Ninja Turtle Cakes

Ninja Turtle Cakes - Ninja Kajkager

These cakes have been on my to-do list for the longest time. Normally they are made without the ninja bandana, and are called Kaj cakes. The name Kaj is the name of a puppet from a Danish children's program "Kaj og Andrea" I grew up with in the 1970's. The cake is a spongecake with a strawberry buttercream and marzipan.

This time Kaj went undercover or mutated into Teenage Ninja Turtles. 

Makes 8 cakes.

Ingredients:

Cake:

• 4 eggs, room temperature
• 150 g sugar
• 110 g all-purpose flour
• 1 teaspoon baking powder
• 1 tablespoon milk
• 1 teaspoon vanilla paste or the seeds from 1 vanilla pod

Strawberry Buttercream:

• 2 tablespoons pasteurized egg whites
• 125 g confectionary sugar
• 150 g butter, salted and room temperature
• 6 tablespoons cooled strawberry pure (Pure:400 g strawberries boiled with 25 g sugar, blended and strained)
• Red food color, optional

Decorating:

• Strawberry jam
• 200 g Marcipan
• green food color (orange, puple, red and blue for the bandana's)
• dark chocolate, small flakes for the eyes

Directions:

Cake: 

Preheat oven to 350℉ (180℃).

Spray three 9-inch (22 cm) baking pans. Place a piece of parchment paper in the bottom of each and spray this too. Set aside. 

Whisk the eggs light and foamy with the sugar, it takes about 5 minutes to get maximum foaming when whisking on a stand mixer.

Mix and sift flour and baking powder together, and set aside. 

Very gently fold the flour, vanilla and milk in the foamy eggs. Be very careful not to deflate the egg mixture to much.

Pour the batter onto a parchment paper lined baking sheet

Bake the cake for about 8-10 minutes, until light brown.

Set aside to cool.

You only need about a third of the cake for the 8 cakes.

Strawberry Buttercream:

Mix egg whites, butter, sugar in a bowl, and whip the buttercream until thick and fluffy over a double boiler. I used a saucepan with very hot water, and placed my bowl on top of that. I didn't have it on the stove. It takes some time to get the buttercream nice and fluffy. Save 1-2 tablespoons of this white buttercream for decorating. Mix in the strawberry pure. Put buttercream into a piping bag, with a large round tip.

Marzipan:

Color most of the marzipan with green color. Color small amounts marzipan with blue, purple, orange and red for the bandanas.

Assembly:

Ninjas in the making.

Using a cookie cutter cut out 8 circles about 2-inch (5 cm) in diameter. Divide each disk horizontally. Spread a thin layer of jam between the two thin disk of cake. Pipe a nice top onto the disk. 

Roll the green marzipan out very thin. I did it a little at a time between two pieces of plastic wrap.   Wrap the marzipan on top of the buttercream, trying to seal the marzipan close to the cake disk. This way you end up with a green bobble.

Cut a large slid into the cake in about a 45 degree angle, press a little on each side to open the cut. This will be the mouth. 

Roll out the colored marzipan and cut a ribbon for the bandana. Pipe white buttercream dots on top of the bandana, for the eyes, place a small chocolate flake on top for the pupil. 

Serve the cake with a cup of tea or coffee. 

Enjoy!

2 Kinds of Hveder - Wheat Rolls

Toasted rolls - ristede hvedeknopper

Even though I'm a expat, I do celebrate Danish Holidays. This gives me (almost) double-up on holidays, the more the merrier 😃

Store Bededag or Prayers Day is coming up on Friday. According to traditions everybody had the day off on Store Bededag even the bakers. You were actually meant to stop all work, play, travels and all games. To make up for not being able to get any fresh bread on Store Bededag, the bakers made an abundance of hvedeknopper (wheat rolls), to tie people over. And the tradition of eating the toasted hvedeknopper the night before Store Bededag was born. Ok people was meant to save the rolls to the next day, but who can resist a fresh-baked roll?

Hveder is one of my favorite rolls. The soft, sweet, fresh baked cardamom roll is so delicious served with some butter. Most people toast the rolls, but I prefer them not toasted. 

Here are my recipes for Hveder:

Traditional Hveder - hvedeknopper:

Hveder - sweet rolls

Grove hveder - 3-Grain sweet rolls:

Toasted 3-grain rolls - ristede grove hvedeknopper

3-Grain Sourdough Rolls

3-Grain Sourdough Rolls

I had to try to make 3-grain sourdough rolls, and they turned out great. 

Makes 8

Ingredients:

• 4 tablespoons mature sourdough (fed and fermented for about 8 hours*)
• 300 ml water
• 350 g all-purpose flour
• 50 g whole wheat flour
• 50 g flaxseeds 
• 50 g rolled rye 
• 40 ml cream or milk
• 10 g salt

Sprinkles:

• sesame seeds 

Directions:

Dissolve the sourdough in the water in  a large plastic bowl. I used a dough-rising bucket. 

