Around the Kitchen Table - How to Make a Strawberries & Cream Cake

Hey everyone, I'm Chef Dennis and I'm here today for Around the Kitchen Table with my co-host Susan Sarah, and we're going to have some fun today making a cake. Now the cake itself really isn't too difficult to make. We're going to make a sponge, and it's just a little tricky on how you have to put it together. The frosting is real easy, and in fact we're going to talk about some different ways to make it so you can make it even easier if you like. But we're going to get started in just a few minutes with the cake, and of course we're going to use the magic of television version for this. I've got one that I've already baked, so it won't take as long, and we'll get going in just a minute. So Susan, how you doing today?

I'm doing great. I, you know, rushing like crazy, and as I'm sure you have, so my backdrop is not my kitchen table because I was using my laptop. I had 7% battery left, and I thought, let me go to the big computer. So, uh, good. It's the day after Mother's Day, and things are back to normal. And, you know, it was a great day. How was your weekend?

It was good. It was busy. We actually had a pretty busy weekend. We went out Friday night with Greg Trulio and Carolyn Caperna and had dinner at a new restaurant in town. It was called the Coop. It was a chicken place, so that was kind of neat. And then Saturday we actually went over to Disney and sat on the beach over at the Beach Club and watched Frozen. So that was fun.

Oh, that's— let's see, I mean, I have two grandchildren. I'm not sure how many times I've seen it, but it's been a bunch. What did you think of it?

I liked it. It was good. A lot of nice songs in it. And that was the first time I've seen it. And, you know, the screen could have been a little better. It was a little breezy, so it kept changing sizes a little bit. But it was still— it was nice being out there under the stars. Almost reminded me of going to the drive-in. I think you can probably remember those days.

I can, absolutely. Yep.

Yeah, not too many of the younger crowd ever even knows what a drive-in is, but I know, I know.

I wonder if there are any, any left even, you know, who knows. So I'll tell you, um, Friday or Thursday I got a FedEx package and my son said, okay, I'm going to give you your Mother's Day gift early. So I said, okay. So he said, come into the kitchen. So there were these two gigantic packages and he said, okay, open the package. So I opened it. Guess what it was? It was a ton of barbecue, all kinds of barbecue from this authentic barbecue place in Kansas City called Jack's. Stack. I don't know if you've ever heard of it.

No, I have not, but anytime you're talking about barbecue, that sounds like a great present.

Comes from Kansas City. And so, so the next night, Saturday night, we had my daughter and her family and my other son and all the, you know, the significant others. And so my daughter said during the day, yay, Pork Fest, you know. So we had this gigantic— we had like 5 different kinds of of meat and pork and brisket and ribs and oh my God, you would have died. And then we had the beans and this creamed corn and all from there and the seasoning. It was fantastic. It was so good. And you know what? I mean, better that than an electric mixer or something, you know?

That's what I thought you were getting when you said a big box. I thought maybe you got your new KitchenAid. And I said, I'm sure you have them already, but that's That's an even better present. Anytime you don't have to cook and you can get something really neat to eat, especially in this day and age, sending stuff, shipping stuff across the country is not a big deal.

I know. And you know, just that's true. And yeah, so it came frozen in this big heavy Styrofoam thing. And he actually did that last year. He got it from that barbecue place last year. So I feel like I went to NOLA, went to New Orleans. First I was in Milan a few weeks ago. Then New Orleans, and now for this feast, like Mother's Day weekend is like the whole weekend long, and Sunday was mimosas and quiches and everything. You know, I feel like I'm trading, you know, one kind of food for another. And then today it's a wonderful cake, but you know what? Today is great because just in case you didn't like the Mother's Day desserts, you have an excuse to make another one, right?

Absolutely. And you know, there's a lot of different ways you can make it. In fact, I'm going to change it up just a little bit from what I'm going to show you when I make it, just because I'm going to have an extra cake and I want to do a different kind of application with it when I make it again. Because, you know, I'll have 2 cakes in the house and that's way too much for me at any given point.

Yeah, well, you're always mixing it up. You're always— and you know what, Chef? I mean, who needs an excuse to make a cake. Come on.

