Japanese Strawberry Shortcake

I've always oogled at Japanese Strawberry Shortcakes on display at confectioneries like Four Seasons, Sun Moulin, etc. Makes you just want to sink your teeth into one of those fluffy and creamy cake slices together with the red succulent strawberries.

When I chanced upon Simply Bakes' post on Japanese Strawberry Shortcake, I knew I had to try it! I followed the recipe to the 'T' and even bought a 7" round pan to bake the sponge cake!!

Loved the final outcome. My poor frosting skills doesn't give justice to this delectable cake. My cake pales grossly in comparison to those you see at the confectoneries. But do give this recipe a try. You will love it!

Japanese Strawberry Shortcake

makes a 7" round cake

For the Cake

Ingredients:

3 large eggs

100g sugar

90g cake flour

15g unsalted butter

1 tbsp milk

Method: 

1. Line your cake pan with parchment paper and butter it.

2. Preheat your oven at 160ºC.

3. In a large bowl, beat the eggs and sugar on low speed for about 30 seconds. Put the bowl over a pot of hot simmering water of 70-80ºC (double boiler) and beat the eggs at high speed for about 1-2 minutes. Put your finger into the egg mixture and make sure that all the sugar has dissolved and egg mixture has doubled in volume. Then, remove from heat and continue beating the eggs at high speed for 3 minutes until ribbon stage and almost tripled in volume.

4. Add the milk to the unsalted butter in a small bowl and put over hot water until melted and warm.

5. Sift the flour into the egg mixture and fold in lightly. About 30 times. When all the flour is mixed in, pour the preheated butter and milk mixture into the batter and continue folding until the batter is smooth and glossy.

6. Pour the batter into the lined cake pan. Drop the cake pan 2 times to remove air bubbles on the surface of the cake.

7. Place the pan into the preheated oven and bake for 23 minutes until a skewer inserted into the cake comes out clean.

8. Remove from oven and drop the cake pan a few times to prevent the cake from shrinking.

9. Let the cake cool in the cake pan inverted on a wire rack.

For the Sugar Syrup

Ingredient:

2 tbspn sugar

3 tbspn hot water

1 tbsp kirsch (cherry brandy)

Method:

1. Dissolve the sugar in hot water. Add the kirsch and mix well.

For the Frosting

enough to frost a 7" cake

Ingredient:

400ml whipping cream

3 tbspn sugar

1 tbspn powdered gelatine plus enough hot water to dissolve it (optional)

450g strawberries

Powdered sugar

Method:

1. Whip the cream with the sugar over a bowl of iced water at high speed until soft peaks formed.

2. Dissolve the powdered gelatine with the hot water and allow it to cool to room temperature. Add the dissolved gelatine into the whipped cream and fold in until evenly mixed.

Assembly

1. For the 7" cake, slice the cake into two halves. Save 8 whole strawberries for the decoration on top of the cake. Slice the rest of the strawberries thinly for the cake filling.

2. Brush the bottom cake layer with sugar syrup until moist. Spread some whipped cream. Fill with all the sliced strawberries and cover the strawberries with more whipped cream.

3. Brush the cut side of the top layer of the cake with sugar syrup.

4. Top the bottom layer cut side down and brush over with more sugar syrup. Frost the whole cake and decorate as desired and top with the whole strawberries.

Thanks for dropping by. Do link back to LY's Kitchen Ventures if you have used any information published in this blog.