Baking: Fruity Mini Christmas Cake with Nuts and Marzipan Decoration

Dough / cake base

1. Separate eggs. Beat the egg whites until stiff, pouring in the sugar. Then hide the egg yolks.
2. Mix the flour, cornstarch, cocoa powder, Christmas spices and baking powder and fold in using a whisk.
3. Grease an 18cm springform pan and dust with cocoa. Fill the dough there.
4. Bake in an oven preheated to 175 ° C for about 20-25 minutes.
5. Then let it cool down briefly in the pan. Then take it out and let it cool completely on a wire rack, then cut through it once.

Crunchy chocolate bars

1. Melt the chocolate over a water bath (max 45 ° C), then place in cold water and let it cool while stirring (up to approx. 30 ° C), then warm it up again slightly over warm water (32 ° C).
2. Put a speculoos in a plastic bag and crumble with a meat mallet or something similar. Then stir the crumbs into the chocolate.
3. Carefully pour this mixture into chocolate bar molds. (If you don’t have one, you can also use empty advent calendars, for example.)
4. Let freeze in a cool room. Then detach it. Only 8 pieces are needed for the cake, so 4 of them can be eaten.

Clementine filling

1. 3 Peel, fillet and chop clementines. Squeeze 3 clementines.
2. Soak gelatine in cold water, then squeeze out.
3. Heat about half of the squeezed juice and dissolve the gelatin in it. then pour in the other half. Now stir everything into the crushed clementines.
4. Place in the refrigerator until a thick paste has formed.
5. Place the lower part of the cake base on a cake plate and place a cake ring around it. Pour in the clementine mass, then place the top base on top.
6. Place in the refrigerator until completely solid.

Walnut decoration

1. Lightly toast the chopped walnuts in a non-oiled pan (until they are fragrant). then put on a plate and let cool.
2. Then heat the sugar in this pan until it melts. Turn off the stove (correct residual heat). Add the walnut halves and toss in the caramelized sugar. Warning: goes very quickly.
3. Brush baking paper or similar with oil and place the caramel nuts on top. DO NOT TOUCH! It is very hot, risk of blisters on the fingers.
4. Crumble the speculoos as described above and set aside.

Marzipan cream

1. Soak gelatine in cold water, then squeeze out.
2. Tear the marzipan apart and put it in a saucepan with approx. 100ml cream. heat at low temperature, stirring constantly until the marzipan has melted.
3. Now dissolve the gelatine in it. Then let it cool down at room temperature.
4. Beat the rest of the cream with vanilla sugar until frothy. Then whip the marzipan cream. Fold in the vanilla cream tablespoon at a time with a whisk.
5. Now loosen the cake ring from the cake base (first cut along the edge with a knife) and then spread the cream all around the cake. Retain a small portion and pour it into a pie syringe.
6. Put the cake briefly in the refrigerator.

completion

1. Place the roasted walnuts around the edge of the cake and press lightly (I do this by hand with a swing).
2. Sprinkle the crumbled speculoos on top of the cake.
3. Use the retained cream to sprinkle 8 tuffs onto the cake. put the caramel nuts on top.
4. Now place the crispy chocolate in a star shape in the center of the cake.
5. Then put the cake back in the fridge.

Marzipan decorative figures

1. Knead the raw marzipan mixture with powdered sugar. Then color them with food coloring as desired and shape them into Christmas figures. For the white parts (e.g. beard) I mixed powdered sugar with some protein powder and a few drops of water, so that a kneadable mass is created.
2. Then place these figures in front of the cake.

Remarks

1. You can find the recipe for Spekulatius in my KB under: … Baking: Spekulatius … ala Grandma … Of course you can also bake according to your own recipe or use pre-purchased ones.
2. My Christmas seasoning mix consists of cinnamon, cloves, cardamom, allspice, mace, star anise, coriander, orange peel, lemon peel, nutmeg and fennel. This can of course be replaced by a commercially available speculoos / gingerbread / Christmas mixture. … spice: Christmas mix …