About walnut cakes - only the truth! Professional secrets of cooking cakes with walnuts and prunes

Remembering the windows of pastry shops not so distant, often scolded by some "soviet" past, I want to exclaim: not everything was so bad!

The taste of the famous cakes from childhood still sometimes makes one regret the unrecoverable Soviet food industry.

Walnut Cake - Basic Technological Principles

Actually, all the nuances of confectionery art can not fit in one article, because it is - the craft, art and science in a close community of discoveries and ideas.

Taking the assumption that all housewives at least once cooked in their kitchen each of the types of dough traditionally used for cakes, we will try to “resurrect” the traditions of bakeries, where the best cakes in the Soviet Union were baked.

In order to “not spread thoughts”, all interesting details related to the process of making dough, creams, icing, fudge, as well as direct baking, assembling and decorating cakes, we put in the “soviet” recipes of the best cakes with nuts.

Do not hesitate: the accuracy of the recipes is guaranteed, because it was taken from the technological maps of professional pastry chefs and technologists, reworked and transformed for use at home, so that on the basis of these recipes any novice hostess could not only reproduce the “masterpiece” copy of the confectionery, but also create a recipe your signature nut cake.

1. Airy protein-nut dough for cake with prunes and walnuts “Rhapsody”

Ingredients:

• Proteins 4 pcs.
• Nuts 90 g
• Sugar (powder) 20 g (for cake layers) + 150 g (for sour cream) + 200 g (for Shalot cream)
• Flour 40 g
• Vanillin 3 g
• Sour cream (36%) 300 g
• Prunes 250 g
• Cognac or essence, cognac 5 mg
• Marmalade, color 100 g
• Whipped cream 150 g
• Cocoa Powder (100%)
• Yolks 4 pcs.
• Oil 180 g

Cooking:

1. The basis of the cake is proteinaceous airy dough. But first you need to prepare a baking sheet or detachable form: line it with oiled parchment. The cakes will need 3 pieces, so make three blanks of paper, beforehand drawing a circle or square on the back of it to apply the dough exactly on the edge. Preheat the oven to 120-140 degrees. The baking time of the cake will depend on the density of the dough.
2. We mix ground nuts (chopped into powder) with flour and vanilla. Add salt and 20 g of powder.
3. Place the proteins of fresh and cooled eggs in the mixer bowl and whisk, gradually adding momentum to the maximum level. Into the egg texture with a stable texture, gently inject the dry ingredients and mix with a spatula or spoon. Do this carefully and quickly so that the dough does not settle before it gets into the oven, otherwise the cakes will be dense and rubber-like. Spread the cakes into molds or onto prepared stencils of parchment. Bake to light blush on the surface. Do not open the oven for the first 20 minutes in order to avoid mechanical shaking and a sharp temperature drop. After you can reduce the temperature to 90 degrees, bake another 15-20 minutes, drying the product. Turn off the oven, open the door slightly and leave it in this position until the cake has completely cooled. After that, you can get them out of the oven, remove the parchment and put it on the dish.
4. For sour cream you need a very thick and fat sour cream. Boil prunes with sugar (150 g). Cool the fruit mass and beat with a blender to a puree-like consistency. Mixer whisk sour cream and gradually add prunes, brandy and vanilla to it.
5. Combine the cooled cakes with the prepared cream and put the semi-finished product in the refrigerator.
6. Prepare “Shallot” cream for the top layer and sides of the cake. Combine the yolks with the sugar, rub it until white, add cocoa first, then cream, whisk the mixture and place in a water bath. Boil the cream until thick. Also add brandy and vanilla to this cream. Combine the cooled mass with pieces of softened butter and whisk to a steady creamy consistency.
7. Cover the surface of the cake with cream, from the pastry bag drop the curb with the same cream. Marmalade, 2-3 prune berries cut into plates, cubes or figures and decorate the cake.

