Choco-Vanilla Tall Boy (Checkered Cake Loaf) with Caramel Floss and Toffee

Dear Cousins!

How are the two of you? I have been a bit busy lately, and you know what was I doing? Cooking!! hehhehee…it was Niloy’s b’day on 25th and it was the first time I was with him on his b’day.  Therefore I wanted it to be very very special which including breaking my limits!! I must confess, that even though I love cooking and am patient with everything related to food (normally I have attention-deficit-disorder with every other thing), when it comes to Icing a cake I never had the courage.  I always thought it to be an arduous task and thought it would require like maybe 10 hours!! But Didi, with your encouragement and support I finally managed to do a cake (of which I am very very proud now) with icing. I called it a Tall Boy because its looks like one! Do you know what is a tall boy? I didn’t…but when I came to Melbourne and was looking for furniture for our flat, I came across this term.  It is basically a tall chest of drawers…but I liked the name..so I named my cake after it.

      

For a 25x8x10 cm Cake:

1 Chocolate Cake with walnuts (26x18cm)

1 Vanilla Cake with walnuts (26x18cm)

100 gms chopped Walnuts

100 gms Strawberry Jam+2 tbsp Icing Sugar+2 tbsp Butter

For Chocolate Ganache

200 gms Dark Cooking Chocolate slab broken to small pieces

250 ml Thickened Cream (or Pure Cream)

3-4 tbsp Icing Sugar

For Caramel Floss and Toffee

100 gms Sugar

1 Tbsp water

Method

Take the two cakes and level them by cutting with a sharp knife so that they fit with each other.  Take the jam, sugar and butter in a bowl and beat with a fork till blended well into a smooth paste. Apply on the top of one cake a sandwich with the other.  Then cut lengthwise into two halves.  On the top of one section apply the jam mix and stack the other half on this one in a way that it is in the order of vanilla chocolate vanilla chocolate.  Then cut into two halves again along the length and place side by side …you have now two parts of four slices with alternate chocolate and vanilla slices (please refer to the picture slideshow below). Again apply jam mix on one part and stack it over the other half.  Remember that it should be chocolate slice on a vanilla slice and vice versa. Cut the rounded edges to have straight sides all around. When you make the whole thing stand on a cake board, it should look like a checkered brick. (I wrapped a chopping board with aluminium foil and placed the cake on it.  In an absence of a cake board, one has to make such arrangements!!)

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For icing, place the pieces of chocolate in a microwave proof bowl, add the cream and heat for 2 mins.  Alternatively, you can heat the cream in a double-boiler and pour over the chocolate. Then slowly and gently (to avoid air bubble) start mixing the two till the chocolate has melted.    Add the icing sugar and let is cool down. I used a large knife to do the icing and layered the whole 3 times to get a smooth surface.  Finally with a stiff tea-coaster I evened the whole thing (another example of the phrase, ‘necessity is the mother of invention’)!! I took the chopped walnut and did a skirting of the cake with it….as in stuck the walnuts on the bottom sides of the cake. I sprinkled the rest on the top of the cake.

Then I made the caramel floss and toffee using the recipe in the Fig and Caramel Icecream.  Then pour the caramel on foil in various shapes for toffee. For the floss, keep pulling the spoon up and down on the foil occasionally using the finger to pull. Be careful as it would be pretty hot! (refer to the slideshow above).

With spoon and fingers keep pulling threads to make the floss

Place the Toffee and Floss on the top of the cake and keep in refrigerator for 4-5 hours. It was awesome you know in looks and taste…it took me 4 hours to finish the whole thing, but the moment I sliced it, there was this look of awe and love in Niloy’s eyes….every bit of my effort was worth it then! Try this..I had read about this recipe some 4-5 years back but never had the heart to make it…but now that I have done it, I feel, “Oh! I can do anything!” 😀

Love and hugs, Rinki