Specifically, Rösti!

The Daring Cooks’ February 2012 challenge was hosted by Audax & Lis and they chose to present Patties for their ease of construction, ingredients and deliciousness! We were given several recipes, and learned the different types of binders and cooking methods to produce our own tasty patties!

I have never made hashbrowns successfully.  I’ve managed to brown potatoes in a pan somewhat effectively on occasion, but I’ve never made a truly beautiful plateful of hashbrowns – until now!

This recipe for Rosti (which is a patty, but basically, it’s hashbrowns in one piece) is amazing; amazingly delicious, amazingly easy and amazingly inexpensive.  For about a buck and 30 minutes of time, you can have a beautiful plate full of fried potato.

There were many other patties included in this super fun challenge, and I encourage you to visit some other Daring Cooks to see what they’ve been up to!  Thanks Audax and Lis for another fun challenge – I can’t wait to make another Rösti soon!

Cheers.

Potato Rösti

Servings: makes two large rösti
adapted from a family recipe

The classic rösti; cheap, easy and so tasty.

Ingredients:
1 kg (2½ lb) potatoes
1 teaspoon (5 ml) (6 gm) salt
2 teaspoons (10 ml) (6 gm) black pepper, freshly milled
1 large egg, lightly beaten
2 tablespoons (30 ml) (½ oz/15 gm) cornflour (cornstarch) or use all-propose flour
3 tablespoons (45 ml) oil, for frying

Directions:

1. Grate lengthwise the peeled potatoes with a box grater or a food processor.
2. Wrap the grated potato in a cloth and squeeze dry, you will get a lot of liquid over ½ cup, discard liquid since it is full of potato starch.
3. Return dried potato to bowl add the egg, cornflour, pepper, and salt.
4. Mix until combined.
5. Preheat a frying pan (cast iron is best) until medium hot, add 2 teaspoons of oil wait until oil shimmers.
6. Place half of mixture into the pan, flatten with a spoon until you get a smooth flat surface. Lower heat to medium.
7. Fry for 8-10 minutes (check at 6 minutes) the first side, flip by sliding the rösti onto a plate then use another plate invert the rösti then slide it back into the pan, then fry the other side about 6-8 minutes until golden brown. Repeat to make another rösti.

I’m cheating a little here – this didn’t get published on Friday** and the photo isn’t mine, but the lamb roast we made on Monday looked a lot like this before we cooked it and was astoundingly good.  And we still have leftovers, making this a dinner that lasted for three meals (leftovers got put into a curry and the last of it will be going into something else today).  So while it was spendy (at about $8/pound), the ROI*** on this dinner, both in dollars and work put in, was pretty high.

For anyone not familiar with lamb, it’s delicious.  If you’re the type who thinks that mackerel is “too fishy,” then lamb might not be the best choice for you, but I still encourage you to try it at least once.  It’s got a unique and super flavorful taste that we love.  It’s also quite rich, which makes it the perfect once-in-a-while celebration kind of thing to eat.

The thing I love the most about this particular recipe, though, is how easy it is.  All you do is rub the roast down with some oil, herbs, garlic, salt and pepper and roast it.  And for a relatively short period of time.  The rule of thumb is around 20 minutes per pound, but ours came out about 20 minutes early (and was cooked a little more than I was angling for), so do keep an eye on it and do keep your meat thermometer handy.

If you’re trying lamb for the first time, I hope you enjoy it!  If you’re a long-time fan, I hope this is a new super-simple recipe for your book!

Cheers.

*Due to weird scheduling, the Friday Tip is going on hiatus (perhaps to be replaced by something else).  I still want to post something every week, but Friday is not the day to do it.
**Thanks to the magic of WordPress, I can backdate.  I love magic.
***ROI = “return on investment”

Roast Boneless Leg of Lamb

Recipe courtesy of The Reluctant Gourmet – link very much worth following for extensive notes on how to cook a lamb roast

Ingredients

• 1 boneless leg of lamb (about 4 to 5 lbs)
• 2 tablespoons fresh rosemary
• 2 tablespoons fresh thyme
• 2 tablespoons fresh oregano
• 4 cloves garlic
• Olive oil
• Salt & pepper

Preparation

Preheat the oven to 450ºF.

Finely chop herbs and garlic (I like to chop the herbs and garlic into some kosher salt – very tasty!)

Rub  oil on all sides of the lamb and season with salt and pepper. Spoon the herb/garlic mixture on the topside of the lamb and spread it out.

