Gingerbread Cake

This recipe for gingerbread cake has been sitting in my list of recipes to try for probably two years now. This year I finally got around to making the cake that sounds just perfect: it contains gingerbread and marzipan! There are 3 almond sponge cake layers stacked with gingerbread cream, plum fruit spread and marzipan:

Recipe:

Sponge Cake:

• 180g sugar
• 110g flour
• 40g corn starch
• 3 eggs, separated
• 100 ml cold water
• 75g ground almonds
• 1/2 tsp baking powder
• 1/2 tsp cinnamon

Beat egg whites until stiff. Then beat egg yolks, water and sugar until light colored and foamy (can take several minutes). Mix almonds, flour, corn starch, baking powder and cinnamon, and fold under egg yolk mixture using a spoon. Fold in egg whites and bake at 320 degrees F for 20 - 30 minutes. I used three 9 inch baking forms and baked the cakes for 20 minutes, which resulted in 3 perfect layers for my cake without having to cut one sponge cake into the different layers. However baking one cake for about 30 minutes and cutting it into layers works just as well.

Cream Filling:

• 180g mascarpone
• 100g greek yogurt
• 200 ml whipping cream
• 100g gingerbread
• 20g sugar
• 1 tsp cinnamon
• 2 tbsp powdered sugar
• 4 tbsp orange juice
• 1/2 package powdered gelatin (~4g)

Crumble the gingerbread into fine pieces (I used chocolate covered gingerbread, but I think any kind will work as long as it does not contain any dried or candied fruit). Using a small grinder or food processor on a low setting works well to make the crumbs. Mix the crumbs, mascarpone, yogurt and sugar. Whip cream with cinnamon and powdered sugar. Dissolve the gelatin in the orange juice for 10 minutes and the heat slowly until the gelatin melts. Let cool a bit and mix into whipped cream (start with one spoonful of cream and add more cream slowly). Quickly mix the cream-gelatin with the gingerbread-mascarpone. If the filling is very soft, put it in the fridge for the gelatin to harden.

Assemble the cake:
You also need plum jam and 100g marzipan. You can either grate the marzipan or roll it out into the form of your cake. Put about 2/3 of the gingerbread cream on the bottom layer. Add the second layer and top it with jam and the marzipan. Finally add the 3rd layer of sponge cake and cover the cake with the rest of the gingerbread cream. Decorate with gingerbread cookie pieces.