Tuesday, June 19, 2012

TWD: Genoise -- the French can have it!



Put me in the failure column for this week's Tuesdays with Dorie. My French strawberry cake would turn anyone off genoise. I have successfully made sponge cake and jelly roll cakes in the past, but genoise was a new experience. Unfortunately, my cake bottom was tough enough to use as paving material. Notice the lighter bottom half in the picture at right. That was the tough and doughy portion.

Rather than cut the 8-inch cake in thirds, put strawberries and whipped cream between the layers, then frost the cake with whipped cream, I elected to cut my cake into rounds using a 3-inch biscuit cutter hoping to salvage at least part of the cake.

I followed the instructions to a T, whipping the mixture until I got the prescribed ribbon of batter. I believe I folded the flour in adequately. Although the bump in the bowl of my Kitchen Aid mixture did hide pockets of flour, I folded and folded until I felt I got all the flour incorporated. I then carefully folded in the butter and a portion of the batter mixture, but to no avail. The cake, particularly the shoe-leather bottom layer, looked inedible.

Soldiering on, I divided my rounds in half, layered each half with strawberries and whipped cream, and tried to soak enough juice into the intractable bottom layer to make it edible. It didn't work. The bottom layer was so rubbery, the strawberry syrup rolled off like water off a duck's back. My husband and I ate the top half of the cakes and put the bottom half down the disposal. I will be very interested to see how others fared with this recipe. Although I was only able to eat the top portion of the cake, I learned that I much prefer the southern version of strawberry shortcake, using warm biscuit-like rounds made with White Lily self-rising flour, lard, buttermilk and sugar. I will concede the genoise version to the French and stick to my tried-and-true shortcake.

11 comments:

  1. oh no, sorry it didn't work out!

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  2. Your cake looks good, even if tough! I too like the southern-style biscuit rounds! Nice baking with you, Catherine at www.praycookblog.com

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  3. Sorry this wasn't a hit for you. I have to say - I prefer biscuits with my berries over cake. This was nice, but not what I would yearn for.

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  4. Oh My Gosh, you are so funny! I am glad that you were able to laugh at your cake! Being a girl from the south, I also like old fashioned shortcake with a little lard in it. I will admit though, this cake was on the top of my list!

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  5. How weird that it divided itself into a tough layer and a not-tough layer! How annoying! I wasn't terribly impressed with how mine turned out, either.

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  6. So sorry. Sounds like we had similar results. Would love to see your no-fail shortcake recipe! :)

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    1. Hi Jessica: Here is my recipe for shortcake: 2 1/2 cups of White Lily Self-Rising Flour, half a cup of lard, a tablespoon of sugar, enough buttermilk to make a nice dough (about 1 cup). Cut in lard using pastry blender or your hands, mix with sugar and buttermilk, knead about 8 times, pat out dough until an inch thick, cut into rounds and bake at 485 degrees for 9-12 minutes. The White Lily flour is really important.

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  7. I made mine twice because I would not waste my strawberries on my first cake! I said it so many times today but, I think this recipe was off! Your cake really looks good…it certainly looks better than my first try! It was so frustrating!

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  8. Sorry you didn't get good results after you followed the recipe. I think many bakers had similar issues! You had a good idea to save the project and it looks pretty!

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  9. Love your post title! Your plated dessert looks great!

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  10. I agree. Give me a good old strawberry shortcake any day.

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