Place lamb in a shallow roasting pan and roast for 30 minutes at 450ºF. Reduce the oven temperature to 325ºF and continue cooking until you reach the desired internal temperature (discussed extensively in The Reluctant Gourmet’s post – go read it!).

Remove roast from oven and let it rest for 5 to 10 minutes on a cutting board.  Prepare a pan sauce.  Here’s how I do it (you will see another method if you read the recipe and notes on the RG’s site): heat your roasting pan on the stove top using two burners (works best with a gas stove top).  Deglaze with white wine (about a cup) and reduce the sauce until it thickens a bit.  Turn off the heat and strain the sauce into a pyrex measuring cup.  At this point, you can return the sauce to the roasting pan and let a tablespoon or so of softened butter swirl in there.  You will need to stir the sauce prior to spooning it over your lamb (and, in our case, mashed potatoes).  It will be some of the most amazing pan sauce you’ve ever tasted!

Do be sure to put whatever herbs and garlic come off the roast when you remove the netting either into the sauce or back on to your sliced lamb.  That stuff is spectacular!

Kashe pictured with penne and no cheese

Kashe Varnishkes is one of the best and easiest dishes on the planet.  It’s also one of the cheapest.  Double score.

There’s not much to write about this dish before the recipe, because there really isn’t much to it; pasta, onion and buckwheat.  That doesn’t sound impressive as a meal, but it’s very hearty and very satisfying, due at least in part to the frying of the onion in chicken fat.

If you’re a vegetarian, chicken fat is a no-go for you and you’ll probably want to use olive oil to make this.  I can’t vouch for the version made with olive oil, because I haven’t tried it, so if you do, please let us know how it is!

If you’re not a vegetarian, I highly recommend using the chicken fat and rendering your own.  It’s really easy (and fun in the way that being thrifty and using all of an animal that you are eating is fun).  There is a step by step explanation of how to render fat below.

The Kashe recipe is my adaptation of Mark Bittman’s adaptation of his mother’s recipe.  She approved of his recipe, and mine’s not much different, so I’d like to think I’d get the seal of approval as well.  But even if she hated it, I’d still make it this way – it’s just too easy and good not to!

Cheers.

With cheese and bow ties

Kashe Varnishkes with Bow Tie Pasta

Adapted from Mark Bittman

Serves 2

1 medium onion, sliced (not super thin, but a half an onion shouldn’t give you 4 slices either)
1/2 cup uncooked buckwheat
5-6 handfuls of uncooked bowtie pasta, grabbed by someone with medium sized girl hands (I’m not really sure how much this is exactly – you want enough pasta to feed two people – I’ll try measuring next time and update with a weight)
1/4 chicken fat* (instructions on rendering below)
Salt and pepper
Parmesan cheese (for serving)

Prepare the buckwheat.  Rinse it, put it in a small or medium saucepan and add 1 cup of water.  Bring to a boil, then turn it down and simmer, covered, like you would if cooking rice.  It will take about 15 minutes.  I like to fluff it up a bit when it’s finished cooking, and take the lid off to let the steam escape while I’m cooking everything else.

Prepare a pot of boiling water to cook the pasta.  I like to have this on the back burner, ready to go so I can time it with the onions.

Melt fat in a non-non-stick frying pan over medium high/high heat.  When fat is hot, add onions, sprinkle with a bit of salt**, and cook, stirring regularly (not like someone with OCD, but stir them once every minute or so), for about twenty minutes, or until they are mostly brown, but not brown/burnt.  Add water as needed (a couple of tablespoons to about a quarter cup) to keep it from sticking and to deglaze the yumminess.  When onions are done, add the buckwheat and fry it all together for a bit.  Add more salt to taste and lots of pepper.***

While the onions are cooking, you can cook your pasta.  My bit of advice here; I like to have it all synch up and have the pasta ready just as the onion stuff is ready, but if they aren’t done at the same time (happens more often than not), it’s better to have the onions done before the pasta.  Pasta that just sits around tends to get icky and stick to itself, so don’t worry about the onions being done first.  Just turn off the heat.  Reheating them won’t hurt them at all.

When pasta is done cooking, drain it and add to the frying pan with the onions.  If a bit of pasta water gets in there as well, so much the better.  Additionally, if anything is sticking to the pan, add a bit more water.  Cook just to get everything nice and mixed up and heated through (2 minutes – maybe 3 unless your onions are really cold).

Turn this out into bowls (warm ones are not a bad idea!) and add more of whatever you like (salt, pepper, rooster sauce, peanut butter).  I like to add finely grated Parmesan****.

