Polish Princess

May 12, 2015

I dreaded this recipe. So many calories and I’m feeling war weary from all the “discipline.” I’m down 11 pounds now, but stuff like this just takes me to my knees. For anyone who can appreciate this, 1/20th of a piece is 10 points. That’s right! I had my piece and thankfully, didn’t like it. It was just too rich for me. One shouldn’t have to break into a sweat after a piece of cake. I prefer my calories to be light and fluffy, like a Bavarian Cream or something (or a Gin Martini-dry and neat).

To boot, I fell sick mid-cake due to something I ate at lunch. There I was working on the buttercream, and the room suddenly got way too hot. I flushed with queasiness; then my head started spinning. That was pretty much the end of me for the rest of the day. Poor Rick had to nurse me AND pack up the Polish Princess for the night. All-in-all, this cake and I just weren’t a match.

The Finer Cookie is a participant in the Amazon Services LLC Associates Program, an affiliate advertising program designed to provide a means for websites to earn advertising fees by advertising and linking to amazon.com. This post contains affiliate links, which means The Finer Cookie will receive a small commission if you make a purchase using this link. This modest income helps support the website.

Ingredients

Volume Grams Ounces

Instructions

I found making this cake very interesting, as I had never added egg yolk to beaten egg whites. Then to add the water at the end of the folding process was even more curious.

Folding the flour into the eggs and sugar

The batter poured nicely into the cake pan and it baked without a hitch.

The only issue I had was taking the cake’s temperature. Truthfully, I dislike this step because I have a tendency to tear the cake with the probe. I think I will stop checking the temperature unless I really am in doubt. I’m a fairly good judge of when the cake is fully baked.

TEA VODKA SYRUP

I liked this syrup very much. Rather than using straight black tea, I pulled out some ice wine black tea that I bought at The Chateau Laurier after High Tea. It is sweetly fragrant and I thought it would work nicely. It did.

It is always surprising to me how much syrup a cake will absorb. One would think that the cake would just dissolve, but it never does and the next day, it was in perfect condition—still firm and intact.

PASTRY BUTTERCREAM

This is where I parted ways with this recipe. I think I would have preferred straight pudding cooked the old fashioned way, then flavored and left in the fridge overnight. I just felt the whole buttercream thing was over-done.

COCOA AND WALNUT PASTRY BUTTERCREAM

Went together simply and easily.

CHOCOLATE AND RAISIN PASTRY BUTTERCREAM

I used my leftover white raisins and currents I had in the pantry and soaked them in vodka rather than straight water. In the end, I was happy with my choice because I felt the vodka brightened up the flavors of the buttercream.

ASSEMBLING THE CAKE

I’ve learned from making charlottes, where you layer cake with Bavarian cream in a spring form pan, that it’s best to put cardboard cake round on the base of the pan before assembling the cake.

The cardboard cake round before it went into the pan

You don’t know the countless times I’ve assembled beautiful charlottes, with lady fingers, praline and peeled pistachios, fancy ribbons—you know, the full Monty, only to realize at the 11th hour that I couldn’t transfer it off the ugly cake base onto a beautiful serving piece. Uuggh! Those hard lessons…

The cake returned to the pan for assembly. The cake returned to the pan for assembly. — The cake returned to the pan for assembly.

UNMOLD THE CAKE, CUT AND SERVE

The cake unmolded nicely, but it didn’t cut well for me, even with a hot knife. Maybe the nuts and chocolate weren’t chopped small enough? The drag from these ingredients might be why I didn’t get a clean cut? Maybe I cut it when it was too cold? Cutting through the cold buttercream was stressing out the tender cake and the slices were tearing apart? In the end, I found that the cake had to sit out for several hours before the buttercream was a super smooth and delicious consistency.