Yep, and this is a little different. It's very light. We're going to make a sponge, and people are sometimes a little hesitant to try it. It is a little difficult, but you know, it's really not that hard. It's a recipe that I've used a few times, and you know, I'm not a baker by any stretch of the imagination. I do this for fun. You know, the rest of the cooking I'm pretty serious at, but this is kind of an excuse for me to just have a good time, relax,, and of course enjoy what I make afterwards. So if I can make it, trust me, just about anybody can make it. It's just a couple little simple steps in it, and then just making a different kind of frosting. I have a Marscapone cheese frosting that I'm making, and I went in there to get the Marscapone this morning, and I didn't have any, so I'm using cream cheese. So it's easily adaptable. If you don't have the Marscapone, that's fine. You can use cream cheese. If you don't really like a cheese frosting, you could just use straight whipped cream if you wanted to.

So do you think you'll have that sort of, that a little bit of sweet salty thing going on that everyone loves?

Actually, there's no real salt in this at all.

I mean, with the cream cheese, or does it get totally sweet?

It's not very sweet. It's not, it's very mildly sweet.

Good, I like that.

Yeah, it's not like, you know, makes your teeth kind of curl sweet at all. You could of course use more sugar in, and I did not. It's, again, the strawberries were very sweet and tasty and flavorful, but there really isn't a lot of sugar in it considering how much fluid is in there. I used a whole quart of strawberries. I pureed them with the sugar, and at that point, that was not overly sweet. Then you whip up some cream, some whipped cream, and you fold that into it with the cream cheese or mascarpone if you have it. And again, it's really not that sweet. Now, the mascarpone is a little creamier.

Okay.

Okay.

So I'll give you that. Like the cream cheese, if you wanted to use a whipped cream cheese, it might be better. I did whip it up first. And you're not really going to get to see that step because it has to sit in the refrigerator for about half an hour to an hour to really make this frosting firm enough so it'll do what it needs to do.

Okay, so it's not overly sweet. No. And you have strawberries. For me, that's almost a health food.

I had made this once before, and I just used the frosting, which is almost like if you want to say it's a fall mousse. It's a very simple way to make a mousse without it really being as rich, not quite as fluffy and airy, but it's kind of almost that. You could serve it that if you wanted to, or you could freeze it and make a strawberry cream pie out of it. It's really that simple. Of a cream to make using the cream cheese as a base instead of using 10x sugar to thicken it up, which would make it way too sweet. It's a nice way to make a little bit of a difference. You really don't get a whole lot of the tang. Actually, you could probably use Greek yogurt if you wanted to because the final thickener is actually the gelatin that you put in the whipped cream. That's what really gets it holds it together and makes it thick enough to spread.

I love that idea about Greek yogurt, and then it's— that would probably lessen the sweetness down even more, do you think?

Well, I don't know if it would lessen it down, but it's definitely going to give it more of a tang.

Oh good, oh, I like that. Okay, that makes me feel healthy. So let's get started.

Okay, so we're going to get started, and I am going to show you the first step of this, and that's going to be to just— we're not really cooking the eggs as much as we're getting them to a point where they make them easier to whip. So I started warming up the water. I'm gonna grab that.

Oh, so is it a double boiler thing?

Yeah, only because we need to get the eggs to 120, which is not really hot. So I have here, I have 4 whole eggs and 2 yolks.

Okay, so you need a thermometer nearby.

Yes, you do.

Okay.

Unless you have really good sense of temperature. And then into this we're going to put in 1 cup of sugar and 2 teaspoons of vanilla.

What is that, that Madagascar vanilla? It's a—

actually, it's a vanilla. It's a Mexican vanilla, simple, single strength. I got it at a place in Winter Park called Penzey's. They're actually all over the place. There was one in Philadelphia, and I never knew it until we moved. It's a really nice vanilla, but you can get a Madagascar, you can get a Tahitian. I'm just going to whip this up, and then what I'm going to do is I'm going to just put it over the heat. I'm doing it in my mixing bowl because once it's in my mixing bowl, then I'm going to continue to whip it. So this is just going to go—

Oh, okay. So you have 3 things going on. Now, let me ask you a question. Are those— are those meant— are they a set, is what I'm asking. Are they a set, or is it just 3 separate pots?

Oh, it's just 3 separate pots.

Cool.

And actually, because I don't— this is an induction cooker, and I don't have a small pot to put right on it, so I have to put my sauté pan on because that's induction, gets hot, and this one goes inside.

Okay, so you get whatever you have.

Yeah, you know, it's not— again, it's not rocket science. Use what you got, make it work. You know, I could have just done this on the stove, but I wanted everyone to see it too. So by doing it this way, everybody can still get an idea of what I'm doing. And again, you know, I'm not really cooking it per se. I'm getting it up to 120, and it's not really that difficult to do. And I just have a little Taylor thermometer here. Oh yes, it's a digital, you know, it's like 76. So I'm just going to keep it moving.

