Yeasted Meringue Coffee Cake ~my 1st Daring Bakers challenge, March 2011~

The March 2011 Daring Baker’s Challenge was hosted by Ria of Ria’s Collection and Jamie of Life’s a Feast. They challenged The Daring Bakers to bake a yeasted Meringue Coffee Cake from a recipe found by Jamie from her dad’s collection of hand-written recipes from the 1970’s.

Around the last week of every month, ovens around the world dole out delectable victuals to feed their blogs. I have often salivated lustfully at luscious creations from these magical kitchens… and have been apprehensive if I could ever rise to such exacting standards considering that baking isn’t exactly one of my fortes. I only just get by – but ofcourse I dream big – and so I joined the ranks of the Daring Bakers and this Yeasted Meringue Coffee Cake is my first challenge.

I didn’t fool around with the proportions as I was unsure of the results, but couldn’t help playing around with the fillings. So in the end I made two of these cakes, one with a filling of chocolate and coconut, and the other, inspired by middle eastern breakfast called Knefe bel-Jeben, I filled with rose scented middle eastern semolina cake called Basbousa. The results were lovely, delicious fresh out of the oven and even better the next day. The version with Basbousa was a bit dry but I poured some extra syrup right before eating and it was fine.

Recently I have been very busy, shifted into a new home and all that goes with it. At the time of the challenge there was a lot of packing and reorganizing going around and I was hard pressed for time, so I prepared the dough the previous day and refrigerated it, next day as I put it out on the counter to come back to room temperature while I went about preparing the basbousa, and meringue. The rest is all about assembling.

Ingredients for Meringue Coffee Cake

(Makes 2 coffee cakes, if you want just one cake, halve the amounts)
4 cups flour
¼ cup sugar
¾ teaspoon salt
7 g active dried yeast
¾ cup whole milk
¼ cup water (doesn’t matter what temperature)
¼ cup ghee/clarified butter
2 large eggs at room temperature

For the meringue

3 large egg whites at room temperature
¼ teaspoon salt
½ teaspoon vanilla
½ cup sugar

For the chocolate coconut filling

1 cup coarsely chopped chocolate
1/2 cup dessicated coconut
¼ teaspoon ground cinnamon
Icing sugar for dusting cakes

For the basbousa filling

1 Basbousa cake
Rose water syrup

Method

1. For the dough: In a large mixing bowl, combine 1 ½ cups of the flour, the sugar, salt and yeast.
2. In a saucepan, combine the milk, water and ghee and heat over medium heat until warm.
3. Gradually add the warm liquid to the flour/yeast mixture, using a wooden spoon, beat until well blended. Add the eggs and 1 cup flour and beat to blend for about 2 minutes.
4. Stir in enough of the remaining flour to make a dough that holds together. Turn out onto a floured surface (use any of the 1 ½ cups of flour remaining) and knead the dough for 8 to 10 minutes until the dough is soft, smooth, sexy and elastic, keeping the work surface floured and adding extra flour as needed.
5. Place the dough in a lightly greased bowl, turning to coat all sides. Cover the bowl with plastic wrap and a kitchen towel and let rise until double in bulk, 45 – 60 minutes.
6. Prepare your filling: get together chopped chocolate, dessicated coconut, and cinnamon powder for Coffee cake with chocolate meringue filling.
7. Prepare the Basbousa cake, once cool crumble and keep aside.
8. Once the dough has doubled, make the meringue: In a clean mixing bowl – ideally a plastic or metal bowl so the egg whites adhere to the side (they slip on glass) and you don’t end up with liquid remaining in the bottom – beat the egg whites with the salt, first on low speed for 30 seconds, then increase to high and continue beating until foamy and opaque. Add the vanilla then start adding the ½ cup sugar, a tablespoon at a time as you beat, until very stiff, glossy peaks form.

Recipe for Basbousa

This is so incredibly simple to put together, I was very happy to have got around to making this semolina cake, next time I plan to bake this as is and not stuffed into anything – it does deserve a special place on the table.

Ingredients

1 cup semolina flour
1/4 cup white sugar
1/2 cup yogurt
1/4 cup vegetable oil
1 1/2 tablespoons dessicated coconut
1/2 tablespoon baking powder

for the syrup

1/2 cup water
1 cup sugar
1 tablespoon rose water

Method

1. In a medium bowl, mix together the semolina flour, sugar, yogurt, oil, coconut, and baking powder. Set aside for 30 minutes.
2. Prepare the syrup: in a small saucepan over medium-high heat, stir together the water, sugar, and rosewater. Bring to a boil, and boil for 3 or 4 minutes. Remove from heat, and set aside to cool to room temperature.
3. Preheat the oven to 175 degrees C. Spread the semolina batter into the bottom of a 9×13 inch baking pan, lined with baking paper.
4. Bake for 20 minutes in the preheated oven, or until light brown. Cut into squares, and pour syrup all over the cake. Let the cake absorb the syrup and cool down before crumbling it for the filling.

Assembling the Coffee Cakes

1. Line 2 baking sheets with parchment paper.
2. Punch down the dough and divide in half. On a lightly floured surface, working one piece of the dough at a time (keep the other half of the dough wrapped in plastic), roll out the dough into a 20 x 10-inch (about 51 x 25 ½ cm) rectangle. Spread half of the meringue evenly over the rectangle up to about 1/2-inch (3/4 cm) from the edges. Sprinkle dessicated coconut, chopped chocoloate, and powdered cinnamon over the first rolled out dough. (I added some instant coffee into the remaining meringue batter and baked coffee flavoured meringue drops)
3. Roll out the remaining dough in a similar fashion, spread rose flavoured syrup over it, and top with crumbled basbousa.

4. Now, roll up the dough jellyroll style, from the long side. Pinch the seam closed to seal. Very carefully transfer the filled log to one of the lined cookie sheets, seam side down. Bring the ends of the log around and seal the ends together, forming a ring, tucking one end into the other and pinching to seal.

5. Using kitchen scissors or a sharp knife (although scissors are easier), make cuts along the outside edge at 1-inch (2 ½ cm) intervals. Make them as shallow or as deep as desired but don’t be afraid to cut deep into the ring.

6. Cover the 2 coffee cakes with plastic wrap and allow them to rise again for 45 to 60 minutes.
7. Preheat the oven to 180°C.
8. Bake in the preheated oven for 25 to 30 minutes until risen and golden brown. The dough should sound hollow when tapped.
9. Remove from the oven and slide the parchment paper off the cookie sheets onto the table. Very gently loosen the coffee cakes from the paper with a large spatula and carefully slide the cakes off onto cooling racks. Allow to cool.
10. Just before serving, dust the tops of the coffee cakes with confectioner’s sugar as well as cocoa powder if using chocolate in the filling. These are best eaten fresh, the same day or the next day.

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