Honey Cake with Cheese Cream
My classic recipe
I can safely say that honeydew is in the top 3 of my favorite cakes. I don't get tired of it, I make it for the family and I always hit the hearts!
The cake is super tender and soaked, it really just melts in your mouth.
It might take you a while to make your first honeydew, so it's easier to set aside a free day for the cake. Now that I've gotten the hang of it, I make honeydew in 2 hours.
In the classic recipe, the cream for the honeydew is made with heavy sour cream. In the course of my experiments, I found out for myself that sour cream does not give consistent results, the cake is difficult to assemble and the taste is a little bit lost to more modern versions of the cream. In my honeydew we will be making cream cheese cream with cream. This cream is more stable, but it also soaks up the honey cakes just as well.
As a base for the cream, you can use cheese like Philadelphia, mascarpone or other types of cheese with a high percentage of fat.
Now the most important thing: I owe the key to my successful honey cake to honey. I always choose dark honey, preferring buckwheat honey. It has a rich brown color and an unusual tart taste.
Cakes with buckwheat honey are maximum caramel and gingerbread.
Whichever honey you choose, it is important that you initially like the taste of it.
What if you don't eat honey?
You can replace honey with natural maple syrup, muscovado black sugar, or the same amount of pre-made caramel.
The cake is super tender and soaked, it really just melts in your mouth.
It might take you a while to make your first honeydew, so it's easier to set aside a free day for the cake. Now that I've gotten the hang of it, I make honeydew in 2 hours.
In the classic recipe, the cream for the honeydew is made with heavy sour cream. In the course of my experiments, I found out for myself that sour cream does not give consistent results, the cake is difficult to assemble and the taste is a little bit lost to more modern versions of the cream. In my honeydew we will be making cream cheese cream with cream. This cream is more stable, but it also soaks up the honey cakes just as well.
As a base for the cream, you can use cheese like Philadelphia, mascarpone or other types of cheese with a high percentage of fat.
Now the most important thing: I owe the key to my successful honey cake to honey. I always choose dark honey, preferring buckwheat honey. It has a rich brown color and an unusual tart taste.
Cakes with buckwheat honey are maximum caramel and gingerbread.
Whichever honey you choose, it is important that you initially like the taste of it.
What if you don't eat honey?
You can replace honey with natural maple syrup, muscovado black sugar, or the same amount of pre-made caramel.
Ingredients for a cake of 2-2.5 kg:
Honey Cakes:
120 g butter
200 g white (or brown granulated) sugar
2 tabs of dark honey with a scoop
2 eggs
1 tbsp baking soda
300 g of wheat flour
Salt
Cream:
500 g of mascarpone or cream cheese
500 ml of 30-33% cream
150 g powdered sugar or other
ingredient to taste
Vanilla to taste
Smoothing Cream:
250 g white chocolate
25 g cocoa butter
70 g butter
Honey Cakes:
120 g butter
200 g white (or brown granulated) sugar
2 tabs of dark honey with a scoop
2 eggs
1 tbsp baking soda
300 g of wheat flour
Salt
Cream:
500 g of mascarpone or cream cheese
500 ml of 30-33% cream
150 g powdered sugar or other
ingredient to taste
Vanilla to taste
Smoothing Cream:
250 g white chocolate
25 g cocoa butter
70 g butter
Prepare the cakes:
In a saucepan combine the butter, sugar and honey, put on low heat and stir. It is necessary to wait for the moment when the honey and butter completely melt and remove the cauldron from the fire. There is no need to wait for the sugar to dissolve completely.
In a saucepan combine the butter, sugar and honey, put on low heat and stir. It is necessary to wait for the moment when the honey and butter completely melt and remove the cauldron from the fire. There is no need to wait for the sugar to dissolve completely.
Leave the saucepan on the table for 5 minutes, and then beat the eggs at room temperature and mix them into the sugar-oil mixture with a whisk.
Immediately after this, add a teaspoon of baking soda to the container and whisk everything well again with a hand whisk for a minute.
