The strawberry garden cake is a showy and flavorful dessert, perfect for a party or a birthday.
I saw the strawberry garden cake on a foreign website and, since we really love this fruit, I decided to make it with small changes. Given the very good result, I published it on my blog and I hope you like it too!
It takes a bit of time because, in addition to the tasty base with small dark chocolate pieces, it has a layer of juicy strawberries compote, one with white chocolate and lots of fresh strawberries!
A delicious and theatrical dessert — I think it’s also lovely to present for celebrating a family birthday or with close friends!
I opened a recipe channel open to everyone and free on WhatsApp — no notifications and no sound — which you can join by clicking the following link https://whatsapp.com/channel/0029VaHbGIn9cDDig7Cw2x0F and every day you can read one sweet and one savory recipe!
STRAWBERRY GARDEN CAKE
ASI’s kitchen
- Difficulty: Easy
- Cost: Medium
- Rest time: 2 Hours
- Preparation time: 40 Minutes
- Cooking time: 25 Minutes
- Portions: 9
- Cooking methods: Oven
- Cuisine: Italian
- Seasonality: Spring
Ingredients for the Strawberry Garden Cake recipe
- 1 eggs
- 6 tbsp + 1 tsp butter (at room temperature (about 3.2 oz))
- 3.2 oz brown sugar (about 1/3 cup)
- 1 tsp baking powder
- 2 cups + 2 tbsp all-purpose flour
- 1.8 oz sprinkles
- 9 oz strawberries
- 3 tbsp sugar
- 1/2 lemon (juice only)
- 1 cup heavy cream for whipping
- 7 oz white chocolate
- 3 1/2 tbsp butter ((about 1.8 oz))
- as needed strawberries
- as needed mint
- 1/2 cup heavy cream for whipping
Tools
- Baking pans
- Electric mixers
- Spatulas
- Knives
- Cutting boards
- Bowls
Steps
1) TO PREPARE THE BASE I mix the soft butter with the granulated sugar in a bowl or in the stand mixer bowl, then add the egg and successively the sifted flour with the baking powder.
2) Now I add the chocolate sprinkles and knead until I have a dough that I then cover and let rest in the refrigerator for at least 30 minutes.
3) After resting, I place the dough between two sheets of parchment paper and with a rolling pin I roll out the pastry making a square for the base and a strip for the outer perimeter (about 3/4 cm — about 1/4 inch) of the strawberry garden cake.
4) I completely line the square pan or the 8 x 8 in square ring, joining the base and the perimeter well because otherwise the filling of strawberry compote and white chocolate might run and leak during the rest in the refrigerator before tasting!
5) FOR THE BASE I do a blind bake so after rolling out the pastry I cover it with parchment paper and place ceramic pie weights or dried beans or other legumes as preferred.
6) Bake at 356°F in a preheated oven for about 20–25 minutes, then let it cool completely.
7) FOR THE STRAWBERRY COMPOTE put the sugar, the juice of half a lemon and the stemmed strawberries — washed, dried and roughly chopped — in a small saucepan. Let it simmer gently for about 10 minutes, stirring a couple of times.
8) Let the strawberry compote cool and start preparing the ganache with white chocolate.
9) FOR THE WHITE CHOCOLATE GANACHE heat the heavy cream (unwhipped) in a small saucepan and when it is just about to boil turn off the heat and pour the finely chopped white chocolate. With a spatula stir well and carefully to melt and blend everything, then add the bit of butter and let the mixture rest to cool.
10) When the tart — in other words the tart shell is cold — pour the strawberries onto the base and then the white chocolate ganache, then put the strawberry garden cake in the refrigerator for a couple of hours.
11) FOR THE FINAL DECORATION whip the cream with electric beaters and wash, dry and slice the strawberries into wedges. I used lots and lots of them and covered some gaps with whipped cream piped from a pastry bag, finishing with a few fresh mint leaves from my balcony!
12) The strawberry garden cake is indulgent and also looks very nice, don’t you think??
Enjoy!Annalisa
Annalisa recommends…
1) Clearly the strawberry garden cake can also be made with peaches or cherries, just make the compote with the fruit you choose.
2) You can decorate with edible flowers — little daisies, violets and other untreated flowers.
3) If you don’t have the time or desire to make the fresh fruit compote, I would suggest using a layer of jam or marmalade, or even lemon curd — personally I would include a thin fruit layer!
4) Do we have frozen shortcrust pastry in the freezer, the classic one or the Massari Milano shortcrust, almond or coconut? It’s perfectly fine to use it for this baked square pastry that you can then fill and decorate with lots of seasonal fresh fruit, chocolate chips, delicate and airy mousses and much more!
5) As you can see the sides of the strawberry garden cake are not perfect: I found a secret to even them up after baking but I was afraid of breaking the whole square — one day I’ll reveal the mystery, but I know you are surely more precise than me!
