Krystina Castella - Crazy About Cakes: More than 150 Delectable Recipes for Every Occasion

crazy about

cakes

More than 150 Delectable Recipes for Every Occasion

Krystina Castella

STERLING and the distinctive Sterling logo are registered trademarks of Sterling Publishing Co., Inc.

2011 by Krystina Castella
Illustrations by Krystina Castella
Photography by Teri Lyn Fisher
Designed by Rachel Maloney

All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise, without prior written permission from the publisher.

ISBN 978-1-4027-6914-6 (paperback)
ISBN 1-4027-8929-8 (ebook)

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

Castella, Krystina.

Crazy about cakes : more than 150 delectable recipes for every occasion / Krystina Castella.

p. cm.

Includes bibliographical references and index.

ISBN 978-1-4027-6914-6 (pb-trade pbk. : alk. paper) 1. Cake. I. Title.

TX771.C337 2011

641.8653--dc22

2010040169

For information about custom editions, special sales, and premium and corporate purchases, please contact Sterling Special Sales at 800-805-5489 or specialsales@sterlingpublishing.com.

2 4 6 8 10 9 7 5 3 1
www.sterlingpublishing.com

For Eve Boyl Ofstad and James K. Neill

Acknowledgments

Thank you to everyone whose help has crafted this book:
Jennifer Williams, editor
Teri Lyn Fisher, photographer
Sienna DeGovia, food stylist
Larena Faretta, pastry chef
Michela Swarthout, digital tech
Barbara Clark, project editor
Rachel Maloney, design director
Elizabeth Mihaltse, jacket art director
Jason Chow, jacket designer

As a teenager, I loved crafts. I made greeting cards by hand, tended to the strawberries in my garden, crocheted granny squares for blankets, performed major renovations to my collectible dollhouseand, of course, I baked! For me, playing was synonymous with making, and the kitchen was the best place for fun. After I came home from school, baking was my favorite way to relax and explore. I made cupcakes, cakes, and cookies for my swim team, for bake sales, and to share at slumber parties. I would study new recipes and techniques, using my imagination to determine the best treat for upcoming birthdays, special occasions, and holidays, and I would prepare them with my own creative twist.

The first over-the-top cake I made was for my Sweet Sixteen birthday party. Most of my friends spent the hours before their parties primping to make themselves gorgeous, but I spent the day in a much more enjoyable wayby beautifying my cake. I shaped a huge golden cake that could feed more than one hundred people into the number 16. The numerals were outlined with row after row of stars piped onto the cake in a rainbow of colored frosting. Not only did the frosting match the party decorations, but it also served as an introduction to a new level of cake making. I realized that cakes are the bakers ultimate platformat the same time as they allow us to create look at me desserts, they visually excite and then comfort us in a fleeting moment of tasty bliss.

After college, I turned my love of crafting and playing into a career and became an industrial designer. Today, I design products by first playfully exploring their materials and then translating those explorations into models and sketches. Ive created dozens of new products this way, including furniture, toys, clothing, stationery, housewares, and soft goods.

I approach baking in exactly the same way. I develop new recipes by playing with a pantry full of ingredients, cabinets filled with baking pans, and a tool kit of decorating supplies. I particularly love the creative opportunities that sweets providethis is one realm where it is completely acceptable to push the limits. Sometimes I want to create something healthful, sometimes I want to create something cute; at other times I want something fancy and indulgent. Taste, texture, form, and color all come together in the process of baking and decorating.

Another reason I love cakes is because of their ties to tradition and culture. Cakes are the baked treat that we are most likely to eat every day or for dessert. If there is a special occasion, holiday, or party anywhere in the world, you can bet there will be a cake made with love at the center of the celebration.

The influences for the cakes in these recipes come from far and wide, but mostly I was inspired by one of three major themes: retro-modern, ethnic fusion, and flavor fusion. In other words, I wanted to blend the past with the present, cultural influences from all flour corners of the globe, and flavors to satisfy all our sensesall with a sense of fun.

RETRO-MODERN

Whether you want authentic made-from-scratch recipes for the old-fashioned cakes we all know and love or modernized interpretations that contain less flat and more natural ingredients, youll find them in this book. For example, I have added new spices to age-old cakes such as .

ETHNIC FUSION

In these types of cakes, flavors from one cuisine are blended with a twist from another. For example, New Yorkstyle cheesecake takes a trip to Florida and discovers not only Key limes but also the Nuevo Latino influences of guava, pecans, and coconut. Global ingredients such as plantains, chayote, yucca, and beets inspired me to rethink vegetable cakes. My Italian heritage inspired the .

FLAVOR FUSION

As I developed the recipes in this book, my friends and family couldnt believe that I was actually experimenting with such unconventional cake-baking ingredients as corn and Cheddar (for the . Many recipes use alcohol as a flavoring, partly because I love boozing cake up but also because alcohol offers an array of outside-the-box flavorings that are perfect to enjoy at cocktail or dessert parties.

THE HOME BAKERS ADVANTAGE

One of the biggest benefits of baking at home is the fact that you have the ability to control the quality of your ingredients. In my recipes, I use only natural sweeteners, and I often substitute fruits or other sweet ingredients for a portion of the granulated sugar. I love to use superfoods like berries, pineapple, dates, and nuts and seeds, which are high in antioxidants. All-natural butter and all-purpose flour are the basis for most of my cakes, but youll find plenty of recipes that use unsaturated fats and whole grains as well. Seasonal flavors such as summer or fall fruits dont have to be limited editionmany recipes can be adapted to use ingredients that are available throughout the year. And finally, when using chocolate, remember that it is not about how much you use. I recommend the highest quality you can find.

Home bakers can also control the size of their creationsafter all, good things come in small packages. The craze for cupcakes has taught us to enjoy the little things in lifeno more supersizing! With a focus on quality, you can have it all in a few bites of bliss. Miniature or portion-size indulgences come in every form, from .

CAKE CRAFTING

I love the fact that, in many homes, the kitchen is the new living room, and instead of hanging out in front of the TV, people are cooking and baking. Men and women are finding happiness in the domestic arts, and a fantastic way to show off those skills is through handcrafted cakes. But the cakes we enjoy today are not the complicated creations of the past that take days to make, resplendent with spun sugar and superdetailed decorations. Artisans of all skill levels can now show off their chops with a perfectly risen sponge cake or with accessories like chocolate cups for . Crafting also extends to presentation, and this book provides ideas for serving and plating cakes in recipes and in photographs.