Lately, layer cakes have been the order of the day. Admittedly there are so many recipes out there, but sometimes there arises a unique challenge that makes me nerd out and put earnest effort into reinventing the wheel.
It may be a red velvet cake with a better crumb, it may be a white cake with lightness but body to support sprinkles, it may be a yellow cake with the texture of chocolate cake.
This is not one of those; instead, the formula for this cake sat on the back burner for almost 15 years after I developed it. I wanted a butter cake with forward nut flavor, moist crumb, and a feathery texture -- most of what I encountered were serviceable yellow cakes with a smattering of nuts, or thin sponges that were layered with rich filling, or dense financiers that negated any icing, or short crumbly slabs that were more cookie than cake. The goal was to be able to use any nut flour or pulverized nut to make a fillable, frostable layer cake -- a tall one that could be filled into a 5 or 6 -inch high tier, with the fine nut pieces evenly suspended and not sunk to the bottom. Marching in time with this idea was using a nut butter, or turning praline paste into a cake -- more on that to come.
I used a version of this as my own wedding cake -- a cashew praline cake filled with blueberry five-spice compote and frosted with white chocolate ganache buerre. It was good but not great, a little on the rich and heavy side. I kept tinkering with the balance of ground nuts and fats with various nut products and pastes, with particular attention to mild cashews and elusively-flavored pistachios making up a larger percentage of the dry ingredients than i had seen in others.
A version rolled out at another teaching gig later, a 2-layer 10" cake with hazelnuts and almonds, filled with apricot jam, and frosted with semisweet ganache buerre praline. It was a good cake but not a long lasting gig. Along the way, my two kids were diagnosed with virulent nut allergies, so this cake template stayed shut away from my home kitchen. The next jobs i had didn't need layer cakes, or had no opportunities for tinkering, or or or.
Not speaking of the Years that Were, I thought about remaking a tier of our wedding cake for our 20-year anniversary this past September, but again, not in the house. I rediscovered some old teaching materials from that time recently and vowed to resurrect this gem. The cake trend landscape was changing too, with small diameters stacked high instead of larger 2-layer cakes. New chances, new flavors, as well as a retinkered finishing.
Yes, it is more fall-flavored than spring, but there is still time ... isn't there always?
Caramel Apple Walnut Cake
Walnut layer cake – 3 8” layers
242 g ground walnuts
420 g all purpose flour
1 ½ tsp baking powder
½ tsp baking soda
1 tsp salt
280 g unsalted butter, softened
420 g sugar
220 g eggs
345 g buttermilk or plain low-fat yogurt (not Greek)
Combine dry ingredients. Cream butter and sugar until light and fluffy. Add eggs and beat until emulsified; scrape down well. Alternately add dry ingredients in 3 parts with buttermilk or yogurt in 2 parts, scraping down between each addition. Fold through with a spatula. Divide evenly into 3 pans. Bake at 325 until cakes spring back. Cool 15 minutes, then unpan onto a rack to cool completely.
Apple filling
Peel, core and dice 5 golden delicious or honeycrisp apples. Add 90 g sugar and a pinch of salt, tossing to draw out moisture. (optional: add 1/2 vanilla bean, seeds scraped. Or use vanilla sugar.)
Melt 56 g butter in sauteuse or skillet. Add apple dice and coat with butter. Cook, covered over low heat, until juices release. Mix together 25 g cornstarch, 1 tsp cinnamon and 45 g sugar; stir evenly into apples. Cook until thickened. Add 1 tsp lemon juice. Allow to cool.
Caramel buttercream
488 g unsalted butter, cold
450 g granulated sugar + 25 ml corn syrup
210 g cream
12 g sea salt
Cut butter into 1” cubes and place in freezer while making caramel.
Over high heat in tall saucepan, make a dark caramel with the sugar and corn syrup.
Whisk in cream off heat (it will spatter and rise a lot in the pan, be careful.) Return to heat, stirring until smooth.
Add 60 g of the frozen butter cubes to hot caramel, stir in, transfer to mixer bowl. Cool to just warm -- approx 120F-140F. Add salt and remaining butter cubes. Emulsify with whip on low speed first to avoid splashing, then whip until aerated and creamy, scraping often. The caramel base will want to stick to the bottom of the bowl and the butter will want to clump inside the whip, but as the emulsion forms, scrape the caramel up into the cooler butter. Finish with paddle on medium speed for maximum smoothness -- it will take awhile, passing through a curdled phase before smoothing out when there is enough air.
Trim cakes level if necessary. Place one layer on a cake circle and apply a thin coat of the buttercream and a dam around the edge. Fill in with the cooled apples. Repeat, placing last layer bottom side up. Frost with buttercream on sides and top and garnish with caramelized walnut halves, dried candied apple peels and sea salt.