2. Puffed walnut cake - another best recipe from “Napoleon”

Ingredients:

• Sour cream (21%) 200 g
• Margarine, creamy 250 g
• Soda 20 g
• Vinegar 30 ml
• Flour, high-grade wheat 550 g
• Vodka or cognac 50 ml
• Nuts 300 g
• Milk, whole 250 ml
• Oil “Extra” 400 g
• Sugar 180 g
• Eggs: 2 whole and 4 yolks
• Vanilla extract

Yield: 2.0 kg (+/- 5%)

Cooking:

1. Dough for cake layers (8 pieces / 130 g):
2. Sift flour onto the desktop. Separate 150 g of flour: 100 g for rolling and powder and 50 g for making custard. Frozen margarine slices with a knife in flour until a homogeneous mass (oily flour crumbs). Collect a crumb in a bowl, having made in it deepening, pour in sour cream and solution for a loosening of the test. To improve the quality of the test pour brandy or vodka: this increases the layering of the dough and makes it more lush.
3. Quickly knead the dough, avoiding the melting of the margarine. Put the dough on the table again and start rolling it into a thin layer with a rolling pin. The dough must be folded after rolling the envelope and continue to roll: to increase the texture layering repeat this operation at least 16-20 times. If the dough starts to melt during the process of rolling, cool it by placing it in the freezer for a while, and then continue working. Each newly rolled layer lightly sprinkle with flour, before you roll it. After that, divide it into 8 pieces of the same size and roll each one into a 20x20 cm square. Cut the edges cut off when leveling the cake, combine into a single piece and roll out a separate cake so that after baking it is crushed into the crumb needed for powder.
4. Bake cakes in the oven at 200 degrees. Each of them should be spread on a baking sheet, sprinkled with flour.
5. Cool ready-made puff pastry cakes, while preparing the cream.
6. Yolks and whole eggs, cooled to 2 degrees, beat with sugar. Add 50 g of flour and pour the resulting mass in a thin stream of milk into boiling milk, while quickly rotating in a circle with a whisk to avoid the formation of lumps. Immediately after boiling, turn off the stove while continuing to stir the mass. Add the vanilla to the custard and allow to cool to room temperature. It is possible to accelerate cooling by placing the pan with the cream in a container with ice or ice water.
7. Cut the butter into small pieces and add to the cooled (!) Cream. Beat up to white in the mixer bowl.
8. Peel and pre-dried walnut kernels chop with a knife or chop in a mortar.
9. Collect the cake on a dish, smearing each with a cream cake and pouring on the nut crumb. To make the cake soaked with cream, gather it, slightly press it down, and then decorate it with crumb from the same dough mixed with crushed nuts. The cake should stand in the fridge at least overnight.

3. Sand cake with walnuts and Abrikotin prunes

Ingredients:

For the sand cake (450 g):

• Flour 1 grade 275 g (including for dosing 30 g)
• Oil 82.5% 155 g
• Sugar 100 g
• Eggs: 2 yolks
• Ammonium or soda 1 g
• Salt, vacuum 2 g
• Essence (in assortment) 2 mg

Cream (280 g):

• Butter (82.5%) 150 g
• Sugar powder 10 g
• Vanilla 3 g
• Condensed milk with sugar 60 g
• Liqueur or brandy 5 ml

For lipstick (260 g):

• Sugar 200 g
• Treacle (or invert syrup) 30 g
• Essence 1 g
• Water 70 ml
• Creamy chocolate cream (90 g):
• Oil 50 g
• Powder 25 g
• Condensed milk 20 g
• Cocoa 5 g
• Vanillin 1 g
• Cognac 2 ml
• Biscuit crumb, fried 60 g
• Abrikotin liqueur (sweet, seedless) 40 ml
• Nuts, fried 20 g
• Dried fruits (dried apricots, prunes) 60 g

Yield: 1.0 kg

Preparation Steps:

