Archive for the 'Baker' Category

Sublime Cheesecakes

It seems every country has a cheesecake – Australia has the gelatine cheesecake, America has the baked, Italy’s is the ricotta or mascapone cheesecake, while France’s is the flatter, neufchatel cheesecake, Germany has quark flans and the list goes on! Perhaps there are so many variations because they’re not only densely, richly delicious but also, incredibly easy to make.  

Cheesecakes are basically a dense baked custard – a mix of cream cheese, cream and eggs baked at a low temperature. You can use any cheese you like – just as long as you give it enough structure to support its fat and water content – and any filling or topping can be used. Think nuts, rosewater, fruit in any form, chocolate, whiskey, raisins, maple syrup – the options are endless.

A stand alone, crust-free cheesecake also makes a great gluten free dessert – the eggs are what bind cheesecakes so no flour is required, although some cheesecakes include cornflour to stabilise the cream mix. The only exception is ricotta where flour is needed to soak up the moisture in the cheese.

If you’re going for a base, there are several different options. I grew up with a version of the Eastern European cheesecake (now considered a New York cheesecake), a lemony baked cheesecake with a sour cream topping and no biscuit base. In Australia however, the biscuit base is an essential part of the cheesecake ensemble and is commonly made using digestive wheat biscuits. I prefer to pre-bake the base to increase its crispness and add a pinch of cinnamon to complement the sweetness. A sponge base (and top) is another alternative as is a nut crumble base and top.

 

 

Mixing Tips

* Beat cheese with a paddle attachment to remove lumps before adding other ingredients. In fact, never blend any two ingredients of different consistencies together without first softening the firmer ingredient to the consistency of the other. The exception is mascarpone which will turn lumpy if overbeaten.

* Beat ingredients slowly and only until evenly mixed. Overbeating incorporates too much air and will cause the cake to rise too high too quickly whilst baking.  As a precaution, tap the prepared cake tin on a bench top to remove any air bubbles before placing it in the oven.

* To avoid overbeating, have your ingredients at room temperature before starting. This reduces the risk of overbeating to reach the right consistency.

* If you prefer a lighter version, separate the eggs in your recipe, whipping up the whites with a bit of sugar then fold through the cheese mix.

 

 

Baking Tips

* Bake cheesecakes slowly at a low temperature. This will allow steam to release gradually and evenly.

* Don’t overbake cheesecakes. Overbaking dries them out causing the cake to shrink and crack.

* Cheesecakes prefer the even temperature of conventional ovens. If using a fan forced oven, reduce the temperature.

* Leave cheesecakes to cool in a switched off oven to allow for gradual cooling and less shrinkage.  If you can’t leave the cake in the oven to cool down, take it cake out while its still quite wobbly in the centre as cream based cakes tend to continue cooking as they cool down.

 

 

Serving

* Always serve cakes at room temperature. Depending on the weather, take your cheesecake out of fridge with enough time to give the ingredients time to relax and release the flavours.

* Use a wet knife to de-mould cheesecakes and to cut into slices. Preferably, dip the knife in warm water and wipe clean between each cut.

 

 

Looking for a delicious cheesecake recipe to test out your newly acquried skills? Click here for the beautiful Berry Compote Cheesecake recipe by our Baker!

 

If you have a question for our baker, email us at [email protected] Yael Shohat is the Executive Director of Yael’s Cakes of Distinction, 23 Clevedon Street, Botany, 02 9695 1695 

Published on October 16, 2008 in Baker. Closed

Meringue Magic

By Yael Shohat

Meringues; those airy, sweet, sometimes crispy, sometimes chewy concoctions are made by beating egg whites and sugar in one of three ways:

 

Italian: This style meringue is made by slowly drizzling a sugar syrup into egg whites as they’re beating. This creates a soft, spreadable meringue suited to icing or piping cakes or adding to butter icings.

 

Swiss: Swiss meringue is made by beating egg whites and sugar over hot water. It is a little more fiddly, but the heat gives the meringue more volume. The result is a sturdier meringue which can be piped or spread onto baking paper, baked and then used in much the same way as a layer of sponge would be used as a base on which to layer other fillings, icings and mousses.

 

meringue

French: The easiest meringue (for a change!) to make is French. Here, it’s as simple as adding sugar gradually to egg whites as they are being whipped.

 

The fun part about meringue is that depending on how much sugar you use, you can create different textures – soft, hard, chewy or a blend – and add a myriad of different flavours. Combine them with nuts, fruit, chocolate, coconut or hundreds and thousands; whatever takes your fancy! Because of their sweetness, I usually combine meringues with tart or acidic flavours, like grapefruit, lemon and passionfruit.

 

Meringues are also one of the easiest things to bake. If you break it down, you’re really only using 2 ingredients, and if they don’t rise, it’s not the end of the world; simply crush the meringue and add the crumbs to whipped cream and fruit. And, as meringues are baked at a very low temperature, you can even turn the oven off and leave them there to crisp overnight. What other baked product allows for such laissez faire?

 

 

Here’s a few tips to keep in mind, before getting started.

 

* For a soft meringue, use less sugar – usually an equal amount of sugar to egg whites. For crisper meringues, you can use up to twice as much sugar as egg whites. I usually use caster sugar, but if you prefer to use brown sugar, you’ll need to sieve the sugar as it is moister.