How to render poultry fat

Kathlyn’s method

Save the fat from whole chickens or ducks***** that you roast (collect the fat from the bird’s cavity and around the neck pre-roast and store in a ziplock bag).  The great thing about rendering fat is that you can collect this stuff for quite a while******.  I had a ziplock in the freezer for months with chicken fat in it – it did look a little weird when I finally rendered it, but it turned out fine.  If you’re big on roasting chickens, you’ll have a pretty easy time of this.  If you’re not big on roasting chickens, read this.

When you decide you have enough fat (you could have fat from three chickens or 40 – more fat=more rendered fat, but it doesn’t really matter how much you do), chop the fat up into more or less uniform 1″ pieces and put it in a sauce pan,  adding enough water to cover the fat.  Put a lid on the sauce pan and set it over medium heat for about 15 minutes.  The steam from the water is going to get some of the fat out of the…fat?  I know that makes no sense, but the fat you want to cook with will start to come out of these fat chunks.

Take the lid off the pan and keep boiling for another 20-30 minutes.  The water will boil off, and the liquid fat will start to darken.  I’ve seen instructions that say the chunks will melt, but I’ve always strained something out of my rendered fat.  You’ll get a sense of what it looks like and you’ll definitely be able to tell that the water is gone – you won’t have any more steam and it will start to smell different.

Strain the liquid fat and either use it immediately, or put it in an air-tight container for storage.  If you’re really hard-core, you can leave it on the counter (like we used to do with bacon grease back in the hippie 70s), but if you refrigerate it – or freeze it – it’ll keep for quite a long time.  How long?  Not sure but nothing smells quite like rancid fat, and it’ll smell like something you don’t want to eat.

You can use rendered fat to cook all kinds of things – it’s really yummy.  It’s not a good general fat substitute for olive oil or canola, especially if you have heart problems, but it’s a nice treat, and you can always use it sparingly or in combination with other oils that are a bit “better” for you.

*Duck fat would probably be really nice in this as well.  I think lard or tallow would be too strong.
**Adding this salt here is something you can do, or not do.  I picked up the habit of doing it when cooking onions, and I like it.  It’s one of those things that will spark debate with cooks (when to season, salt, etc.) but in my opinion, it’s all opinion, and you should do exactly as you please. So experiment.  Add spices early, add them late.  There is one Indian dish I make where I learned that adding the spices in exactly the same sequence with the same timing as the recipe calls for makes a big difference.  But there are a lot of times when it just doesn’t.  So add salt here, or don’t.  You will want to add some salt eventually, but when you do it – like so many things in cooking – is totally up to you.  Isn’t that cool?
***Unless you hate pepper.  Please see note above.
****Which is definitely not part of the Bittman recipe, but it’s my kashe and I can smother it with cheese if I want to!
*****Not sure what would happen if you mixed the two kinds of fat.  It could be like crossing the streams, or it could be completely fine (more likely).  If you try it, please let me know how it works out!
******Apparently, you can get more fat off a whole chicken if you cut it up into pieces.  We really never do that, but it makes sense that you’d be able to.  From what I’ve read, a home-butchered bird will give you enough fat for about 1/2 cup of rendered.  If you do it the way we do it, just pulling the fat out of whole chickens, you’ll probably want to save the fat from at least 5 or 6 birds.

Keeping with our easy meals theme, I’m resurrecting a recipe that I’ve posted before.  Since we’re doing easy this month,  I think that applies to me too.

Lentils are extremely nutritious and very easy to make.  It’s just a matter of simmering with some spices (turmeric and salt) and then finishing with oil.  Brown lentils are super healthy, but they take a while – about 45 minutes to an hour.  Their cousin, pink lentils** (which you can see are actually orange) however, take about 10-15 minutes.  In fact, this light meal (which doubles as a nice snack) can be made in about 20 minutes, and it only takes that long because you need 20 minutes to make rice.

Simple, easy, delicious and pretty healthy.  Oh, and a perfect protein (legume and grain) and vegan to boot.  How’s that for covered bases?

Hope that’s helpful!

Cheers.

Indian Spiced Pink Lentils

1 cup pink lentils
1/2 teaspoon ground turmeric
1 teaspoon salt
4 cups water
2 tablespoons canola oil
2 dried red chilies
1 teaspoon cumin seeds
1/2 teaspoon cayenne pepper
Juice of 1/2 lemon

Rinse the lentils and pick out any weird stuff (like rocks).  Drain them really well and put them in a med-small sauce pan.  Add turmeric and salt and water.  Bring to a boil, skim off the foamy part (although I don’t know why you need to do that – if you skip the skimming and nothing bad happens, let me know).  Lower the heat to a simmer and cook for about 15 minutes, covered.

