Sticky Tape the Date

         One of the most popular Australian desserts is date pudding. It’s a delicious treat, especially when served with some butterscotch sauce or plain caramel. What happens, however, when a whimsical pastry chef (as Sidney-based Adriano Zumbo is) takes this combination as a starting point for creating a new delight, can be described only by the most enthusiastic words. 

        “Sticky tape the date’ – when I saw this cake in “Zumbo” book, I was impressed by the way it looked – a row of date logs, covered in coconut “snowflakes” and a glimmering caramel glaze. And! There is much more inside the gateau: the strips of date gel and caramel chew which compliment the overall flavour of the chocolate cake batter, enriched with dried apricots and dates. The chocolate caramel (!) which goes in the bottom of the baking tin, has a beautiful aroma and that mouth-watering caramel maison that covers the whole cake is sinfully more-ish.

Barbados

            To say true, I’m not a big fan of exotic flavours in desserts. I prefer simple ones: chocolate, orange, vanilla. Too simple? But you can always spike it with some liquor or rum! Any additions? Why not – I love honey, caramel and nuts. And what about fruits? Well, I choose something more conventional for my palate: apple and pear, strawberry and banana… As far as all those tropical fruits are concerned, I don’t mind eating them on their own, but if you make me choose between a sophisticated gateau garnished with lychees, star fruits and kumquats and a simple apple pudding, I would go for the latter one.

            No wonder, when I saw Barbados cake in my “Zumbo” book, I initially decided against cooking it. Mango, pineapple, coconut – it’s not “too” exotic for me but not too appealing at the same time as well. After giving it a thorough consideration, however, I came to the conclusion that I should definitely give this recipe a try before I leave India. In Russia, I figured out, I would most probably face the problem of finding all the necessary ingredients (like kaffir lime, jaggery, coconut milk powder and cream, nothing to say of fresh tropical fruits) and even if I do I would have to pay much more for them! It became obvious that it would have been stupid “to skip” the recipe.

Toasted Lammyjammit

             When I think of typical Australian dishes, only a great range of desserts comes to my mind: sticky date pudding, light Pavlova, anzac biscuits and lamingtons. The latter ones are actually small cakes coated in toasted coconut; I have heard about them for the first time when I was watching Masterchef two years ago.

         Two months ago, however, as I finally got my “Zumbo” book from Melbourne, I saw an extraordinary variation of a traditional dessert: a big bar cake coated in what seemed to be chocolate coconut. The cocoa coconut and a sleek strip of chocolate on top were so appealing that I couldn’t but decide to make this cake at home!

Pineapple, Coriander and Coconut Bar Cake

      The Daring Bakers’ February 2012 host was – Lis! Lisa stepped in last minute and challenged us to create a quick bread we could call our own. She supplied us with a base recipe and shared some recipes she loves from various websites and encouraged us to build upon them and create new flavor profiles.

     When I learnt that we are supposed to make either a sweet or a savoury loaf this month, I was more than happy. Since I got my “Zumbo” book in January, I got absolutely addicted to it, especially to the chapter dedicated to “Gateaux de voyage”– the bar cakes, or the loaves, or whatever you want to call them. I started to cook a new cake before we finished a previous one; and despite the fact that there are posts only about two of them in the blog – Lavender Up and Attack of the Killer Tomatoes – believe me, I have cooked much more from the book!

      I felt like making another amazing loaf from Zumbo collection for the challenge but there were two major problems. First, Lisa stated that it shouldn’t take us more than an hour and a half to prepare the cake and bake it through. All cakes from Zumbo, however, have a lot of  “surprise” or hidden elements (like gel, caramel or custard) which, of course, need extra time to prepare. The second problem was, I realized that I won’t be able to share the recipe from the book – there are restrictions on copying the material without the publisher’s permission.

     I found the solution when I remembered that one of the members of our Daring Kitchen –  Lorraine Elliott from notquitenigella.com had once attended a masterclass with Adriano Zumbo where they cooked quite a simple “gateau de voyage” – pineapple and coriander bar cake. It was a perfect opportunity to test the recipe in my kitchen!

     The loaf was really quick and easy to make and turned out to be not as sweet as I expected (well, more like some sort of a bread, really!). I have put some pineapple rings at the bottom of the tin – just for presentation, and increased the amount of pineapple pieces in the cake itself. I have also added shopped cilantro stems to the batter – their freshness beautifully counterbalanced the tanginess of coriander powder and sweetness of shredded coconut. In general, it was more than a nice loaf and I am happy that I managed to try yet another recipe from Adriano Zumbo – at the Daring Kitchen this time!

Lavender Up

       

        My favourite part of the “Zumbo” book (compiled by a great contemporary pâtissier Adriano Zumbo) is the one called “Gateaux de voyage”. There this Australian pastry chef gives the recipes of bar-shaped cakes which as he claims are very popular in his shop in Sydney. He calls them “traveller cakes” because they are easy to transport and can be brought as a gift when going to somebody’s house to visit. All of these cakes are astonishing (well, as all of Zumbo’s creations, of course!) so it was very hard to decide which cake I should make first. The dilemma was solved when I had to open a can of blueberries (for my signature “Blueberry cosmopolitan’ cocktail) – it became obvious that the following day I would be able to make a pear and blueberry cake from the book. The girl (who helped me to finish my Cosmo) expressed the desire to taste it and I promised to send her a piece.

            However, as I started to make the cake, I became overwhelmed with doubts and hesitations. For me, it seemed to be way too much. First, there’s a coconut caramel (I love coconut milk and cook a lot with it but I hate coconut cream which goes into the caramel!). Second, the pears are poached in saffron syrup (I don’t have anything against saffron, but it imparts its strong aroma to the food, doesn’t it?). Last, the cake batter itself is made with jaggery and contains my not-so-beloved coconut cream and a big heap of grated coconut. Wait, there should have been lavender sugar in it as well (that’s why the cake has such a name) but since I didn’t have any I substituted it with vanilla sugar (made in the same way – combining freeze-dried powder with normal sugar) – for me, even without the lavender, there were too many flavours in the cake already. My husband suggested that we should first try this doubtful cake ourselves before sharing it with anybody.

When the cake was finally cut, we didn’t have to solve the problem “to share or not to share” any more: we simply couldn’t stop eating it! It came out to be so unbelievably good, with all the flavours complementing each other, that my poor friend didn’t have a chance to get even a small piece of it! I guess, I will have to make up for it – with some more Cosmos and a new cake from Adriano Zumbo!