 

* To get the best volume out of our egg whites, make sure there is no grease or fat on the inside of the mixing bowl or on the whisk you are using. Fats inhibit the egg whites from foaming and aerating.

 

* Egg whites also foam better at room temperature, so take them out of the fridge well before whipping time. If you forget, stick them in a warm (not hot) bowl of water and stir them while they’re warming.

 

* Don’t over-beat the egg whites. They should be moist and shiny, not dry and curdled. Over-beating makes it harder to fold them into other ingredients and reduces their capacity to act as a leavener.

 

* Cream of tartar, lemon juice, vinegar, and other mild acids can also be added to egg whites to increase their volume and stability. These are usually added when your egg whites are going to be folded into other ingredients in a cake. Make sure to add them early on and stick to the measurements – you’ll taste the sourness if you get too heavy handed.

 

* Undissolved sugar crystals weigh meringue down, weakening it. Once baked, the crystals attract moisture and form a cooked brown syrup on the surface of the meringue. For this reason, it’s important to add sugar slowly, giving it time to melt between additions. Personally though, I love that river of sugar on a baked meringue!

 

* And finally, save egg yolks for glazing tops of pies and sausage rolls or, for adding to a cake recipe for an extra blast of flavour.

 

Click here for our Baker’s delicious recipe Meringue Sponge Cake with Passion Fruit Curd

 

If you have a question for our baker, email us at [email protected] Yael Shohat is the Executive Director of Yael’s Cakes of Distinction, 23 Clevedon Street, Botany, 02 9695 1695

Published on September 3, 2008 in Baker. Closed

Perfect Pastry

As daunting as it may sound, making perfect pastry is only a splash of dust and a rolling pin away…

By Yael Shohat

 

Basically a mixture of fat, flour & water moulded together, pastry is a delicious way to encase any winter fare – be it an original recipe or yesterday’s leftovers.There are many different types of pastry, all of which use various forms and quantities of fat – butter, lard, margarine; and liquids – eggs, water, milk.

‘Cool hasty hands make warm pies’ is an old saying meaning everything to do with pastry should be cold and worked as quickly as possible – use cold ingredients, utensils and surfaces (which explains why professionals use marble) and process your mix quickly. This prevents the gluten reacting too early, somthing which will cause the pastry to shrink while cooking, or will toughen the texture.

 

pastry Shortcrust pastry

Due to its sturdiness, shortcrust is the most commonly used pastry and can be used for either sweet or savoury dishes. It also combines well with other ingredients such as grated cheese, sour cream, ground nuts, herbs and spices which change the taste and texture of the pastry. Shortcrust is great as a quiche base or as a home for meat pies and pasties.

Sweetcrust pastry

Sweetcrust pastry is basically a shortcrust pastry with sugar and egg added for greater richness and flavour, and as the name suggests, is mainly used for flans, sweet pies and tarts.

Puff pastry

Puff pastry (also a sweet and savoury interchangeable) is the one we tend to buy ready made as it’s the most laborious to make. But give it a go and the result will be very worthwhile! Once steam hits the butter dotted between the rolled and folded layers of pastry, it aerates the batter to create deliciously crisp layers of thin, buttery pastry. For best results, this pastry must to be made with masses of my favourite ingredient – butter of course!

Unfortunately, not all commercial products are made using butter. If a pastry you’re eating tastes waxy, it is probably because it was made using margarine, shortening or lard… yuck! If you use butter, both the initial taste and aftertaste is subtle and pleasant. So don’t scrimp, you’re only sacrificing the flavour.

 

If you have a question for our baker, email us at [email protected] Yael Shohat is the Executive Director of Yael’s Cakes of Distinction, 23 Clevedon Street, Botany, 02 9695 1695

Published on August 7, 2008 in Baker. Closed

Real Ingredients

Cake expert Yael Shohat shares the virtues of baking with only the best

 

I spend an inordinate amount of time thinking about food – walking up supermarket isles, reading ingredient lists, checking out new products. But as I wander around food markets and see such great, fresh ingredients, I wonder, why there is so much fake food around?

When it comes to cakes, as with all food, using fresh ingredients makes the world of difference – real butter and real eggs, as a minimum, and cane sugar, couveture chocolate and fresh fruits. Having baked cakes professionally for over 15 years (and what we bake is not haute cuisine), the most frequent remark is about the quality of flavour, and of texture – and all this comes from using real ingredients.

Unfortunately, the majority of cakes available in supermarkets, and increasingly in many cafes, are made with a premix, just like the packet mixes you buy in the supermarket. When this level of patisserie becomes the norm however, so does the price, making unprocessed, top quality cakes seem overpriced by comparison. But really, it’s like comparing apples to thongs!

 

Butter Basics

 

The most important ingredient no cake maker can live without is butter – there is nothing quite like it. Margarine doesn’t even come close! While margarine has the same fat content as butter, it has none of the flavour. Oil can be used in some recipes, but unlike butter and margarine, it has no air content, which is important to help lighten cakes and carry the other ingredients. Butter, on the other hand, is perfect, giving cake its moistness & volume, not to mention its sensational taste.

Lets face it, it’s much easier to create a delicious cake with real ingredients – they are full of flavour even before you start. And if you’re going to have your cake, why not have something you really want to eat too.

 

If you have a question for our baker, email us at [email protected] Yael Shohat is the Executive Director of Yael’s Cakes of Distinction, 23 Clevedon Street, Botany, 02 9695 1695

Published on July 3, 2008 in Baker. Closed