Countess cake
Any dessert which includes coffee is a winner for me. The most popular coffee dessert must be of course the Italian tiramisu. I make this dessert usually at home, I buy it less often. It is very easy to prepare it, which is maybe the reason for not buying it and instead making it. However, there are other lesser-known cakes and desserts with coffee. I would like to introduce one such dessert to you today. It is called “Countess cake”. To be honest, I am not sure where this name comes from, maybe from the richness of the cake itself and the amount of the ingredients used for making it. The Countess cake is a cocoa and plain sponge cake layered with butter and custard cream, biscuits soaked in coffee and jelly. For making this cake, I used two types of coffee: black as well as cappuccino.
A piece of this cake in the morning is enough to feel awake. No additional cup of coffee is needed to wake you up 🙂
Find me on Instagram: mecooksblog and Facebook: MeCooksblog
Ingredients for fluffy Countess cake.
Cocoa cake:
- 2 eggs
- 6 egg yolks
- 120 g icing sugar
- 80 g all-purpose flour
- 20 g dark cocoa
- 1/2 teaspoon of soda
- 1 teaspoon of baking powder
- 75 ml sunflower oil
Sponge cake:
- 6 egg whites
- a pinch of salt
- 200 g icing sugar
- 30 g potato starch
- 150 g all-purpose flour
- 1 tablespoon of vinegar
- 75 ml sunflower oil
Custard and butter cream:
- 500 ml milk
- 50 g vanilla pudding powder
- 100 g icing sugar
- 250 g unsalted butter
- 3 tablespoons of powdered cappuccino coffee vanilla flavour
- 130 g round-shapped biscuits
- 200 ml strong black coffee
- 2 packets of gooseberry jelly in powder (75 g each)
- 700 ml water
Additionally: icing sugar for decorating the cake
How to make Countess cake.
Cocoa cake: put the eggs and egg yolks in a bowl, add a pinch of salt and whisk until fluffy. The whisking should take approximately 7 minutes.
When the eggs are nicely fluffy, add the icing sugar in small batches while continuing whisking. Combine the flour with cocoa, baking powder, baking soda, then sift all the dry ingredients through a sieve. Add the dry ingredients to the whisked eggs by folding them gently with a wooden spoon. Finally, slowly add the oil.
Sponge cake: place egg whites in a bowl, add a pinch of salt then whisk until soft peaks. At that point, add the icing sugar while continuing to whisk. Combine the flour with potato starch and sift both through a sieve.
Pour the vinegar into the whisked egg whites, then in small batches add the flour, all while stirring with a wooden spoon. Finally, slowly pour in the oil.
Line a baking tin with baking paper. By using a spoon, place both cake batters alternately in the baking tin. When both cake batters are in, gently toss the cakes on its top with a fork – both batters are supposed to connect slightly. The top of the cake should not be even, instead small hills should be formed.
Place the cake in an oven preheated to 180 degrees Celsius for 35 minutes. After baking, let it cool down.
Butter and custard cream: take 300 ml out of the total of 500 ml of milk, pour it into a pot and add icing sugar. Bring it to boil. Dissolve the vanilla pudding in the remaining 200 ml of milk. When the milk in the pot starts boiling, pour in the vanilla pudding and reduce the heat. While stirring constantly with a hand whisk, cook for two minutes from the point it boils again. Once done, remove it from the heat and cool it down.
Dissolve the jellies in 700 ml of boiling water. Cool them down.
Put the soft butter in a bowl and rub it until fluffy. When the butter is almost white, start adding the cold pudding in small batches, rubbing all the time. Finally, add the cappuccino powder.
Assembling the cake: cut the cake lengthwise. Spread a half of the cappuccino cream on top of the first cake part. Arrange the biscuits soaked in black coffee on the cream, then pour in the thickening jelly. Put the cake in the fridge until the jelly becomes completely thick. At that point, take the cake out from the fridge and place the remaining cream on it. Cover it with the second half of the sponge cake.
Place the finished cake in the fridge to allow the cream and jelly to harden. Serve the cake dusted with the icing sugar.
Good to know when making fluffy Countess cake.
The baking tin that I used was rectangular and measured 25 by 35 centimetres.
I used a kitchen robot to prepare both the cake batter and the butter and custard cream.
Another way of assembling the cake is to place the jelly on top of the cream rather than on the biscuits.
Do you like desserts with coffee? If so, try our recipe for Coffee and orange mousse.