Okay, so it just takes about 2 minutes, 2 to 3 minutes.

It shouldn't take too long to get it hot, that hot, because 120 really isn't that hot. And it was funny, when I did it earlier in the the other day, I had it spot on at 120 without even trying, and then I had to take it off for a minute and then it dropped a little, so I put it back on. But the whole thing is you don't want to let it get too hot.

Okay, what happens if it goes much over 120?

Well, I have not let it do that, so I'm not sure, but it said— it told me that the eggs would not whip correctly.

Okay, they may not scramble, but they may not whip correctly.

Correctly, yeah.

Got it.

And these eggs were out for a few hours too, so they were room temperature. Because with most cakes, what most people don't realize is that you really don't want to put cold ingredients. Like, if there's no butter in this, so it's not as big of a deal, but if there was butter in here, you know, you really have to keep everything kind of at room temperature Otherwise, that's a lot of times the cakes don't come out. My friends at King Arthur had sent me this video and showed me, and I said, oh, I see all my cakes there, the ones that didn't come out for whatever reason.

So you have to do a little bit of planning really beforehand in terms of taking the items out, because otherwise then you're maybe using the microwave to soften the butter, and then you're in trouble.

If you use the microwave, it's going to melt. And with the butter, you want to be able to just push into it and leave an indent. You don't want it so soft that it gets sloppy. It's just going to be soft enough, and that's difficult sometimes. Sometimes you're better off cutting it into quarters if you have a pound, or if you're using sticks, it's a little easier. But with the eggs, you know, you can warm them up just by putting them in a bowl of hot water for a little while.

Uh-huh.

For like 5 minutes, and that'll get your eggs pretty close. Okay, we're almost there.

So now is the— are the eggs, will they add volume to the— scientifically, will they? That's what they do, they'll add volume.

This is— yeah, we're going to whip them up and we're going to fold the flour into it, and that's the sponge, and that's really what's going to give us the consistency. Now I actually had to run out, I started mine and earlier, and I did not have cornstarch, so I had to leave it in midstream and go out and get cornstarch. So I don't think it rose quite enough. Yeah, I may have just let it sit a little too long. I picked up the strawberries and I figured I always have cornstarch in the house, and I didn't. Must have been when I moved, you know, I just never— something I didn't pick back up.

Yeah, yeah. Now I usually have cornstarch. I tend to use it as a crutch for something or other, usually a sauce. So that's right, cornstarch is my crutch.

So it's nice to thicken certain things. I use it mostly if I'm doing any Oriental dishes as the thickener, or if I'm doing berries, you know, it's a nice way to thicken, like I'm cooking down blueberries or some other berry and I want the juice to be nice and a little thicker so it makes a glaze. Cornstarch is great for that.

Yeah, I actually use it when I'm cooking strawberries. There's a traditional Danish dish where you cook strawberries in sugar and then you thicken it with coarse cornstarch, and then you cook it until it's this big mush, and it is so delicious. And then you put cream in it in a bowl, and oh, I'm telling you, it's— It's called a crazy name, but I grew up on it. So maybe one day we'll make that.

Yeah. We still have to get you down here to Florida, so.

I'm coming. I'm coming. And you know what? It's also one of those peasant dishes. We should do some of these simple peasant foods too now and then, you know, that are just simple and everyday. Everyday foods.

Okay. All right, that's it.

Okay, so you have the sugar and the eggs and the corn— you put the cornstarch in there?

No, no, the cornstarch is mixed in the flour.

Okay.

So I'm just gonna get this out of the way. Now that the cornstarch, uh, there's not a whole lot of flour in it. And the cornstarch is part, so. So we have this.

Okay, that is easy enough. I mean, you stir it, you watch the temperature, and—

And I'm going to kill my mic so you don't hear it. So you can, if you want to offer some tips while we're doing this, and I'm just going to—

Okay, absolutely.

—beat it up until it really thickens up.

