Coconut and lime cake with passionfruit cheesecake filling and passionfruit Swiss Meringue Buttercream icing

There is so much inspiration and information available on the internet these days that it can be hard to make a decision when there is so much choice available. There are also so many awesome bakers on Insta to take inspiration from. This was inspired by Cakes by Cliff, Katherine Sabbath and Unbirthday Bakery.

This cake is a mash up of all tried and true recipes that combine magically in flavours that I love and I thought the birthday girl would love also. This was made quite a few months ago and I have been a slacker in posting . . . 

I am a bit of a list maker and tend to have about 30 Evernote notes going at a time. I generally collect a few recipes in a note and cull them when I make a final decision.

Here's a glimpse into my listmaking mania.








I usually have a calendar of when I am going to make everything as well, as I only like to build the cake on the day it's due.

If a cake was needed for a Saturday, I would organise the decorations during the week (i.e. the toppers and the chocolate sail and the meringues), bake the cake on Thursday night, make the cheesecake filling and Swiss Meringue Buttercream friday and fill and ice the cake, make the ganache for the drip on Saturday and decorate.

So, here goes, the list of recipes that contributed to the cake! Of course, you could choose to make less components and it would still be delicious or replace a certain part with one of your own favourite recipes. 

Coconut and Lime Syrup Cake via Donna Hay here

I baked this in 2 x 16cm round pans. I also replaced any lemon with lime. I don't remember the cooking time, use the skewer test (poke in a skewer when you think done and when only crumbs are on stick, not batter, take out.

Passionfruit Curd via Taste here

You will have leftover, but no-one will be complaining!

Passionfruit Cheesecake Filling via Katherine Sabbath 

This recipe was modified from a little booklet Katherine gave out at at cake decorating demo I went to.

250gm cream cheese icing, at room temp

75gm butter

200ml freshly whipped cream

1/2 C icing sugar

1. Beat together room temp cream cheese and butter until well combined. Gently fold through whipped cream and icing sugar alternately.

2. Place in a container and cover with plastic wrap until needed.

Passionfruit Swiss Meringue Buttercream via the neverfail Sweetapolita recipe  here

I made half this recipe (it makes plenty enough to cover the cake) and flavoured it with passionfruit juice. It wasn't passionfruit season, so I strained a can of passionfruit and added about 1-2 tablespoons of juice to taste once the buttercream was finished and beat well. I also added colour and beat well to make sure it was mixed in.

Meringues via Taste here (don't add the lemon rind)

Colour the meringues as needed (gel paste preferred as doesn't add as much liquid) and place into piping bags with star tips and cook as directed. 

Ganache drip

125gm dark chocolate, in pieces

60ml thickened cream

1. Place cream in a saucepan and heat over medium heat until bubbles at edges of pot appear. Take off heat, add chocolate, let sit for 1 minute and then stir until smooth.

2. Place in plastic container and let cool down until it is room temp and similiar to pancake batter.

Chocolate Sail

100gm dark chocolate buttons

So, I know how to temper chocolate, but sometimes you just cant be bothered! So, if like me, you don't want to temper, make sure you use chocolate buttons that have vegetable oil rather than cocoa solids. This means that you don't have to temper it.

To make the sails, melt the chocolate, spread it thinly on a piece of baking paper, and rest it on something in your kitchen to make the sail shape. I draped mine between two glasses, You can also make a support out of foil etc.

If the chocolate hardens before you have reached the shape you want, put the baking paper in the microwave for 5 second bursts and then reshape. That's the benefit of using cooking chocolate rather than tempered chocolate.

Construction

1. Layer cakes into two layers each, you will have 4 in total. If the cakes have domed too much, level them out a little. Make sure you reserve a flat bottom to use as the top layer.

2. Place first layer on a cake board, drizzle a tiny bit of syrup from cake recipe , use a palette knife to spread 1/3 of passionfruit cream cheese icing on base, Then layer a small amount of passionfruit curd. Continue on with second and third layers the same way. Depending on how firm your passionfruit cream cheese is, you may need to stick a kebab stick vertically through all layers to keep them where you want them, whilst it firms in the fridge, Place in the fridge for around 1 hr to firm up.

3. Take cake from fridge and apply crumb coat. Place back in fridge for 15 mins. Apply final coat, scrape back with palette knife until smooth. See Cakestyle on Youtube for a tutorial if needed.

4. For the chocolate drip, I use a teaspoon to drip the chocolate around the edges, once I am happy with the drips, I spread the leftover ganache over the top of the cake. Here is a drip tutorial if needed . I have also seen some tutorials where the chocolate has been put in a piping bag and dripped own the sides that way, I might try that next time.

5. Decorate the top with whatever treats you wish. For this cake I went with roasted coconut chips, white coconut ball chocolates (forget the name), Flakes, a Summer Roll and a chocolate sail. 

Unfortunately, as this was eaten at work, there are no innards images, but it was good!

[Cook it] Pie, everyone loves pie!

I love pies.

Plus I have a new appreciation of making pastry from scratch ever since I came across Smitten Kitchen. Such an awesome food blog that has a fabulous recipe index so that you can search for a particular recipe based on a fruit or a vegetable (amongst other categories, go check it out!)

So if you have a couple of punnets of strawberries in the fridge and  a yearning to bake something, this is your website.

As a bonus, the photography is beautiful. There is also a Smitten Kitchen cookbook which I have and quite admire, but I find myself going back to the website more often.

I have attempted this recipe a few times with a few different variations. The cherry pie is delicious when cherries are in season, but the strawberry and rhubarb has to be a favourite. The cooked strawberries taste like little balls of toffee in your mouth. Delish.

Here is the Strawberry Rhubarb pie recipe along with the pastry recipe.

The only changes that I made, despite the advice not to, is that I use a food processor to make the pastry, I really don't have the patience  to make it any other way!

With the Rhubarb and Strawberry filling I don't use tapioca (as I never have it in the pantry) so instead I used 3-4 tablespoons of cornflour.

Here are some pictures of the steps below, especially the pastry texture as that can be a little hard to master!



Make sure you have all your ingredients measured (and the butter chilled) ready to go.



Pop all the ingredients (bar the water) in the food processer until the butter is in pea sized pieces.



Add the chilled water sparingly, I used about 125ml.



It should look like this when finished processing, the little butter chunks are a good sign.



When I rest it to chill I try and flatten into a disc shape as much as I can (saves rolling later!)




Wrap in plastic and chill in fridge for at least 1/2 hr or until needed.




Chop up this delicious fruit that looks like it is smiling at you.



Put fruit and remaining ingredients in a bowl.




Fill pie to overflowing



Roll out pastry to around 4mm thickness within 2 pieces of non-stick paper and place in pie dish.

 

In a very amateur manner (after watching a few youtube vids) create a rough lattice pattern.





Cook and voila! (Unlike me, maybe place a tray under the pie dish to catch any rogue juices!)

It isn't picture perfect, but tasted delicious!