Last Cake, Next Cake

This week's cake, once again, showed to us how amazing Rose is. Sponge cake with brown butter, syruped with passion fruit juice, sandwich with passion fruit curd, and frosted with white chocolate dreamy buttercream. Seriously, who thought of that stuff? The amazing Rose, that is.

But hey, Rose is not the only amazing one here. When I think about our little circle of participants this week, how international we are. We have a Canadian, an Australian, an American living in Poland, and a Venezuelan living in the US. Cool, huh? :)

Kristina, who finished all the cakes in the sponge cake section (Congratulations!), showed off her baking expertise by remaining cool even disaster happens. "When your chocolate and butter starts separating and curdling and generally looking disastrous, don’t panic. Whisk it back together, and you’ll be fine." Kristina always did an excellent job documenting her cake-making process with step-by-step photos and this time is no exception.

Lois couldn't find passion fruit in Poland, so she used canned papayas. She pureed the papaya with the syrup from the can and lemon juice. Her uneven oven produced a lopsided genoise. Not to be discouraged, Lois wrote: "Fortunately, buttercream can cover a lot!  I used the pureed papaya to make the curd filing and the syrup.  The buttercream has no fruit but is a creamy, fluffy, cream cheese frosting, sweetened only with white chocolate." She served the cake on the same day its made, which turned out to be more dry and firm. "It was much better two days later when the moisture from the curd and syrup moved into the cake. So making it at least a day in advance, as Rose recommends, is a must do too."

If you read her post last week, you would notice that Melissa have been so looking forward to this cake, which she calls "looks nice" and "pretty" twice in her German Chocolate Cake post. Melissa is also the only one lucky enough to use fresh passion fruit and who used the seeds in the curd. While the cake was labor intensive to make, Melissa is not one to complain. "I love the process of making the Genoise batter." She does however prefer a different genoise cake recipe and the Dreamy Creamy White Chocolate frosting than the frosting for this cake.

Our FEATURED BAKER this week is someone who told me 2 weeks ago she's quitting the club, but decided to join us this week because of her love of passion fruit. That person is Monica. You have to believe that her love for passion fruit runs deep. I mean, this is a person who does not like cooked fruit and fruit in a dessert in any form. And yet, this is what she wrote in her post: "this cake earned a great big “LOVE” written on top of its page. I loved the cake.  LOVED IT. It will be made again and again. As everyone knows by now, I’m no fan of cakes with fruit anything.  But, this cake is the definition of heavenly." The cake is also a big hit with everyone else in the house.

Next week we have the Coffee Chiffonlets with Dulce de Leche Whipped Cream. As I said last week, if you love coffee, condensed milk, or whipped cream, this is a cake not to be missed. The Dulce de Leche, which requires baking it in a water bath for 1 - 1 1/2 hour can be made ahead. And the rest of the cake is very easy to put together.