1. Sand semi-finished products (2 pcs.):
2. Low-gluten flour is suitable for shortbread dough, which allows to obtain a crumbly structure of semi-finished products.
3. Rub butter with sugar until white. Pour flour on the table as a slide, put butter on it. In eggs, add baking powder, salt and essence. Pour the eggs into the hole made in the hill. Knead the dough quickly: long-term kneading of the dough is not desirable; If the gluten swells up a lot, then the dough will turn out tight. After dividing the dough in half, roll out square cakes, 20x20 cm. To prevent the dough from sticking to the rolling pin or table, sprinkle the surface with flour. No more than 7% of flour should be spent on the subfloor, of the amount specified in the recipe. Make sure that the dough does not overheat: the normal temperature of the dough is 20 degrees. Thickness - 0.5 cm. Bake at 240-250 degrees for 15 minutes.

Butter cream (cream), basic and chocolate:

1. Both creams can be prepared together, as they are made using similar technology.
2. Beat the butter until smooth and fluffy. First turn on the small revolutions, gradually add them to the maximum. Combine the powder and condensed milk and add together to the butter. At the end of whipping add brandy and vanilla.
3. Separate 90 g of the main cream and add cocoa to it according to the recipe for butter chocolate cream. Carefully interrupt.

Lipstick:

1. Dissolve sugar in water, bring to a boil, remove the foam, and cook over low heat, be sure to cover the dishes with a lid. Add pre-heated molasses to the syrup to prevent the formation of crystals in the lipstick, which turn the lipstick into a heterogeneous mass, making the cake surface ugly. Molasses can be replaced with invert syrup or add 1 g of citric acid to the syrup at the end of cooking. Lip up to test on a weak ball. Quickly cool it after boiling up to 40 degrees, placing it in a container with ice water and stirring vigorously. Beat a small amount with a spatula, and it is better to use a mixer for lipstick stocks.
2. When the lipstick has thickened enough, after saturating with oxygen when beating, transfer it to the jar, cover the surface with water and allow it to mature in a sealed container. In 24 hours, it will acquire the desired, more tender texture. After that, it is taken in the right quantity, heated to 50 degrees, while adding liqueur and essence, and applied to the surface of the cakes. Do not overheat the lipstick so that it maintains a beautiful gloss on the product. To enhance the shine, you can add protein with flavors, 2% by weight of sugar. Apply to the product, previously covered with a layer of jam or jam.
3. The lipstick left in the can is again covered with a layer of water in order to avoid its saccharification.
4. Assemble the cake: spread the cakes with basic cream and glue. Apply jam on the surface, then lipstick, and when it hardens, apply a grid of chocolate cream, decorate with white butter cream, fruits, candied fruits, nuts. Smear the sides with basic cream and sprinkle with fried chips.

4. Airy-creamy cake with walnuts and Tatyana's day prunes

The recipe is based on protein nut and cream dough and cream. Supplement - dried fruits in assortment and chocolate icing.

Ingredients:

Air dough (recipe number 1)

Cream and chocolate cream:

• Cream, cooled (35%) 250 ml
• Cocoa (100%) 30 g
• Vanilla 2 g
• Essence, rum
• Powder, sugar 150 g
• Roasted nuts, crushed 50 g
• Dried fruits in an assortment of 100 g
• Coconut chips 20 g

For the glaze:

• Dark chocolate 100 g
• Oil “Extra” 50 g
• Rum 30 ml

Work Order:

1. Prepare cakes from the air dough, as described in recipe # 1. From 100 ml of cream and icing sugar, boil cocoa. Mix the powder with the powder, add them to the heated cream, bring to a boil and, adding vanilla and essence, cool thoroughly.
2. Beat the rest of the cream, gradually adding the speed of the mixer, add parts of the cooked cocoa, without stopping the beat.
3. Assemble the cake by smearing and pasting the cakes together with the prepared cream. Carefully level the surface. Soak the semi-finished product in the cold, then tuck the surface of the cake with icing or cocoa so that the chocolate icing does not flow. Melt chocolate with butter in a water bath and whisk, adding, for shine and flavor, rum (brandy). Put prepared nuts and dried fruits on a frozen surface, sprinkle with coconut shavings.

