A Day as a Princess

A Day as a Princess

June 30, 2010, 23:02
Filed under: Baking, Cakes | Tags: cake, marzipan, princess cake, strawberry

As a mature feminist I should probably think that princesses are a remnant of patriarchal society that should by now be thrown away with other rubbish. Well, in a way I do. But still, when there is an actual, real, royal – blooded, beautiful princess getting married in the neighbouring country, I must admit that  something in me is evoked. We  Finnish people are so sensible and not at all prone to unnecessary, costly silliness like a royal family, so I guess we can be a little bit delighted for what happens next door, in Sweden?

Recently, I have been very brave and done lots of things that have felt immensely difficult. So I decided to reward myself and bake a cake! And spend a couple of days only doing only silly things with my girlfriends. So we watched Princess Victoria’s and Daniel’s wedding and drank strawberry – sparkling wine, eating a cake that in Finland is called a princess cake.  Partly because in honor of the actual princess and partly to remind myself of some princess – like virtues. A Real Princess, the mythical, archetypal creature of fairytales, is never angry, never mean to other people, and always in possession of her power and her beauty. And there is always the happy ever – after to her story. In real life, the princesses get eating disorders and have unfaithful boyfriends, and I guess the only true happy end awaiting us all is the peaceful grave. But still, there is always enough reason to spent a day dreaming princess dreams, with a piece of cake, and congratulate yourself for a work well done.

Vegan Princess Cake

A princess cake is usually a quite an ordinary sponge cake, filled with vanilla custard, raspberries and covered with a layer of green marzipan. Mine was a little different, because I used strawberries and pink marzipan for the ultimate princess – effect. The custard or pudding I made of oat milk and starch.

The Cake

4,5 dl all – purpose flour

2 tsp baking powder

0,5 tsp baking soda

a good dash of vanilla

2 dl brown sugar

1 tbsp apple vinegar

0,5 dl canola oil

4 lingonberry cider

Mix first the dry ingredients and then add the vinegar, oil and the cider. Mix quickly with a spoon, until the batter is fairly even, and pour into a round cake tin, 24 cm in diameter. Bake in 175 °C  30 – 40 minutes, until a toothpick inserted in the center comes out clean.  Lingonberry cider gives the cake a lovely reddish hue, but you can as well use another kind of cider. Let the cake cool down before filling it. Meanwhile, make the custard:

The Custard

3,5 + 0,5  dl oat milk

a good dash of vanilla powder

1 tsp sugar

2 tbsp potato starch

First, mix the vanilla powder and sugar with 3,5 dl of oat milk, and bring the it to the  boil in a small cooking pot. Mix the potato starch with the remaining 0,5 dl oat milk, remove the pot from the heat and pour in the starch – liquid, carefully whisking. Then bring the oat milk to boil again, without mixing. Don’t cook, but remove the pot from the heat right when you see the first bubble.

Filling and Decorating

2 dl whippable oat cream

150 g pink marzipan

1 dl oat milk for moistening

2 dl strawberries, mashed

Whip up the oat cream, and blend it together with the custard. Cut the cake into to halves, and moisten it with oat milk. Fill the cake with mashed strawberries and half of the custard, and finally cover the whole cake with a layer of remaining custard mixture.  Roll the marzipan into a flat round layer, bigger than the cake,  with a rolling pin. Using a sheet of baking parchment under the marzipan might help, as well as sprinkling the sheet with powdered sugar.  Lift the marzipan – layer carefully on top of  the cake, and cut off the extra at the “hem” of the cake.  Decorate with real roses and sprinkled powdered sugar.

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