Mix in the rest of the ingredients. You just have to mix the dough until all the flour is wet. Let the dough ferment in the bucket, lid on, on the kitchen counter overnight or 7-10 hours.

Gently pour the dough onto a well floured surface. Fold the somewhat wet dough into it self until the surface is firmed up, and the surface got a good tension. Divide the dough in 8 (about 100 g pr roll), roll the dough into a round ball, brush the dough with water and dip it in sesame seeds. Place the rolls on a baking sheet lined with parchment paper.

Let the rolls rise for 30-60 minutes, loosely covered with plastic wrap. I raised my rolls in my oven on the proof-setting.

Preheat the oven to 450℉ (230℃).

Place the rolls on the lower rack in the oven. Splash about ¼ cup of water in the bottom of the oven, and close the oven quickly. You need the steam to get the best oven spring and crust. Bake the rolls for about 22 minutes, until golden.

Let the rolls/rundstykker cool before serving.

Enjoy!

*To test the readiness of the sourdough, drop a spoonful into a bowl of room-temperature water. If it sinks, it is not ready and needs more time to ferment and ripen. If it floats, it is ready to use.

Kaffebrød - Coffee Bread

Kaffebrød - Coffee Bread

Kaffebrød or coffee bread might be a forgotten cake. It might not get as mush recognition as a lot of other Danish cakes. But I really like them. The crispy bread with a sweet slightly chewy topping, is really good with a cup of tea or coffee. 

Makes 12-15.

Ingredients:

Bread:

• 25 g live yeast (2 teaspoons dry active yeast)
• 250 ml milk
• 500 g all-purpose flour
• 50 g butter, salted
• 50 g sugar 
• ½ teaspoon salt
• 1 teaspoon cardamom 
• 1 egg

Topping:

• 300 g marzipan
• 300 g sugar
• 3 egg whites 
• 2 tablespoons all-purpose flour 
• ½ teaspoon baking powder 
• 1 teaspoon vanilla paste 

Directions:

Bread:

Heat the milk till a little more than finger warm. Let the butter melt in the warm milk.

Mix the sugar with the yeast, the mixture turns liquid. If using dry yeast, dissolve it in the milk.

Add all the ingredients to the bowl of a stand mixer. Knead the dough for about 7 minutes. 

Let the dough rise for about 40 minutes. Divide the dough in two, and roll each part Into a large flat bread using a rolling pin. Let the breads rise on a parchment lined baking sheet for about 20 minutes.

Preheat the oven to 400℉ (200℃).

Bake he bread for 15-18 minutes, until golden brown.

Let the breads cool before slicing in 1-inch (2.5 cm) thick slices. Place the slices cut-side up on a baking sheet. Toast the slices for 5-7 minutes until light golden brown. 

Topping:

Mix marzipan, sugar, vanilla and egg whites in a stand mixer till you have a soft paste. Mix in flour and baking powder. Now you should have a thick paste, that won't run off the bread slices. Put the paste into a piping bag, and cut off so you have a large hole, so you just need one fat line of topping to cover the bread slices. Pipe one line on top of the toasted bread slices. Bake the slices for another 10-15 minutes until golden brown.

Let the coffee bread cool before serving.

Enjoy!

Head Cheese - Sylte

Head Cheese - Sylte

6th Day of Christmas.

Sylte or head cheese as it is called in English is a cold cut danes often eat around christmas time. It might be an old tradition and maybe young people will not carry this tradition on, but if the sylte or head cheese is well made, it is very good. My dad was the one who made the sylte in my house. I loved the homemade version, but the commercial version was to hard, fatty and salty for my taste. Originally the sylte is made from meat from the head of the pig. But it is easier to use more available cuts, such as hocks, loin roast or pork belly.
I made this sylte so I can have this traditional cold cut for my Christmas lunch. 

Makes 2 medium or 3-4 small

Ingredients:

• 750 g pigskin from the pork belly
• 1 hock, with skin and bone
• ½ gallon (2 liter) water
• 200 ml vinegar
• 12 bay leaves
• 3 pounds (1½ kg) pork loin
• 5 teaspoons (35-40 g) salt
• 10 peppercorns
• 4-5 sheets husblas or 8-10 g non-flavored gelatin powder

Directions:

Put water, vinegar, Peppercorns, cubed pigskin and hock in a large pot, bring it to a boil and let it simmer for about 2 hours.  Discard the pigskin. Add the cubed pork loin to the soup, and keep simmering for another 1-1½ hours, until all the meat has fallen of the bone tender.

Remove hock and pork loin, and let it cool for a while, so you can handle it. Strain the soup into a clean pot. 

Soak the husblas in cold water or bloom the gelatin according to package instructions. 

In a large bowl, season the pork loin and the meat from the hock with salt. Pull some of the meat a bit apart. Fill 2-4 loaf pans ¾ up with the meat. 

Melt the husblas/gelatin in the soup and pour it over the meat. Cover the loaf pans and let them rest for about 24 hours in the refrigerator before slicing. 

Eat the head cheese on Danish rye bread topped with mustard and pickled beets.

Enjoy!