I think one of my Mom’s very favorite things in the world to do was to bake a cake. She made birthday cakes, cakes for friends and family, cakes for holidays and cakes to take into work. If a friend was feeling poorly or someone had a sadness or loss occur, she’d bake them a cake. She loved to offer her love and support through the fruits of her oven. I loved her for this gesture of kindness and love and watched her for years perform this ritual, even later in the evening after she had returned home from work and was really too tired to bake. Even after her whole day was done, she’d return to the kitchen to bake.
Over the last couple of days I have been thinking about the upcoming celebration of Mother’s Day. This morning I awoke and I thought about trying to configure a nice orange-scented layer cake with an orange curd and mascarpone frosting. My Mom loved orange flavor and her Orange Yeasted Breakfast Buns still live in my memory. I didn’t have any existing recipes for this entire cake ensemble to work from, so I decided to configure my own by working from three individual pieces.
A few months back I made a Lord Bergamot bundt cake. I loved this cake and the fragrance was wonderful while it was baking. While the idea of using Earl Grey tea in baking is certainly not original, I really think it is a good one to keep in the repertoire.
This was my plan:
I began by making a batch of Ina Garten’s Orange Curd for the filling and got that into the refrigerator. Next, I went to work on the layers. I decided upon the recipe for a Vanilla Layer Cake from Good Things By David. I decided to used this as a jumping off point. My layers are in the oven now as I begin writing this post.
Then, I went to a recipe from Fine Cooking for their Vanilla Mascarpone Frosting. I definitely want this cake to have a delicate orange profile – one that is nice but not overpowering. I thought, as I did when I created the Lord Bergamot Bundt Cake, that the earl grey tea would add a nice soft and different addition to just an orange flavoring. Here is how I built this cake recipe:
1. make one recipe of INA GARTEN’S ORANGE CURD and refrigerate.
2. Make the cake:
BERGAMOT/ORANGE-SCENTED LAYER CAKE – adapted from Good Things by David
3 1/2 cups cake flour
3 tsp baking powder
1/4 tsp fine sea salt
2 sticks unsalted butter, room temp
5 eggs room temp
1/4 cup freshly squeezed (blood orange or navel) orange juice
zest of one navel orange
1 cup whole milk, room temp
2 cups sugar
2 tsp vanilla
1/4 tsp almond extract
1 bigelow earl grey tea bag, cut open and tea removed
Preheat oven to 350F. Butter and flour 2 8×2″ cake pans, insert a parchment round into each and butter and flour the liner as well. Or, you can spray with a flour based baking spray.
Sift flour, baking powder and salt together. Cut open the tea bag and whisk in the tea. Set aside.
In a large measuring cup, combine the milk and orange juice. Set aside. In a small bowl work orange zest into sugar with your fingers, releasing the essential oils.
In the bowl of your electric mixer fitted with the paddle attachment, cream butter for 1 minute. Slowly add sugar and beat in on low. Raise speed to medium and beat for 5 minutes, scraping down bowl and paddle at least once during beating and again at the end of the 5 minutes.
Add the eggs one at a time, incorporating thoroughly before adding the next. Scrape down bowl and paddle. Add the vanilla and almond extract and blend.
With the mixer on low, add 1/3 of the dry mixture, then 1/2 of the milk/juice, then 1/3 dry, 1/2 milk, 1/3 dry – beating only until the flour barely disappears. Remove bowl from mixer and with a large rubber spatula, mix the batter to make sure all is incorporated evenly. Divide batter between two pans and bake 40 minutes or until a toothpick inserted in middle comes out clean. Rotate pans half way through. Remove pans from oven and cool on cooling rack for 10 minutes in pans. Gently remove from pans and cool completely on cooling racks.
3. Make the frosting:
ORANGE-SCENTED MASCARPONE FROSTING – adapted from Fine Cooking
1 lb mascarpone cheese at room temp
1 cup heavy cream*
2/3 cup granulated sugar
seeds scraped from 1 vanilla bean or 2 tsp pure vanilla extract(try to use the bean)
pinch table salt
In a medium bowl, combine the mascarpone cream, sugar, vanilla seeds or extract and salt. Using an electric mixer, beat on low speed until almost smooth, 30-60 seconds. Increase speed to medium high and beat mixture for about one minute. Add half of the orange curd to the mixture and blend. Refrigerate frosting for 30 minutes or until it has a firm consistency.
4. Assemble the cake:
Cut each layer in half with a large serrated knife, holding your hand on top of the layer and working the knife around the edge of the cake to mark the cutting spot before you cut through the entire layer. Then cut through the layer. Place the bottom layer, flat side down onto a cake round or onto a cake plate. If using a cake plate, arrange small pieces of parchment around the bottom edge to keep your plate clean. Trim the tops of the layers if desired so that the brown cake crust doesn’t show when you slice it. (I didn’t do that today and that is “F” worthy in Pastry School!) Scoop a small amount of the frosting onto the layer and smooth with an offset spatula. Do not make the layers of frosting too thick or the cake may be unstable. Repeat with the next three layers. Frost the outside with a crumb, or first coat, brushing away any loose crumbs on the edges of each layer. Refrigerate the cake and the frosting for 20-30 minutes. Remove the cake from the refrigerator and frost with a final coat, using whatever design/method you desire. Smooth and swirl as desired. You can decorate the top of the cake with candied orange peels, hazelnuts dipped in spun sugar or have it just plain. * the original recipe calls for 2 cups of heavy cream and this is what I did today. I think the frosting is too loose and so I adapted the quantity to 1 cup as shown above. You should work with your cream quantity and decide what feels best. It will be somewhere between 1 and 2 cups.
first coat in the fridge 
As I sit here putting the pieces of this cake together, I feel like I am with my Mom. She will never know how much I miss her and how inspiring she was to me. I will never forget her inimitable ability to give to others even when things weren’t going well for her. She was the sweetest and most wonderful Mom – one that God took to heaven way too early. I hope she knows that I am thinking of her and that every day I try to be more like her – not just in the kitchen, but in every way……….
I hope this Special Delivery arrives in Heaven in time for Sunday. Hope you like this cake Mom <3. If it weren’t for you, I’d never be doing this. ……With all my love, Marianne