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Thanksgiving | (Part 1) Apple Cheesecake Cake

| Holidays

Happy Thanksgiving everyone! We stayed in town for a Friendsgiving celebration and brought this little cake to the potluck. Inspired by a Momofuku Milk Bar recipe, this cake has cheesecake layers sandwiched between brown butter cake, with brown sugar apple compote and pie crumbs as filling. I coated with Italian meringue buttercream and decorated with buttercream flowers.

My preferred apple for fillings is the Golden Delicious, as it has a nice sweetness and is able to cook down to a compote (or applesauce if cooked long enough). In other words, I feel like I can better control the texture. However, I couldn’t find any Golden Delicious at the grocery store this week, so I went with a mix of Granny Smith and Honeycrisp for a balance of tart and sweet. These apples are great for an apple pie, because the apple pieces retain their shape and structure, but less ideal in my opinion for a cake filling.

The cake was still yummy, but the slices tended to topple over because neither the cheesecake nor the apple filling had enough “mush” to serve as glue. Would love to try this one again with a different type of apple next time!

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Thanksgiving | (Part 2) Apple Rose Tarts & Pumpkin Cake Tarts

| Holidays

 

Continuing with my theme of using ingredients I had on hand, I also made apple rose tarts and pumpkin cake tarts for Thanksgiving (for co-workers, Friendsgiving and the actual family get-together). Although quite simple in theory, the apple tart in particular can be labor intensive if you hand slice your apples like I did. I think I told myself I was practicing my knife skills . . . but I would recommend using a mandolin slicer if you’ve got one!

The apple tarts are inspired by my baking friend Anjali, who in turn was inspired by a Pinterest post. The crust is a Pâte Brisée, and the rose is made from thin slices of Gala apples, coated with some sugar, cinnamon, lemon juice and melted butter.

I also added an apple compote (using Golden Delicious apples) underneath the rose to add flavor and moisture, which I think makes a big difference. After baking, I brushed with some apricot nappage for a glaze.

 
 

The pumpkin tarts use a Pâte Sucrée crust, baked with the same pumpkin brown butter cake batter I used for my Thanksgiving cake.

 
 

After baking, I leveled the top of the tart-cake, brushed on the brown sugar simple syrup, and then topped with mascarpone mousse.

Both were tasty treats and great for gifting. My personal favorite is the apple tart!

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