White Chocolate Mousse Dome with Strawberries and Walnut Praline

I love small dome shaped cakes, they just look quaint and special. These cakes contain a sponge base with white chocolate mousse and strawberries covered in a dark chocolate shell. I originally wanted more of a glaze than a shell over the top but they still turned out wonderful. The walnut praline on the top adds a sweet little crunch and was so simple to make.

One day I will invest in a 'hemisphere' cake tin to make perfectly round dome cakes, but for now I make do with small pinch bowls that are almost completely round. Feel free to make your own sponge too but I found one marked down at the supermarket so used that instead. These little domes are quite appealing and will impress dinner guests but they are so easy to make and can be made ahead of time.

White Chocolate Mousse Dome with Strawberries and Walnut Praline

Adapted from Taste.com

What you will need

1 sponge cake
About 12 strawberries
200g dark chocolate
1 tbsp olive oil

For the mousse
180g white chocolate
300ml thickened cream
1 tsp gelatine powder
3 eggs, separated

For the Praline
1 cup crushed walnuts
1/2 cup sugar

What you will need to do

Using the pinch bowls as a guide, cut out six rounds of sponge cake at about 15mm thickness and set aside.

Prepare 6 small pinch bowls by lining them with glad wrap.

To prepare the mousse, melt the white chocolate and cream over a double boiler until the chocolate has melted. Remove from heat and set aside to cool slightly. Place 1 tbsp of boiling water in a small heatproof bowl and add the gelatine. Bring a small saucepan of water to the boil (I used the same one from melting the chocolate) then take off the heat. Sit the bowl of gelatine in the saucepan until the gelatine dissolves.

Stir the gelatine and egg yolks into the cream and chocolate mixture then refrigerate until slightly thickened. In another bowl, beat the egg whites until stiff peaks form. Fold into the cream mixture until evenly combined. Spoon the mixture into the prepared pinch bowls and divide evenly amongst them. Place in the fridge. Cut the strawberries into halves and remove the tops. Take the bowls out of the fridge and press in four halves into each one.

Take the sponge cake rounds and place into each bowl. Press down gently until you can feel that the sponge is touching the mousse. Wrap any excess plastic wrap over the sponge to secure firmly. Place in the freezer for a couple of hours.

Melt the dark chocolate in a double boiler and add the olive oil. Remove the bowls from the freezer and tip upside down. Carefully remove the mousse cakes and take away the plastic wrap. Sit on a wire rack over a baking tray.

Carefully pour the dark chocolate over the mousse working quickly one at a time to try and cover the whole dome before the chocolate sets. Place domes back into the fridge.

To make the walnut praline, place the sugar in a small saucepan over low heat. Line a baking tray with grease proof paper and spread the walnuts out over it. When the sugar is melted and turning a caramel colour, remove from the heat and pour over the walnuts. BE CAREFUL IT WILL BE SUPER HOT! Leave the walnuts to sit until the sugar has hardened. Break the praline up using a food processor or just whacking it with something hard (I used rolling pin).

Remove the domes from the fridge and top with a small amount of praline. If they don't stick well, melt the tops a little with a blowtorch then add the praline. Keep refrigerated until ready to serve.

Strawberry and Coconut Tarts and One Year Blog-iversary!

It is hard to believe that I have been blogging for one whole year already! I feel like I have learned so much in this year, about baking, blogging and about myself. Sugabuttacream has been a great way to express my creativeness and practice photography and writing (God knows I need it!). I have made things I never thought I would bother to attempt and learned some great skills and techniques along the way. Gosh its definitely about 'the journey' isn't it.

Admittedly this anniversary snuck up on me and I would have liked to have done something a bit more amazing and celebratory-like for this post. But shortcrust pastry tarts are something I have been meaning to make since I bought my food processor so it seemed as good a time as any to try it out now.  This is such a simple pastry recipe and can be used for any sort of sweet tart. These are my twist on the classic strawberry jam and coconut slice and taste just as delicious!

Strawberry and Coconut Tarts

Recipe adapted from Taste.com and Generations of Bush Cooking

What you will need

For the pastry

250g plain flour

125g chilled butter, cubed

1/3 cup caster sugar

1 egg yolk

1tbsp cold water

For the filling

1/2 cup strawberry jam

For the topping

1 egg

1/6 cup sugar

1 cup shredded coconut

What you will need to do

I plan to refer back to this recipe for future shortcrust needs so I have added some visuals for the steps. 

Place flour, sugar and butter into food processor bowl. 

Process until resembles fine crumbs.

Add egg yolk and water.

Process until comes together and forms a ball.

Turn out onto floured surface and kneed lightly until smooth.

Shape into a round disc and place in the fridge to rest for at least 30 minutes.

