Pink Ombré Strawberry Shortcake

I have been rather remiss in posting this past few weeks. If you noticed, the last post didn't have any pictures and the previous one on Levain Boulangerie consisted of photographs taken way back during Vesak. The ironic thing is that although I've been baking rather diligently the past few weeks (for a colleague who is my first huge (and paying) customer), I've been way too lazy to whip out the camera to take photographs. And usually when I'm done baking, it's evening or night, so that means lousy pictures. 

Anyway, I had high hopes for this sponge cake, because it appeared rather highly raved, and one blogger even wrote "不珍藏一辈子后悔". BUT I was disappointed because it turned out to be a rather 'rough' sponge cake, although it baked up pretty high. And to make things worse, this was supposed to be my 'birthday' cake, because I wanted to commemorate my birthday with a nice pink cake. So to say that I was VERY disappointed would be an understatement. One thing's for sure, I'm definitely sticking to my usual sponge cake recipe until I find a better alternative. And to think of it now, I'm definitely going to bake another nice cake as my replacement birthday cake, hopefully soon because it's been way too hot these few days to fire up the oven and I've been resorting to cool treats like froyo for my sweet fix. 

So why post something that I'm not too satisfied with? Well, I had thought I decorated the cake quite nicely on the outside and it would be a waste not to post the photographs up, especially since I had carted out my cake stand and other props to take photos. (Although on hindsight, I realized that the camera did catch a great number of flaws on the frosting which I was not too aware of at first glance).

I first got an idea for this cake when I saw Yossy's beautiful pink ombré cake here, way back at the start of the year (on pinterest I think), then I saw it again on Lisa's blog - this time a purple version. Alas, as with many other wonderful pages/ideas that I bookmark, they get pushed back in the queue and I forget about them. It was only in late May that I got reminded by Steph (who has crazy beautiful ideas on her blog) about the ombré cake that I wanted to make. And yes, if you can't tell, I am a fan of ombré. I've always had this fascination for gradients, so it's of no surprise that ombré cakes are on my to-do list. (I'm also a fan of the ombré hair color trend, considering that I just highlighted my hair a few shades of gold and brown ;p) I've made cakes in both pink and green, but this is way easier since it's just a matter of tweaking the frosting - très simple!

Sponge Cake 

Adapted from Huan's Sweets

Makes a 18cm sponge cake

150g eggs (about 3 large eggs)

110g castor sugar

100g all-purpose flour

26g butter

40g milk 

Method: 

1. In a metal mixing bowl over a bain marie, add in the whole eggs and castor sugar and whisk until the mixture reaches about 40°C. Remove from the bain marie and using a mixer, beat the egg-sugar mixture on medium-high speed until you get almost stiff peaks. The mixture should take about 20-30 seconds to disappear into itself. Following that, reduce the speed to low and beat for 15 seconds. This is to ensure that the air bubbles in the mixture are not overly large. 
2. Then, heat the butter and milk until the butter is melted, and allow it to cool to about 40°C.
3. Sift the all-purpose flour into the egg mixture and gently fold the flour such that the egg mixture does not over-deflate. Once all the flour has been folded in, add in the cooled butter-milk mixture and continue to fold gently until it is fully incorporated. Pour the batter into a lined and greased cake tin, and make sure to rap the cake tin against the counter a couple of times to ensure there are no huge air bubbles in the batter. 
4. Bake the cake in a preheated oven at about 160°C (fan-forced) for about 25-30 minutes. Allow the cake to cool on the counter for at least 15 minutes before releasing from the cake tin. 

As for the other parts of the cake:

I skipped on the sugar syrup (although I think this would have greatly helped the dry cake) and used the stabilized whipped cream from my strawberry shortcake recipe, but added a couple drops of natural red coloring to get the desired shades of pink. I also added fresh strawberries in the middle cream layer.

Janine's jots: 

• Taste: Sponge was sufficiently sweet, although the egg smell was very prominent because no vanilla was added. 
• Texture: Like I said, I was not a fan of the cake. I found the texture way too rough for a sponge cake, although it was fluffy. 
• Storage: The cake stores pretty well in the fridge - it lasted about a week, but if you didn't add sugar syrup to the sponge layers, beware that the cake will be VERY dry. 
• Would I make this again?: Unlikely for the cake, although the ombré is definitely something I'll repeat because it's so simple to achieve but the results look fantastic!