The baking soda should react with the heat and honey and form a white foam cap on the surface.
Let the baking soda do its job by leaving the saucepan with the ingredients alone for 5-10 minutes.
When the baking soda has done its job, once again stir everything with a whisk, add salt to the ingredients and begin sifting the flour.
When all the flour is sifted, mix it into the liquid ingredients using a spatula or a mixer with a spiral attachment.
Place the saucepan with the dough in the refrigerator for 1 hour.
Immediately after this, add a teaspoon of baking soda to the container and whisk everything well again with a hand whisk for a minute.
The baking soda should react with the heat and honey and form a white foam cap on the surface.
Let the baking soda do its job by leaving the saucepan with the ingredients alone for 5-10 minutes.
When the baking soda has done its job, once again stir everything with a whisk, add salt to the ingredients and begin sifting the flour.
When all the flour is sifted, mix it into the liquid ingredients using a spatula or a mixer with a spiral attachment.
Place the saucepan with the dough in the refrigerator for 1 hour.
Prepare the cream:
It is convenient to prepare the cream while the dough cools in the refrigerator, so that after the honey cakes are baked, all that is left is to assemble the cake.
Cream for whipping, choose a high percentage of fat and pre-cool them in the refrigerator. It is best to leave them to cool completely overnight.
You can use mascarpone, creme cheese or any other fat cheese you like to taste. The cream cheese will give a more salty flavor, similar to the classic sour cream for honeydew.
You can use powdered sugar or other sweetener (syrup/sugar) for the cream. Taste the cream and adjust the sweetness to your liking.
So, add vanilla and powdered sugar to the cream and whip until stably firm. Visually the whipped cream will stop moving around in the whipping container, this will take 3-5 minutes of time.
When you think the cream is perfectly whipped after a minute, stop and add the cheese.
Don't whip the cream all the way to the end, as there is a chance of over whipping it (and then it will separate and that would be bad).
Once you have added the cheese, whisk everything together for about 1 minute, no longer. The cream will become thick, stable and homogeneous. We leave it alone and send it to the refrigerator until the cake is assembled.
It is convenient to prepare the cream while the dough cools in the refrigerator, so that after the honey cakes are baked, all that is left is to assemble the cake.
Cream for whipping, choose a high percentage of fat and pre-cool them in the refrigerator. It is best to leave them to cool completely overnight.
You can use mascarpone, creme cheese or any other fat cheese you like to taste. The cream cheese will give a more salty flavor, similar to the classic sour cream for honeydew.
You can use powdered sugar or other sweetener (syrup/sugar) for the cream. Taste the cream and adjust the sweetness to your liking.
So, add vanilla and powdered sugar to the cream and whip until stably firm. Visually the whipped cream will stop moving around in the whipping container, this will take 3-5 minutes of time.
When you think the cream is perfectly whipped after a minute, stop and add the cheese.
Don't whip the cream all the way to the end, as there is a chance of over whipping it (and then it will separate and that would be bad).
Once you have added the cheese, whisk everything together for about 1 minute, no longer. The cream will become thick, stable and homogeneous. We leave it alone and send it to the refrigerator until the cake is assembled.
Baking:
When the dough has cooled well and is denser, you can work with it.
Transfer the dough to a work surface dusted with flour and gather into a smooth ball.
If you feel the dough is a little runny and sticks to your hands, add a little flour. Just a little, just to make the dough comfortable to work with. A large amount of flour will clog our cakes, making them stiffer and less bright in flavor.
We divide our dough into 10-12 pieces, put it on a plate and send it to the fridge.
We will take one piece at a time and bake them one at a time, and keep the rest in the fridge so they don't melt and get softer.
Preheat the oven to 180 °C degrees. Roll out a piece of dough on a sheet of parchment, dusting with flour if necessary. The thinner we roll out the dough, the more cakes we get, and the more moist and tender the cake will be.
When the dough has cooled well and is denser, you can work with it.
Transfer the dough to a work surface dusted with flour and gather into a smooth ball.
