The Larder Cake - Made From 5 Homemade Ingredients

Jul 29

2 min read

Almost nothing in this cake was made the day I baked it.

The citrus sugar was made back when the good citrus was cheap. The extracts have been sitting in the cabinet quietly getting better since [month]. The crème fraîche was a two-day project I have made so many times now I stopped measuring. The jam is from strawberry season, which around here is a short and slightly frantic window.

So this cake took about a year to make and about an afternoon to put together.

That is really the whole point of keeping a larder. You do the work once, when the thing is in season and cheap and plentiful, and then months later you open four jars and get something out of it that you could not have made from a grocery run.

What went into it

The sponge is built on citrus sugar and two homemade extracts, with crème fraîche in the batter for a tender crumb that keeps better than a plain butter cake. Strawberry jam between the layers. Stabilized whipped cream on top, with fresh strawberries and mint.

I meant to keep this one simple. Two layers, jam, cream, done. Then there were berries on the counter and mint by the door and I am not built to leave that alone.

About the whipped cream

This is the first time I have shared how I stabilize whipped cream, which is a little overdue given how often I get asked.

Regular whipped cream is fine for about an hour. Then it weeps, the piping softens, and anything you built with it starts to slide. Stabilized cream holds for days in the refrigerator, pipes cleanly, and does not water out onto the plate. It is the difference between a cake you serve immediately and a cake you can make the day before.

The method is in the printable, along with the part most people get wrong, which is temperature.