5. Biscuit-cake with nut cream

Ingredients:

For biscuit semi-finished product:

• Eggs “D1” 6 pcs.
• Flour high-quality 120 g
• Sugar 60 g
• Vanilla 2 g

For impregnation:

• Amaretto 50 ml
• Orange syrup 70 ml
• Water 30 ml

For the air test:

• Nuts (in assortment) 150 g
• Protein 4 pcs.
• Flour 45 g
• Essence 1 g

For nut cream “Shalott”:

• Oil 200 g
• Sugar 175 g
• Whole milk 120 ml
• Eggs: 1 yolk and 1 pc. (integer)
• Roasted nuts 50 g
• Cognac 10 mg
• Vanilla 1 g
• Cocoa 20 g

For decoration: chocolate leaves, borders and patterns

Cooking Procedure:

Sponge cake.

1. Beat the chilled proteins separately to a firm foam. Pound egg yolks with sugar until it is completely dissolved. Connect both masses. In the sifted flour, add vanilla powder and mix it with eggs, adding piece by piece. Mix the dough quickly and gently, place it in the prepared detachable form and put it to bake in a preheated oven for 20-25 minutes at 180 degrees.
2. Cool the sponge cake at room temperature, cut into 2 cakes, each soaked in syrup made from fruit syrup, liqueur and water.

Air Prefabricated.

Crush the nuts by adding flour. Combine the mixture with whipped to a stable foam proteins gently mixing. Shape the baking sheet with greased parchment. Put the dough and bake, as indicated in the recipe number 1. Cream.

1. Add sugar mixed with cocoa into boiling milk. Turn down the heat. Beat the eggs and pour in a thin stream into the hot liquid with constant stirring. Cool the thickened cream in a bowl with ice, not stopping it to stir with a whisk. Ensure that the cream mass is homogeneous. Add flavoring ingredients to it.
2. Whip the butter until white and gradually pour the custard. At high speed bring the cream to readiness.
3. Combine cakes with chocolate cream, putting an airy nut semi-finished product between the biscuit cakes. Smear the sides with the same cream and sprinkle with fried biscuit crumbs. Decorates the surface and sides of the cake with a border of chocolate, the same leaves and patterns.

6. Sandy cake with walnuts and Forest fairytale prunes

Ingredients:

Sand prefabricated (according to recipe number 3)

• Strawberry jam, 120 g
• Nuts, roasted (crushed) 50 g
• Prunes 100 g (net)

Protein cream, raw:

• Eggs (squirrels) 3 pcs.
• Sugar powder 300 g
• Vanillin 5 g
• Citric acid 1 g
• Strawberry essence 5 mg
• Food colors in assortment
• Candied 80 g

Cooking:

1. Prepare shortbread dough according to recipe number 3. Cake - round, diameter - 28 cm. Roll out a round cake on a board sprinkled with flour. Put the form upside down and turn it upside down. Press the edges of the dough so as to form a side. Bake until tender.
2. Lubricate the cooled cake inside with jam. Sprinkle with nuts, pre-fried and finely chopped.

Prepare the cream.

1. Chill whites to a steady, fluffy consistency. After switching the mixer to slow speed, add powder in portions. When it is dissolved, pour in a teaspoon of an aqueous solution of citric acid and essence.
2. Divide part of cream into 3 cups to add red, yellow and green dye. Put the white cream in a pastry bag and apply on jam with nuts. Smooth the surface with a spatula and sprinkle lightly with powdered sugar. From the colored parts of the cream using different shaped nozzles otsadite flowers, leaves and legs of mushrooms. Make hats for mushrooms from halves of prunes and dried apricots. To make the “mushroom legs” of tender protein cream strong and able to hold the weight of dried fruits, insert the core of nuts inside the legs.