If you feel the dough is a little runny and sticks to your hands, add a little flour. Just a little, just to make the dough comfortable to work with. A large amount of flour will clog our cakes, making them stiffer and less bright in flavor.
We divide our dough into 10-12 pieces, put it on a plate and send it to the fridge.
We will take one piece at a time and bake them one at a time, and keep the rest in the fridge so they don't melt and get softer.
Preheat the oven to 180 °C degrees. Roll out a piece of dough on a sheet of parchment, dusting with flour if necessary. The thinner we roll out the dough, the more cakes we get, and the more moist and tender the cake will be.
When the dough is rolled out, cut out a circle of the desired diameter, it is convenient to do this with a baking dish or a lid from a saucepan.
Prick our cake with a fork and bake for 4-5 minutes until caramelized. While one crust is baking, roll out the next one on a new sheet of parchment.
Remove the finished crust along with the parchment, cool for a minute, and gently remove from the parchment with a knife.
If you focus on baking and rolling out the new crust while the previous one is baking, the process doesn't take long.
And yes, check to see if your baking tray can hold more than one crust at a time.
Prick our cake with a fork and bake for 4-5 minutes until caramelized. While one crust is baking, roll out the next one on a new sheet of parchment.
Remove the finished crust along with the parchment, cool for a minute, and gently remove from the parchment with a knife.
If you focus on baking and rolling out the new crust while the previous one is baking, the process doesn't take long.
And yes, check to see if your baking tray can hold more than one crust at a time.
Assembling the cake:
Now for the easiest part: assembling the cake. The height of the cream should be roughly equal to the height of the cake. The thicker the cake, the more cream it will need. We assemble the cake according to the crust/cream principle. The cream is quite stable and easy to assemble. You can put it on the cake with a spoon or with a pastry bag.
When the cake is ready, spread the cream on all the edges and sides, so that there is no unsoaked area. Leave the cake in the refrigerator for 4 hours or overnight.
The longer the cake is in the refrigerator, the better it will soak and taste better.
Now for the easiest part: assembling the cake. The height of the cream should be roughly equal to the height of the cake. The thicker the cake, the more cream it will need. We assemble the cake according to the crust/cream principle. The cream is quite stable and easy to assemble. You can put it on the cake with a spoon or with a pastry bag.
When the cake is ready, spread the cream on all the edges and sides, so that there is no unsoaked area. Leave the cake in the refrigerator for 4 hours or overnight.
The longer the cake is in the refrigerator, the better it will soak and taste better.
Leveling Cake:
If you are making this cake for yourself/friends/family and don't want to bother, you don't have to make a special leveling cream.
After soaking the honeydew, you can flatten the cake with the leftover cream from the filling, or you can make cream to spare in advance.
The cream I used to level the cake is more suitable for complicated decorations, events and long transports.
It's super stable and doesn't let the delicate cake fall apart in transit or float in a warm room.
So, melt the white chocolate or frosting in the microwave or water bath.
We add liquid cocoa butter and room temperature butter to the chocolate. Mix everything until homogeneous and color with a fat-soluble dye as desired.
If you are making this cake for yourself/friends/family and don't want to bother, you don't have to make a special leveling cream.
After soaking the honeydew, you can flatten the cake with the leftover cream from the filling, or you can make cream to spare in advance.
The cream I used to level the cake is more suitable for complicated decorations, events and long transports.
It's super stable and doesn't let the delicate cake fall apart in transit or float in a warm room.
So, melt the white chocolate or frosting in the microwave or water bath.
We add liquid cocoa butter and room temperature butter to the chocolate. Mix everything until homogeneous and color with a fat-soluble dye as desired.
The cream is ready to work. You can smooth the cake with it with a spatula or use it for stencils and origami.
After smoothing, we leave the cake to stabilize in the refrigerator for a few hours, after which you can decorate the honey cake and take it to friends across town!
After smoothing, we leave the cake to stabilize in the refrigerator for a few hours, after which you can decorate the honey cake and take it to friends across town!