Whisk lentils to break them up into a sort of chunky puree.  Simmer uncovered for another few minutes and let it get thicker.  Meanwhile, heat the oil and cumin in a small frying pan.  After about two minutes (seeds are toasty but not burned!), add the chilies and cook for another 30 seconds.  Take the pan off heat, maybe add a little more oil to cool it down (just a little), add the cayenne pepper and stir.  Add this to the lentils.  Add the lemon juice and gently stir.

Note – this stuff will thicken up as it sits around, and I think it gets better as it does.  It’s pretty thin when you first take it off the stove.  If you want to make it to eat now and like it thicker, try taking away one cup of water.  You can always add more if you need to thin it out.  Just keep an eye on it as it simmers to make sure that it doesn’t burn.

Serving this over rice is great.  You can eat it by itself as well or with some flatbread, which is a real treat!

*My schedule has changed recently and consequently, the Friday Tip may change days.  Stay tuned.
**If my world-wide-interweb sources are correct, pink lentils are skinned and split massour lentils, which are very similar to brown lentils.  I believe this is why brown lentils have considerably more fiber (over twice as much – I think it comes from their skins).  But both varieties are excellent, low-fat sources of protein.  If you need to watch your fat intake, you can use less oil in the finishing of the lentils.  I think I’ve already halved the amount from the original recipe, but you could probably do 1 TBSP of oil.  You just need enough to fry the spices.

So am I late or what?  No Friday tip last week and three days behind with my Daring Bakers post.  What’s going on? (No need to point out that it’s now Saturday, thanks)

I’m in Alabama, where the weather is hot and life moves a little slower.  Plus I’m at an economics conference, so I’ve been kind of busy.  Apparently too busy to do a Friday tip or post my Daring Bakers on time.

Oh!  Before I forget…the bot words:

Jana of Cherry Tea Cakes was our July Daring Bakers’ host and she challenges us to make Fresh Frasiers inspired by recipes written by Elisabeth M. Prueitt and Chad Robertson in the beautiful cookbook Tartine.

So…first things first.  This was a lovely cake.  I will admit that I didn’t really make it the way you’re supposed to make it.  For one thing, I didn’t use marzipan.  I don’t like marzipan, and it’s expensive, so I didn’t use it.  Everything else was more or less like the recipe.  Which my husband said tasted just like strawberry shortcake.

And that’s great, because he likes strawberry shortcake.

There wasn’t much difficult in making this recipe – it’s a little labor-intensive for something that is essentially strawberry shortcake, but it’s pretty and very nice to eat.  Especially the pastry cream.  Light but still kind of decadent and quite delicious.  Great choice Jana!

So the recipe is below, in case you’re tempted to make your own fresh fraisier.  But I also wanted to offer up a tip, since it’s still relatively close to Friday.

You know when you see those cute cakes that look like they are made just for one or two people?  Or those stacked and layered appetizers?  Well, you need a mold and/or a cutter to make those, unless you want to buy a bunch of small pans specifically for this purpose.  And I needed one for this challenge.

Well, I didn’t really need a mold.  I needed a spring form pan.  But I didn’t have one and I wasn’t going to buy one just for a challenge.  I love the DBs, but I don’t have a lot of extra cash or room in my kitchen.

Enter the repurposed tin can.

As long as the can doesn’t have any rings in it, it will work.  The cake pictured below was made using a half recipe of German chocolate cake batter in a small sheet pan, using a large can that used to contain tomatoes as a cutter.  The can made perfect, uniformly round layers.

I used the crab can to make the challenge.  Instead of buying mini spring form pans, I just used the can as a template to cut a tall circle out of a cake that was baked in a regular loaf pan.  Once the cake was cut and split, I used the bottom layer of the cake to push a layer of saran wrap flat on the bottom of the can (so it could be lifted out later).  Worked like a charm.

If you need to be able to push the cake/appetizer/whatever out through the bottom, make sure you can remove both end of the can.  Simple, right?  And the best part?  You can just recycle the can and don’t need to store more additional specialty equipment!  Need to make another cake?  Just use the next can of tomatoes!

Hope that’s helpful!

Cheers.