Okay, so we're going to also talk about ovens.. And we have a special guest today that I didn't even mention on the thread. So our special guest is Julie McCrory, and Julie McCrory is a spokesperson for Miele. If you know Miele, the German appliance company, and of course they do wonderful appliances, high-end appliances which are focused around cooking in a very, very intensive and deep way. They make wonderful ovens. They make steam ovens. They make combination convection steam ovens. So Julie will be joining us, oh, in about 20 minutes, I guess, and she'll tell us some of the features. And some of them are— some of the features are so, you know, easy, and it'll have many, many menu items that you just sort of key into the oven, and you can say, okay, I want to make this kind of roast or this kind of cake or casserole, and it will compute. It will give you the recipe and it will compute the time for you so you know exactly what to do. And of course, the design is beautiful. The design of Miele ovens, just gorgeous. We have a Pinterest page on Around the Kitchen Table which I will be uploading some of my images of the Miele ovens that I have taken in most recently that I've seen in Milan at the big Miele display in Milan. And they also have a new color called Truffle, which is a sort of warm— I wouldn't call it a warm gray, it's sort of a grayish brown, which is very, very popular now. Maybe you've seen it in home furnishings, and it's a glass-fronted oven. Which is just, you know, just really beautiful and, you know, kind of sleek. And so, you know, I'm looking forward to talking to Julie. And the installation of these ovens too are just beautiful. They're seamless, they're tight, and, you know, they're just lovely. And on the Pinterest page, I will be uploading ovens that show different styles, show different features, different styles. There's some brands that are all about color. One brand has about 700 different colors. Can you imagine that? And we'll even do custom colors. So that's dangerous for people who, you know, like trendy colors. I'm not so sure how that will go. You have to, you know, hold back a little bit. But, you know, if you love orange and you've always loved orange, orange, then maybe you want an orange oven. Maybe you want to design your kitchen around an orange oven. So that would, you know, that's something to see too. You back with us, Chef? No.

Some of those new oven colors are beautiful. They really are. I've seen those in the European ones more than anything else. Yep.

Yeah, well, there's a couple of American brands, actually two American brands that have a million, almost a million colors. So you're right, it's cool.

Okay, so what I have here now is, I think you can see, let me go to this camera again, is you can see the, the eggs and they're kind of thick. And what you want to do is be able to see, like if you do a line in it, that it doesn't go away completely. Okay. All right. So it forms its base and then it starts to go. So what we're going to do with this then— I'm trying to—

Yeah, but move it the other way, the opposite way. I know. Keep going. Keep going. Okay. There we go. There we go. Great.

Okay, good. So what I'm going to do now is I've got a mixture of flour and cornstarch. And what I didn't mention with the eggs was there just was a pinch of salt. Okay. So what I'm going to do now is I'm using a little bit of a sifter, hand sifter here, and I'm just going to shake this flour and cornstarch mixture, and I stirred it up a little first, so I'm just going to sift this into it, and I'm going to do it about a third at a time.

So is that sort of a— it almost looks like a strainer. It's not the traditional kind of sifter?

No, it's just a little strainer. It's just a little wire mesh strainer.

Okay, that's easy because I don't know how many of us, Chef, have our flour sifter, you know, at the ready.

I have one. You know, this works just as well. And then so now I have the flour, so what I want to do is just start folding it in. And it may look like it folds right in right away, and it really doesn't. And you have to check the bottom because what happens is the flour tends to go towards the bottom magically by itself. Okay. And you want to just keep working it in as gently as possible. You do have to move it to get the flour mixed in, but these eggs are what's going to give the cake the spongy consistency, you know, make a nice sponge cake.

You know, I've seen a lot of recipes where things are folded, ingredients are folded into other ingredients, and I may be mistaken, but now I lost my train of thought. Oh yeah, can you fold too much?

Yeah, because then you're going to break it. The idea with folding is to do it just enough to get the items incorporated, because otherwise you're losing all that work that we did to put air in there.

Okay, so you want to keep, keep it fluffy, sort of.

Yeah, okay, that's what's gonna build, that's what's really gonna build a cake.

Mm-hmm, okay, so you need that, need that spongy fluffing factor.

And if you put it all in at once, you know, it would just be a mess. You wouldn't get it in there really well. And it's amazing how quickly it does find the bottom and when you start folding it, so you really have to keep turning it. Uh-huh. And like I said, this is probably— this is the hardest part of the recipe. Now other than this, it really is not difficult.

So if you sift it effectively, you shouldn't get clumps with it, right?

Oh, you're gonna get them as you mix. You know, it's, it's gonna make it a little bit easier on you, but you're still gonna, still gonna clump a little because I've got— I don't have a real big surface here, so flour still laying on top of itself. Okay. And it's gonna— as soon as it gets moisture, you know, it's gonna start to clump a little bit.

Well, that's actually a good question. The shape of the bowl, is that the optimal shape of the bowl more narrow or—

No, I could use a bigger, a wider mouth bowl. It's just that I'm transferring this into another bowl. Now, this is the one that I heated the eggs in, whipped the eggs in. So for me, it's just a matter of, you know, if you're really afraid that you want and you want a bigger space, then by all means, transfer them. You can see how that flour is still showing up.

