Layered cake with prunes, walnuts and a cream that will cause many 'oohs', 'aahs' and 'I-didn't-know-that-was-comings'.

A position of honour (at least by me) on our kitchen shelf belongs to the book 'Eesti kokkade kokaraamat' which contains recipes composed by 26 Estonian chefs. These range from simpler recipes to Barbeque entrecote with basil marshmallow, ginger-hoisin sauce and roasted tomato seeds (just a sidemark: can you imagine that?).

This cake is adapted from the creation of Maren Rits, the chef of restaurant 'Postipoiss' and is unique for its use of Merevaik, an Estonian creamy processed cheese.

As my springform pan is 27 cm, I only cut the cake into 2 layers, although the recipe said 4 (how small does a pan have to be?). I also reduced the amount of prunes by half as there didn't seem to be much more room for them, but feel free to add as much as you like. And I didn't use muscovado and demerara sugar...but substituted with what I had.

Layered cake with prunes
(adapted from Maren Rits's recipe in 'Eesti Kokkade Kokaraamat")

130 g butter, room temperature
230 g light muscovado (I substituted with 180 g regular sugar + 50 g soft brown sugar)
3 eggs
100 g flour
1 tsp baking powder

400 g prunes (I used 200 g), chopped
100 g walnuts, chopped
2 tbsp demerara sugar (I left out)

200g sweet condensed milk
400 g creamy processed cheese (i.e. Estonian Merevaik)
100 g light syrup

1. Slightly beat the eggs with sugar, add butter and beat with an electric mixer until fluffy.
2. Add flour mixed with baking powder.
3. Bake in a springform pan at 180C for about 25 minutes.
4. Let the cake cool down and cut into layers (2-4) depending on the thickness of the cake.
5. Beat condensed milk, processed cheese and sugar syrup together with an electric mixer until incorporated well.
6. Spread the mixture between layers and on top of the cake, sprinkling prunes, walnuts and demerara sugar on the cream.
7. Let the cake stand overnight, serve on the next day for best results.

Now that's one sweet cake! Although it turned out looking quite different from the photo in the book, we really liked it. The cream tastes more of condensed milk than of the cheese, but the processed cheese definitely gives the cream an intense flavour, the source of which is very hard to detect, and makes it a bit sticky. Between the layers the cream is soft, but on top of the cake it has become thick and looks a bit like sugar icing.

The cake, the cream, the prunes and the nuts - there are so different textures together in every bite that it's just pure pleasure! With only 200 g of prunes there was a piece of them in almost every bite and that was enough for us. The overall sweetness (quite overwhelming!) is counterbalanced only by the slightly bitter walnuts. I didn't sprinkle any sugar between the layers - the cake certainly does not need more sweetness, but I believe 2 tbsp of demerara sugar would rather serve as a flavour nuance and crunchy bits in a cake that is generally very soft.

For a drink alongside the cake I'd recommend cold milk. I guess strong coffee could work as well (not that I ever drink it, of course!).

Coco-nutty prune candy

A few weeks ago I had cravings for ice cream with hot sauce. That's called a tooth-ache wish. I happened to have a bunch of prunes left over from my chocolate-y meat sauce and decided to boil them in some coconut milk. The coconut milk thickened and adopted the fruity sweetness of the prunes, which turned soft and velvety, being rich in creamy coconut milk.

I didn't eat it all, no matter how serious my cravings were.
I discovered the left-overs later when they had already cooled down. Instead of a sauce there were soft coconut-flavoured prunes. Ding! An idea! I would have walked..well...a mile to have got hold on to some white chocolate to dip these prunes into. It took me a week to get the chocolate, though...


Coco-nutty prune candy
(about 30)

2 dl prunes
2 dl coconut milk
about 120 g white chocolate
about 2 dl coconut flakes

1. Boil prunes with coconut milk for 10-15 minutes (don't cover).
   
2. Remove from heat and let the prunes cool. If there is too much coconut milk left, you can just pick the prunes out.
3. Melt chocolate over a waterbath. Prepare a small bowl with coconut flakes to roll the candy in and parchment paper/foil/silicone sheet to place the candy on for cooling.
4. Dip each prune into white chocolate, let excessive chocolate drip off, roll the candy in coconut flakes and place onto parchment paper/foil/silicone sheet to cool. (I used 2 teaspoons - one for dipping and one for covering so I didn't get a chocolate-coconut flake mess)

The candies can be stored in the fridge and taken out only some time before serving - that way it's better to eat them in several bites. If they're kept at room temperature, it's better to eat them in just one bite - or pieces might fall off them and...that's just not that comfortable.