Fresh Fraisiers (notes by Miss Jana)

Notes: The gelatin will continue to stiffen day by day. The longer you let your finished cake sit, the more firm it will become. Also, I prefer to assemble the cake on the platter it will be displayed on, some people do not, but I recommend placing the bottom layer on the platter, then affixing the cling wrap lined spring form pan around the bottom layer. It saves the hassle of trying to move the cake after assembly.

Mandatory Items: You must make a cake with exposed fruits, edible flowers, etc. around the sides of the center layer. You must make all components (cake, pastry cream mousse, simple syrup) from scratch. You may not make a trifle. It must be a free-standing cake on a platter.

Variations allowed: Have fun with this idea! I love creativity so feel free to mix up the strawberries for other fruits or edible flowers, freeze the mousse as an ice cream etc. Making a cake, a filling, maintaining the structure of the cake with the exposed fruits is mandatory, but the flavors and methods should be just plain fun! I am providing you with a basic chiffon cake and many alterations (lemon, orange, coconut, and chocolate) to it! You may be as creative or traditional as you like! For the Vegan and Gluten-Free crowd I have provided links at the end to help with the portions of the recipe that will not suffice.

Preparation time: The traditional recipe I am providing can be made in stages. As a whole the recipe requires at least 4 hours of time, and 4 hours of refrigeration, BUT the cake, pastry cream and syrup can be made days ahead of assembly to help ease the time burden. Once these three are made, the cake will take about half an hour to assemble followed by 4 hours of refrigeration.

Equipment required:

● measuring cups and spoons for liquid and dry ingredients
● cutting board & knife to prepare the fruit
● electric mixer or stand mixer
● wooden spoon
● rolling pin
● plastic wrap
● parchment paper
● cooling rack
● serving platter of your choice
● 8 inch (20 cm) spring form pan
● 2 large mixing bowls
● small mixing bowl
● whisk
● rubber spatula
● toothpick
● butter knife
● heavy sauce pan
● fine mesh sieve
● small dish
● 2 small sauce pans
● small stainless steel bowl or double boiler
● pastry bag

Basic Chiffon Cake:

Ingredients:
1 cup + 2 tablespoons (270 ml) (5½ oz/155 gm) all-purpose flour
1 teaspoon (5 ml) (4 gm) baking powder
3/4 cups (180 ml) (6 oz /170 gm) sugar
1/2 teaspoon (2½ ml) (1½ gm) salt, preferably kosher
1/4 cup (2 fl oz/60 ml) vegetable oil
3 large egg yolks
⅓ cup + 1 tablespoon (3.17 fl oz/95 ml) water
1 teaspoon (5 ml) pure vanilla extract
3/4 teaspoon (3¾ ml) (3 gm) lemon zest, grated
5 large egg whites
¼ teaspoon (1¼ ml) (1 gm) cream of tartar

Directions:

1. Preheat the oven to moderate 325°F (160°C/gas mark 3).
2. Line the bottom of an 8-inch (20 cm) spring form pan with parchment paper. Do not grease the sides of the pan.
3. In a large mixing bowl, stir together the flour and baking powder. Add in all but 3 tablespoons (45 ml.) of sugar, and all of the salt. Stir to combine.
4. In a small bowl combine the oil, egg yolks, water, vanilla and lemon zest. Whisk thoroughly.
5. Combine with the dry ingredients and mix thoroughly for about one minute, or until very smooth.
6. Put the egg whites into a stand mixer, and beat on medium speed using a whisk attachment on a medium speed, until frothy. Add cream of tartar and beat on a medium speed until the whites hold soft peaks. Slowly add the remaining sugar and beat on a medium-high speed until the whites hold firm and form shiny peaks.
7. Using a grease free rubber spatula, scoop about ⅓ of the whites into the yolk mixture and fold in gently. Gently fold in the remaining whites just until combined.
8. Pour the batter into the prepared pan. Bake for 45 to 55 minutes or until toothpick inserted into the center comes out clean.
9. Removed the cake from the oven and allow to cool in the pan on a wire rack.
10. To unmold, run a knife around the sides to loosen the cake from the pan and remove the spring form sides. Invert the cake and peel off the parchment paper. Refrigerate for up to four days.

Pastry Cream Filling:

Gluten Free! Vegans see the links at the end!

