Fraisier cake is one of my favourite French cakes. My version has a syrup soaked genoise sponge base, fresh strawberries and a crème mousseline on top. Crème mousseline is made by adding a lot of butter to crème pâtissière (or pastry cream) and is absolutely delicious. This dessert is basically a fancy way of serving strawberries and cream.
For the Genoise Sponge
- 2 large eggs
- 60g caster sugar
- 60g plain flour
- 15g unsalted butter
Preheat the oven to 170°C and line a baking tray with baking paper and a 16cm diameter ring. The ring needs to be quite deep as the batter will have a lot of volume, the ring I used was 6cm deep.
Melt the butter in a small saucepan and leave to cool slightly whilst you prepare the other ingredients. Place the eggs and sugar in a bowl over a bain marie and whisk until the mixture is hot to the touch (if you have a thermometer it needs to be about 50°C).
Take the bowl off the heat and continue to whisk until the mixture is lighter in colour, bigger in volume and has cooled down.
Pass the flour through a sieve and then gently fold into the egg and sugar mix. Once the flour is fully incorporated, take a small amount of the batter and pop it in to the saucepan with the melted butter and mix together. Then transfer the butter mix into the larger batter mix and gently fold in. Mixing some batter with the melted butter first makes it easier to incorporate the butter.
Gently transfer the batter into the ring on the baking tray, being careful to not knock any of the air out. Bake in the oven for about 15 minutes until firm to the touch. Once baked, leave to cool in the ring.
For the Crème Mousseline
- 500ml milk
- 4 egg yolks
- 125g caster sugar
- 50g cornflour
- 2tbsp vanilla extract
- 250g unsalted butter (at room temperature)
First of all make the pastry cream. Start by heating the milk gently in a saucepan. Meanwhile, whisk the eggs with the sugar, then whisk in the cornflour. Once the milk is simmering, pour a small amount into the egg mixture and whisk together, then pour the entire contents into the saucepan and turn up the heat. Whisk continuously until the mixture is thick. Pour into a clean bowl and whisk in the vanilla. Cover with cling film (the film needs to be touching the pastry cream) and chill in the fridge.
Once the cream is cool, pop the butter (at room temperature) in an electric mixer and whisk until it is smooth and creamy. Keep whisking the butter and add the pastry cream a little at a time until fully incorporated. The mixture may look a little curdled but keep whisking and it will become smooth. If the mixture is a little lumpy, it means the butter was perhaps too warm when mixing the two together. This can be rescued by putting the bowl over a bain marie and whisking until smooth.
For the imbibing syrup
- 75g caster sugar
- 75ml water
- 25ml alcohol (e.g. strawberry liqueur, vanilla vodka or champagne)
Bring the sugar and water to a boil in the saucepan. Take off the heat and add the alcohol and mix.
To assemble the cake
For the cake, you will need a punnet of strawberries.
Remove the cake from the ring (run a knife around the ring to release the cake). The cake needs to be about 2cm in height so use a sharp serrated knife to trim off the top of the cake. I use a different sized ring mould to rest the knife on so the cake is cut evenly.
Next take the original ring the cake was baked in and line with acetate and put on a board or cake stand. Place the cake in the bottom of the ring and using a pastry brush, brush the imbibing syrup all over the cake. Use all of the syrup so the cake is really moist.
Next, you’ll need about 7 or 8 strawberries to line the ring with. Try and choose strawberries that are about the same size (the remaining strawberries will be chopped up so it doesn’t matter how they look). Hull the strawberries and chop in half. Place the strawberries inside the ring, cut half facing outwards, and press against the acetate.
Now spoon or pipe some of your crème mousseline over and around the strawberries to fill the gaps between them. Spoon more of the mousseline over the cake. Now roughly chop your remaining strawberries (reserving 3 or 4 for decoration on top) and put them in the middle of the crème.
Finally pour the remaining mouselline on top. Bring it right to the top of the ring and smooth over with a palette knife.
Pop in the fridge and leave to chill for at least 1 hour. Once chilled, remove the metal ring and the acetate. Smooth over any rough edges with a palette knife, then decorate the top with strawberries and fresh mint leaves. Serve immediately and enjoy!
