Bo Friberg

Chestnut-Rum Cream Cakes

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Preparation info

  • Yield:

    16

    servings

    • Difficulty

      Medium

Appears in

top 1000The Professional Pastry Chef

The Professional Pastry Chef

By Bo Friberg

Published 1989

  • About

In this recipe, the pureed chestnuts are delicious mixed with cream, flavored with a hint of rum, and paired with chocolate. If you use canned chestnut puree, which you must do most of the year, be very careful to work it completely smooth before mixing in the mascarpone cheese. Because of the high starch content, the puree is quite firm and will give new meaning to the word lumpy if you fail to do so.

Ingredients

Method

  1. Line the bottom of a cake pan, 10 inches (25 cm) in diameter, with baking paper. Add the sponge batter and spread the top even. Bake at 425°F(219°C) for approximately 15 minutes or until baked through. The cake should spring back when pressed lightly in the center. Set aside to cool.
  2. Place 16 cake rings, 3 inches (7.5 cm) in diameter, on a sheet pan lined with baking paper. If you do not have cake rings, cut 16 strips from acetate, 10 × 1½ inches (25 × 3.7 cm), overlap the short ends, and tape them together to make rings that are 3 inches (7.5 cm) in diameter. Line the rings with strips of acetate.
  3. Run a knife around the edge of the pan to release the cooled sponge cake and unmold the sponge. Remove the skin from the top of the cake. Slice the cake horizontally to make 2 layers. Brush the layers with cake syrup, using it all up. Cut 16 circles from the 2 layers, using a 3-inch (7.5-cm) plain cookie cutter; you will have to piece the last 2 together. Place a sponge circle in the bottom of each ring.

  4. Place the chocolate-rum cream in a pastry bag with a No. 3 (6-mm) plain tip. Pipe the filling on top of the sponge circles, dividing it evenly. Be careful not to get any filling on the sides of the ring above the cream. Refrigerate while making the chestnut-mascarpone cream.

  5. Place the chestnut-mascarpone cream in a pastry bag with a No. 5 (10-mm) plain tip. Pipe the filling on top of the chocolate cream, dividing it evenly among the rings. Use a spatula to even the tops. Refrigerate the desserts until set, at least 2 hours or, preferably, overnight.
  6. Flavor the mousseline sauce with the rum. Reserve in the refrigerator.
  7. Whip the heavy cream with the sugar until stiff peaks form. Place in a pastry bag with a No. 6 (12-mm) star tip.
  8. No more than 1 hour before serving, remove the metal rings or acetate strips from as many desserts as you plan to serve. Pipe a whipped cream rosette in the center on top of each one. Cover the top around the whipped cream with shaved chocolate. Place the decorated servings back in the refrigerator. The undecorated servings can be kept in the refrigerator, covered and left in the rings, for several days.
  9. Presentation: Pour approximately ⅓ cup (80 ml) mousseline sauce off-center on a dessert plate. Use the back of a spoon to shape the sauce into a round pool about 5 inches (12.5 cm) in diameter. Place a small amount of chocolate sauce for piping in a piping bag. Pipe a rounded zigzag pattern, about 1 inch (2.5 cm) wide, around the perimeter of the sauce. Pull a small wooden skewer through the center of the zigzag (see Figure 16-2). Place a serving of cake behind the sauce with about one-quarter of the cake in the sauce pool. Decorate with a candied chestnut on top of the whipped cream rosette.