Ingredients:
1 cup (8 fl oz/250 ml) whole milk
1/2 teaspoon (2½ ml) pure vanilla extract
1/8 teaspoon (1/2 ml) (¼ gm) salt, preferably kosher
2 tablespoons (30 ml) (10 gm)cornstarch
1/4 cup (60 ml) (2 oz/55 gm) sugar
1 large egg
2 tablespoons (30 ml) (1 oz/30 gm) unsalted butter
3/4 teaspoon (3¾ ml) (4 gm) gelatin
1/2 tablespoon (7½ ml) water
1 cup (8 fl oz/250 ml) heavy cream

Directions:

1. Pour the milk, vanilla, and salt into a heavy sauce pan. Place over medium-high heat and scald, bringing it to a near boiling point. Stir occasionally.
2. Meanwhile, in a stand mixer add the cornstarch and sugar. Whisk to combine
3. Add the eggs to the sugar and cornstarch and whisk until smooth.
4. When the milk is ready, gently and slowly while the stand mixer is whisking, pour the heated milk down the side of the bowl into the egg mixture.
5. Pour the mixture back into the warm pot and continue to cook over a medium heat until the custard is thick, just about to boil and coats the back of a spoon.
6. Remove from heat and pass through a fine mesh sieve into a large mixing bowl. Allow to cool for ten minutes stirring occasionally.
7. Cut the butter into four pieces and whisk into the pastry cream a piece at a time until smooth.
8. Cover the cream with plastic wrap, pressing the plastic wrap onto the top of the cream to prevent a skin from forming. Chill in the refrigerator for up to five days.
9. In a small dish, sprinkle the gelatin over the water and let stand for a few minutes to soften.
10. Put two inches (55 mm) of water into a small sauce pan and bring to a simmer over a medium heat.
11. Measure 1/4 cup (2 oz/60 ml) of the chilled pastry cream into a small stainless steel bowl that will sit across the sauce pan with the simmering water, without touching the water.
12. Heat the cream until it is 120 F (48.8 C). Add the gelatin and whisk until smooth. Remove from the water bath, and whisk the remaining cold pastry cream in to incorporate in two batches.
13. In a stand mixer, fitted with the whisk attachment, whip the cream until it holds medium-stiff peaks. Immediately fold the whipped cream into the pastry cream with a rubber spatula.

Simple Syrup:

You may choose to flavor the syrup. One way is to use flavored sugar (for example: apple cider sugar, orange sugar, or vanilla sugar) or to stir in 1-2 teaspoons of flavored extract. You may also infuse with herbs or spices, if desired or add four tablespoons (60 ml) of fruit juice or liqueur while the syrup is cooling.

Ingredients:
1/3 cup (2⅔ fl oz/80 ml) (2⅔ oz/75 gm) of sugar, flavored or white
1/3 cup (2⅔ fl oz/80 ml) of water

Directions:

1. Combine the water and sugar in a medium saucepan.
2. Bring the mixture to a boil and let the sugar dissolve. Stirring is not necessary, but will not harm the syrup.
3. Remove the syrup from the heat and cool slightly.
4. Transfer syrup to a lidded container or jar that can be stored in the refrigerator. Simple syrup can be stored for up to one month.

Fraisier Assembly:

Components:
1 baked 8 inch (20 cm) chiffon cake
1 recipe pastry cream filling
⅓ cup (80 ml) simple syrup or flavored syrup
2 lbs (900 g) strawberries
confectioners’ sugar for dusting
½ cup (120 ml) (5 oz/140 gm) almond paste

Directions:

1. Line the sides of a 8-inch (20 cm) spring form pan with plastic wrap. Do not line the bottom of the pan.
2. Cut the cake in half horizontally to form two layers.
3. Fit the bottom layer into the prepared spring form pan. Moisten the layer evenly with the simple syrup. When the cake has absorbed enough syrup to resemble a squishy sponge, you have enough.
4. Hull and slice in half enough strawberries to arrange around the sides of the cake pan. Place the cut side of the strawberry against the sides of the pan, point side up forming a ring.
5. Pipe cream in-between strawberries and a thin layer across the top of the cake.
6. Hull and quarter your remaining strawberries and place them in the middle of the cake. Cover the strawberries and entirely with the all but 1 tbsp. (15 ml) of the pastry cream.
7. Place the second cake layer on top and moisten with the simple syrup.
8. Lightly dust a work surface with confectioners’ sugar and roll out the almond paste to a 10-inch (25 cm) round 1/16 inch (1.5 mm) thick. Spread the remaining 1 tablespoon (15 ml) of pastry cream on the top of the cake and cover with the round of almond paste.
9. Cover with plastic wrap and refrigerate for at least 4 hours.
10. To serve release the sides of the spring form pan and peel away the plastic wrap.
11. Serve immediately or store in the refrigerator for up to 3 days.