Whole Foods Chantilly Cake

My lovely sister, Melanie, was home for about two weeks over 4th of July week (weird how it wasn't week-end). We also got to celebrate her birthday too, which she apparently hadn't celebrated at home for about 6 years. Since I went to boarding school and then to college, I know exactly how that feels, it I knew it was special that she got to finally celebrate at home with her family. Since I almost always bake something when I go to my grandmother's house and it was also Mel's b-day, I thought this would be the perfect time to bake a cake.

There is no comparison to the Whole Foods Chantilly cake. It is simply fantastic. Sold by the heavenly slice, this cake is exceptionally moist and the most incredible frosting. So naturally, my instinct was to try and make it myself. And I must say, it came out pretty damn good. The cake wasn't as moist, but I'll probably play around with that recipe a bit more before it's perfected. The Chantilly cream frosting however was sensational. I mean, anything with both cream cheese, whipped cream, AND mascarpone has got to be amazing (which it was).

.....I also admit being lazy when I took these pics, and thus I really don't think they do the cake justice. It was delicious and I definitely will be making it again. Maybe I'll have a DSLR camera and I'll finally get accepted onto foodgawker....(yeah right) but a nerd can dream, right? 


Whole Foods Chantilly Cake 
What you will need: 

Simple yellow cake recipe (I used THIS ONE)

Chantilly cream frosting

Macerated strawberry/raspberry puree  

Apricot fruit glaze (or just thinned and microwaved apricot jam)

strawberries 

blackberries

raspberries 

blueberries 

strawberries 

Chantilly Cream Ingredients
8 oz container cream cheese, room temp
8 oz container mascarpone cream cheese, room temp
1 cup confectioners sugar
2 cups heavy whipping cream
1 teaspoon almond extract

Berry Sauce

Blend together strawberries and raspberries (or just raspberries. I didn't have enough so put strawberries in there too).  In a small sauce pan over medium low heat, add the berry puree and 1/4 cup of sugar. Let this sit for about 5 or so minutes until you think the sugar has disolved into the puree.

Directions
1. Whip the cream cheese, mascarpone and confectioners sugar together until light and fluffy.

2. In a separate bowl, whip together the heavy whipping cream and almond extract until stiff peaks form. Make sure not to over mix because it will become grainy and change the texture and appearance of your frosting. 

3. Gently fold the whipped cream into the mascarpone cream cheese mixture until fully incorporated.

 The next steps I show you how to assemble the cake. I think the pictures are pretty self explanatory. Read the captions for more details about each pic

Let the sauce sit and soak in for a bit. I think this adds a bit of extra moisture to the cake

Spread a generous layer of the frosting on top of the sauce. With the spatula, make the outer rim of the frosting higher than the center so the fruit and sauce stay in the center of the cake rather than spill out the sides when you add the top layer of cake.

This is the crumb coat before the second coat of frosting. This is crucial for a smooth finish on your cake. The key is to not let the spatula touch the cake during round 2 of frosting. (for the crumb coat, you do)

Now the fun part - arrange your fruit! I cut the kiwi's in half. I also started with the biggest, aka the strawberries, and gradually worked my way down to the smallest (the blueberries)

Mel tryin to sneak a taste before we dig in. No one wanted to sing. LAME

Slice...

Serve!

My New Audi A4 - in cake form!

My dad got me a new car this summer (I know I almost peed a little I was so excited) and to say thank you, I thought I would give him a car too. I have always wanted to use fondant before, but I've been pretty intimidated by it. I thought it would be really difficult and too advanced for my inexperienced...ness. I'm not gonna lie, this is the most time consuming kitchen project I have ever done, but it is so satisfying that I would absolutely do it again. (although its redunculously expensive too - the fondant alone was over 20 dorra. no I didn't make it myself. even the big deal bakers don't make their own though. I know sucre doesn't...big deal) Anyhoo, I also had to bake 3 cakes which has 8 egg yolks in each cake. yeah that an s*-ton of eggs. I plan to make some macaroons tomorrow though with the leftover whites so we'll see how that goes.

  

For the cake I used a classic yellow cake recipe I found on the inter-web which you can find here. This particular project was more about the look of the cake than the actual taste. I basically wanted to see if I could actually pull it off so I didn't want to get to wild with flavors. I also wanted to do a yellow cake because my car is black with a beige interior (so I want to make a black car cake, with a yellow interior with a chocolate ganache between each layer. I know, I'm realllly clever)

I used two large rectangular pans and two medium rectangular pans (with 3 recipes of the classic yellow cake)

After I carved the cake, I covered it in chocolate ganache so the fondant would stick to the cake

I made a small batch of simple buttercream for the piping(and don't tell steph, but I don't know how I feel about them candle holders. their pretty intense...)

You would think that cutting into the cake you spent several days to make would be heartbreaking, but I actually loved it...Also I didn't realize how big of a cake this actually is. It could easily serve about 20 or more people. There were 3 of us....

Because it took me several days to make this cake (because I work too much and never have time to do anything these days) the cake itself was dryer than when it was first baked. Therefiz I decided to add a dollop of buttercream on the side with some fresh blueberries. I think it make a huge difference.