Preheat the oven to 180*C. Remove pastry from fridge and place on floured surface.

Roll pastry out to about 5mm thick.

Using a round cutter, cut out as many rounds as you can. Take the remaining off cuts and roll out again and cut out more rounds. You should be able to get about 8-10 rounds.

Place the rounds into silicone cupcake trays and gently push down to line the bottom and sides.

Using a fork, poke some holes in the bottom of the tarts.

Bake for 10 -15 minutes or until slightly golden. Leave to cool slightly in tray then gently remove and place on cooling rack.

For the filling, place about 2 teaspoons of jam into each tart to almost fill them. 

For the topping, beat the egg and sugar together until light and fluffy. Stir in the coconut until completely combined. Divide the topping evenly between the tarts, spoon onto the tops. Place in the oven for 5-10 minutes until toppings start to brown. For extra crisp top, use a blowtorch to scorch the tops.

Lemon Cream Biscuits and Relay For Life

So I made these a while ago and just haven't gotten around to posting them. They were super yummy if you like lemony things. But more importantly I wanted to let people who read this know that I am participating in Relay For Life this year and am currently fundraising! Here is a link to my fundraising page if any one wanted to donate. It is a really good cause and the relay itself should be a whole lot of fun. I will probably make some tasty treats to keep us going through the night! Any contributions would be greatly appreciated but if you can't donate, even a tweet or post on your twitter or Facebook to this page and link would be super appreciated :) Thanks!

Lemon Cream Biscuits

Recipe adapted from Taste.com

What you will need

250g butter, room temp
1/3 cup icing sugar, sifted
1 tsp vanilla essence
1 3/4 cups plain flour
50g cornflour

60g butter, room temp
2/3 cup icing sugar, sifter
1 tbsp lemon juice

2 tbsp lemon juice
extra icing sugar, sifted

What you will need to do

Preheat oven to 160*C and line a baking tray with baking paper. Beat the butter, icing sugar and vanilla until pale and creamy. Sift the flour and cornflour into the butter mix and beat until just combined. Roll spoonfuls of mixture into balls and place on baking tray leaving a few centimetres between each. Flatten slightly with a fork then bake for 15 minutes or until cooked (they should only slightly brown on the bottom). Let cool on trays then transfer to a wire rack.

To make the filling, cream the butter, icing sugar and lemon juice until smooth and creamy. Pipe or spread filling on half of the biscuits then sandwich together with remaining biscuits.

To make the lemon glaze, mix a little icing sugar into the lemon juice until a smooth but runny consistency is reached. Brush glaze over the tops of the biscuits with a pastry brush. Place in fridge to set.

Hazelnut Cheesecake

Wow it has been too long since I last posted! I have been ridiculously busy of late, mostly because last week was my BIRTHDAY!! I had a bit of a shindig with most of my family and D's family making the trip up north and some friends partied with us too. I made. so. much. food. I had been baking a freezing things in the week leading up to my party and the sad thing is that I didn't get to take photos before the night :(.

Because I was making a birthday cake for the party I decided to make just a small one for my actual birth day. I was already planning on making mini hazelnut cheesecakes for the party so I just decided to make a medium cheesecake for my birthday at the same time. It was quite delicious! Ferrero Rocher anyone?

Hazelnut Cheesecake

Recipe adapted from Australian Good Taste Magazine April 2013

What you will need

250g Nice biscuits
150g hazelnuts, roasted and skins removed
100g unsalted butter, melted
500g cream cheese
300ml sour cream
100g caster sugar
3 eggs
320g nutella
Pinch of salt
Ferrero Rochers to decorate

What you will need to do

Process the biscuits and hazelnuts until finely crushed. Add melted butter and process until combined. You can make one large cheesecake in a 23cm spring form tin or about 18 mini cheesecakes and 1 medium 4 inch cheesecake. If using tins, line the bottom with baking paper and spray the sides with canola spray. If making minis, you can line muffin tins with cupcake papers, or if you have silicone cupcake trays just leave as is. Press the biscuit mix into the bottoms of your tins/ trays. Press in firmly and put in the fridge to chill.

Preheat the oven to 160*C. Process the cream cheese, sour cream and sugar in the food processor until smooth. Add the eggs one at a time and process until well combined. Take out the bases and pour the cream cheese mixture into each tin/ tray evenly. Heat the nutella in the microwave for 20 seconds then spoon a bit over each cheesecake. Take a knife and swirl the nutella through the cheesecake slightly. Bake for approximately 20 minutes. Cooking time will vary on the size of the cheesecakes, one big cheesecake may take an hour, the smaller ones will only take about 20 minutes. Keep an eye on them and they will be done when the middle is still slightly jiggly.

Once cooled, remove from tin/tray and decorate with Ferrero Rochers.