 teaspoon salt

5 eggs, separated

1/2 cup vegetable oil 

1 tablespoon vanilla extract

1/2 teaspoon cream of tartar

Preheat the oven to 325F. In a large bowl, sift together the flour, baking powder, sugar and salt. Add the egg yolks, vegetable oil, cooled coffee, and vanilla. Stir until combined.

In the bowl of a stand mixer, add the egg whites and cream of tartar. Beat at high-speed until peaks form. 

Add the batter to the whipped egg whites in thirds, gently folding until combined each time. Be careful not to over-mix or deflate the egg whites.

Pour the batter into a mini cupcake pan lined with baking liners. Bake at 325F for 20-25 minutes. 

Let cool and top with whipped cream and a chocolate heart. Dust the tops with cocoa powder, if desired.

coffee chiffon cake

I've been wanting to try making a chiffon cake for a while now, so when we found out it was our our friend K's birthday last week, I thought it would be the perfect time to try making one.  I decided to try this recipe for coffee chiffon cake.

It took me three tries to get a decent chiffon cake.  The recipe called for an angel food cake tube pan, but I wanted to make a layer cake with two 8" pans instead.  I knew that I'd have to change the baking time, but I just didn't know by how much.  I ended up underestimating the baking time for my first batch - I had never made chiffon cake before and didn't know what to look for to tell if it was done.  But the toothpick came out clean so I assumed it was done!  I was wrong.  A few minutes after being taken out of the oven, my cakes started deflating ... and pulling away from the sides of the pan ... and eventually collapsed into a sad, lumpy mess.

So I made a second batch.  This time I almost doubled the baking time, still not knowing how to tell if it was done or not.  But when I pulled it out of the oven, it was already collapsed!  What was I doing wrong?

After a couple of searches on the internet (thanks Google!) I discovered that I was preparing the pans wrong.  Angel food and chiffon cakes rely on the whipped egg whites for their height, and if you grease the pans (which I was doing, like I normally do for regular cakes), the cake has nothing to grip onto for stability while rising.  And so it will collapse.  Aha!

So I had to make a third batch.  This time I didn't grease the pans at all, but still kept a piece of parchment paper on the bottom of the pan.  When I took the cakes out of the oven, I set them upside-down to cool (as Google instructed me to do), to help keep the cakes from deflating.  After they had cooled, I turned them right-side-up and was happy to see that they didn't deflate at all!  But ... as soon as I used my offset spatula to release the edges of the cake from the cake pans, they deflated.  But only a little bit.  So I was still happy.

To go with the lightness of the chiffon cake, I filled it and covered it with cream that I whipped up with cocoa powder and sugar.  Then I dusted the top with more cocoa powder, and decorated it with some whole coffee beans.  Hope you enjoyed it K and C!