Inspired by a photo seen on the web and wanting to make a quick dessert for this period, today I made in my kitchen the naked cake made of panettone with berries, with 3 layers of very creamy filling and a lot of love!
I added raspberries and blueberries to the filling and decorated with some sprigs of currants and mint leaves.
The naked cake or bare cake is a cake that although decorated and covered with cream leaves the layers visible, which in this case are made of panettone, the classic one with raisins and candied fruits.
The coating I made for the
Christmas version of the naked cake by combining ricotta, whipped cream, and mascarpone serves to level, giving a clear geometric shape to the cake.
Well, that’s what pastry books say because mine is always a bit wonky despite having taken …thousands of photos but in my defense, I add that the panettone was already crooked by itself, okay?!
What dough for the naked cake? Generally, a sponge cake is prepared, or a sponge, a mud cake, red velvet, so rather compact bases assembled and with a minimum of 2 layers and coated, leveled with a rather light layer of cream, the same as the filling.
What cream to use for filling the naked cake made of panettone but also for all bare cakes? Mmmhhh, so we can put a basic fresh whipped cream, buttercream even the meringue one, diplomatic cream, ganache, etc., etc.
How to decorate the naked cake? The idea of using edible flowers (in Bologna I buy them by ordering at the Esselunga on Viale Lenini) is beautiful, but we can really range with fresh fruit, candied fruit (what about orange slices?) chocolate chips, sugar sprinkles (beware that with humidity they melt and are not very nice to see all spread out) and so much more.
Meanwhile, I show you my previous naked cake prepared with the quatre quarts dough and decorated with rosemary and currants … you can see I love berries, right?
NAKED CAKE QUATRE QUARTS
NAKED CAKE MADE OF PANETTONE WITH BERRIES
The kitchen of ASI
- Difficulty: Very easy
- Cost: Economical
- Rest time: 1 Hour
- Preparation time: 40 Minutes
- Portions: 8 people
- Cooking methods: Without cooking
- Cuisine: Italian
Ingredients
- 1 panettone (for me Maina 700 grams classic)
- 5.3 oz ricotta (cow milk)
- 3 tbsps powdered sugar (heaping)
- 10.6 oz mascarpone
- 1 cup fresh liquid cream
- 1.8 oz blueberries (plus more for decoration)
- 6.3 oz raspberries
- to taste currants
- to taste mint leaves
- to taste powdered sugar
Preparation
To prepare the naked cake made of panettone filled with cream and berries, I prepare the filling cream that I made by combining mascarpone, ricotta, and a little fresh liquid whipped cream.
I didn’t add much powdered sugar (3 heaping tablespoons) because I didn’t want it to be too cloying, too astringent, too sweet.
I then whipped the cream until nice and firm and then added the other ingredients, sweetening the whole thing.
I set aside about 150 grams of this super soft cream for the outer coating and started cleaning raspberries and blueberries.
I cut the washed and patted dry with paper towels raspberries in half and then added them to the cream, also adding the blueberries.
I sliced in succession 4 parts possibly of the same thickness of my low panettone from the Maina brand, setting aside the dome that I will use for other little cakes I already have in mind!
I placed the first layer on the serving plate and then started filling with mascarpone ricotta cream powdered sugar and berries.
I continue to make layers filling them evenly and finish with the last fourth slice of classic panettone from Maina.
I then take the 150 grams set aside earlier and uniformly coat (I swear I tried) the whole naked panettone cake.
Now I decorate the top of my naked panettone cake with currants, blueberries, mint leaves, and generously dusting with powdered sugar.
What do you think? Quick and very easy, now we put it in the fridge waiting for the tasting…
Bon appétit!
Annalisa
I forgot to say that a famous version of naked cake is the one prepared by the pastry chef Christina Tosi, an American pastry chef from the Momofuku restaurant chain and opening the Milk Bar, who invented a particular pastry by adding any type of junk-food to the base dough, like peanut butter and sugar sprinkles for the Funfetti cake, which I also prepared in a very homemade way on the blog.