How long should you boil the prunes? I have boiled them at quite a high temperature. The first time I made the candies, I used a small pot - the prunes didn't fit in one layer. I boiled them for 15 minutes and the coconut milk was still quite light-coloured. The second time I used a saucepan - the prunes didn't fill one layer. After 10 minutes I removed the saucepan from heat, because the coconut milk was quite brown already. So I recommend using a pot that just holds one layer of prunes and keeping an eye on it - don't let the coconut milk turn that brown, the taste will be better.

The candies have a mild coconut taste and are very velvety inside. White chocolate adds additional sweetness and makes the overall impression quite sweet. If you're an extreme sweettooth, try adding dark syrup when boiling the prunes. Using toasted coconut flakes would make the nutty accent yummily overwhelming.
Do try this at home!

TGRWT#5: Meat with chocolate - are you kidding?

To try and eat meat with chocolate – that’s no easy challenge. Like – no way. But the more I thought about it, the more tempted I felt. Not only to test myself but also to shock others to see what they’d say and if they’d have anything to say at all. Well, they had. Amrita’s challenge for this months TGRWT#5 – combining meat and chocolate – has been the most intriguing one this far.

A traditional mole would have been a safer choice, I guess, because it’s widely known that it has chocolate in it and people actually eat it and like it and they actually do. No mole this time, amigos. I used an Italian recipe (Cinghiale in agrodolce) that actually called for wild boar (not a good idea to spend a pile of money if you’re mixing meat with chocolate for the first time – trust me), but used pork, I also lessened the amount of red wine vinegar. Otherwise I followed the recipe, word for word. Quite a scary afternoon.

Pork in chocolate and prune sauce
(adapted from Hans Joachim Döbbelin’s ’Italy’)

100 g prunes
75 g big raisins
600 g pork chops
75 g bacon
3 tbsp olive oil
salt
50 g bitter chocolate
2 tbsp brown sugar
1 dl red wine vinegar
3 laurel leaves
cinnamon

1. Soak prunes and raisins in lukewarm water
2. Cut the meat into slices
3. Chop bacon and heat it with olive oil until transparent
4. Add pork chops and fry them on both sides, then add salt and fry for additional 10 minutes on lower heat.
5. Drain prunes and raisins and grate chocolate (for me it was easier to just chop it into little pieces)
6. Heat sugar, laurel leaves and red wine vinegar on a pan until sugar dissolves, then add the mixture to the meat
7. Also add raisins, prunes, chocolate and some cinnamon, then heat almost until boiling point (don’t let it boil!)
8. Mix meat and sauce well and heat everything for another 15 minutes, not letting it boil.
9. Serve with pasta or be a traitor like me and serve with rice instead.

I don’t imagine eating something like this with pasta. Really really really. Pasta with sweet and sour chocolate sauce? No. Rice was definitely much better.

Cooking this dish filled the kitchen with overwhelming vinegar smell – that was a bit alarming, especially for my mother. ’If I had known you were going to use it for meat, I wouldn’t have bought you this bottle of vinegar,’ she said when she came home. And also – ’If you asked me to buy meat I thought you’d be making something really good, but you made something sour.’ Okay, not a very bad start.

The dish is best described as sweet and sour chocolate meat. The taste of chocolate, most of all, is strange. It may be strangely good, but it’s still strange, strangely chocolate-y. What I actually like the most, are the prunes – delicate, soft, somehow maintaining a good balance between tastes. I’d rather eat the meat and pick out the prunes (into my mouth, of course), adding some yoghurt to my rice instead of chocolate sauce! The meat has an interesting accent to it, but isn’t flavoured by the sauce in a taste-killing way.

When my parents came home, I kept repeating, ’Really-really, you don’t have to eat this, you can just have rice with smoked chicken, really. Really.’ But strangely this time they wouldn’t listen, although I refused to reveal the components of the dish and hid myself in my room, doing all kinds of, you know, important stuff. After they’d called me for several times to go and explain the mystery, I heard the words ’this meat was good’.

I’m in awe. I’m confused. Something’s wrong in the world.
My parents liked meat in chocolate sauce.