7. Chocolate-sponge cake with walnuts “Wenceslas”

For sponge cake:

• Flour 120 g
• Cocoa 30 g
• Sugar 150 g
• Vanilla essence 2 g
• Eggs 6 pcs.
• Melted butter 40 g

For impregnation:

• Rum 50 ml
• Water 30 ml
• Sugar syrup 75 g

For cream:

• Milk 300 g
• Starch 50 g
• Sugar 150 g
• Oil 350 g
• Grill (baby) 80 g
• Fruit 100 g

Chocolate Icing:

• Oil 82.5% 90 g
• Chocolate, black 100 g
• Rum (cognac) 30 ml
• Apricot jam 50 g

Cooking:

1. Split chilled eggs to 2 degrees C in yolks and whites. Sponge sugar also split in half and add each piece while whipping proteins and yolks. Mix flour and cocoa and add to yolks whipped into a thick mass. Gradually add whites and sugar whipped with sugar, essence. When combining proteins with yolks and flour mixture, use a spatula and try not to knock so that the dough does not settle. Pour in the melted and cooled to 20 degrees butter. Stir.
2. Fill an oiled form in 3/4 volume and bake at 200-220 degrees, placing the form in a preheated oven. After half an hour, take out the form and hold the biscuit in it for five minutes. Transfer to a grate or cooling board. Wrap ready-made semi-finished product for 8 hours. Then unfold and divide the sponge cake into 3 layers of the same thickness.
3. Combine syrup ingredients and soak biscuit cakes.
4. To make a cream, stir the starch in a small part of the milk and pour it into the rest of the milk boiled and sweetened with sugar. Cool the milk jelly.
5. Beat the butter and add the cooled jelly to it, without stopping the beating. In the finished thick cream, add cocoa and rum essence with vanilla.
6. Also add small pieces of prunes or other dried fruits to the cream, roast crumbs (chopped walnuts, combined with melted caramel).
7. Combine cakes with cream. Coat the sides of the cake with the same cream. Smear the surface with apricot jam and apply chocolate icing.
8. To make a glossy glaze, melt an equal amount of chocolate and butter. Beat with a spatula to the pomp. To shine, add alcohol (20-30 mg).

Walnut Cake - Tips and Tricks

• If you prefer homemade baked goods to finished products, then it’s better to get good household scales in order to know the weight of the ingredients added to baking to one gram: confectionery likes accuracy, on which both appearance and texture often depend taste. To achieve similarity with the original recipe without scales is very difficult.
• For the preparation of cakes, syrups, creams, fudges with the addition of fragrant alcoholic beverages are often used: brandy, rum, liqueurs. Strong alcoholic beverages, in addition to flavoring properties, add porosity and lightness to non-yeast dough. Liqueurs are mainly used to flavor creams, glazes, they impregnate ready-made cakes, if necessary, according to the recipe, to create a moist consistency of cakes or pastries.
• If you are fond of baking, then some of the traditional confectionery liqueurs or tinctures should be present in the kitchen. Prepare the “Abrikotin” liqueur or the homemade “Amaretto” liqueur, which will help out at any moment when you want to bake something sweet.
• “Abrikotin” is a fruit liqueur based on apricot pulp, sugar syrup and vodka. The famous, classic Italian “Amaretto” is the same apricot liqueur, but with the addition of seeds, or bitter almonds, or apple seeds. If you make these liqueurs at home, then baking will not only be tasty, but also inexpensive, because, as you know, the cost of “famous” liqueurs includes their fame, beautiful packaging, and all sorts of trade margins. But, after all, not a prestigious package is important for homemade cake, but taste. The low cost price of a sweet product is an extra nice bonus. Only for homemade liqueurs, use high-quality alcohol.
• Make sand and flaky cakes square or rectangular in shape, trying not to get scraps. When they are re-kneaded violated the texture inherent in this type of dough. Make sure that when rolling out, layers of uniform thickness are obtained, so that the baking is free of defects.