Yeah, yeah.

And it's all in, and then you go to the bottom and you see all kinds of flour in the bottom. I think we got it now.

Okay. And stainless versus porcelain bowl versus a plastic bowl? Well, I wouldn't use plastic.

Yeah, if you, if you like porcelain and that's what you want to use. I just use stainless. I mean, I'm from kitchens from from professional kitchens. Sure. That's pretty much all we'd ever use. Yeah. So, you know, old habits die hard, and I like stainless. It cleans easy. It sure does. Very forgiving. I burn the hell out of some pans, and you know how to clean up.

Yeah, I'm a, I'm a soaker. I will soak, you know, whatever I have to soak, and then I Worry about it later.

So, all right, so that's the, you know, in thirds. So now we're just going to finish this up.

Now, uh, okay, so you're, you're kind of digging in deep and then going up and around, it seems. Yeah. Okay.

And then I'm going down to the bottom just to make sure that it's not settling. There's a nice And you just have to really kind of look around. You know, I could go in there with a whisk and whip it up, but then I think I would start to deflate it a little bit. Okay. You just want to try and be gentle.

I think if you move it to your right just a bit, it'll— we'll see it a little bit more. To your right. No. Oh, okay. Maybe then the other— the other way, I guess. Yeah. No. Oh, there we go. Perfect. Where's Waldo? I know. I was thinking right, left. That's perfect.

What I need to do is put an X on the counter with some tape.

Yeah, just like they do, you know, in the theater. Yeah. And that's where your bowls— tell your bowls, go over here, stand here and don't say anything.

There's more flour getting on the bottom again. So it's almost ready. Okay. I have just about all of it.

Yeah, it looks delicious. It just looks— it's just a very, very— it's great.

It's so soft. Okay, so now what I'm going to do, so I have my pans and I'm actually going to do 3. Now in the recipe I made, I did 2 and I'm going to split them. What I'm going to show you how to do is if you have the extra pan You don't necessarily need to do that.

Also, there's enough for 3. Wow.

Well, they're going to be thin layers.

Yeah, I like that. That's nice.

You know, because the star of this show is this luscious strawberry cream. Uh-huh. Okay. The cake is a vehicle, and if we were in a restaurant, you know, a lot of it is about, you know, eye appeal. And fresh fruit. Uh-huh. Okay, so people think if they're getting more fresh fruit, you know, if they're getting not too sweet cream, you know, the cake is always the evil part. So if you're giving them less cake and in a sponge, now sometimes it's a little easier to take. So what I did was I have cake papers down Cake papers.

I don't think I've ever heard of cake paper.

Well, you know, they're little cut rounds and they fit right in the pan. Uh-huh. So that way they come out, they're really nice. Now the trick with these, with some cakes, like a lot of times cakes crown. And when I put the paper down, I buttered it first so it stuck a little bit and it's easier to come out. But with these, what you want to do It's just gonna kind of roll it a little bit.

Hmm. Okay. So all the surface is covered.

Well, all the surface is covered, and I'm trying to get it closer to about where it's going to rise to. Oh, I see. Okay. I'm going up a little higher on the pan. Uh-huh.

I see. Oh, okay.

By going up a little higher on the pan, it's supposed to stop it from crowning.

You mean that by crowning, do you mean the middle section of the cake?

Yeah, where the middle section comes up so high. That's right. Okay, so this is supposed to be the deterrent for crowning.

Now that's a great tip. Never, never knew that. Good pro tip.

Another one had said, told me to take my finger and go around it, and that never seemed to work, but this actually worked on the first set, so— Oh good, yep. So, and these, like I said, these aren't going to be really thick layers, but I'm going to do— you know, since I have a strawberry one for today, uh, we have some amazing fresh peaches in Florida. Oh, and I never even knew Florida grew peaches. They're about the size of a plum. But they're really, really good. So if I can get a hold of enough peaches, I thought I would try another one with a peach filling instead.

Oh yeah, that sounds great. Who knew? I thought Georgia had peaches.

Yeah, well, New Jersey has great peaches, and I missed them. I'm gonna miss them because they're huge and they're so sweet and juicy.

Yeah, I think we have them in Long Island. I think we have them for 2 weeks and that's it.

Yeah, you know, Florida's might be just about done too, unfortunately, because they've been out about 2 weeks. Uh-huh. But I'm gonna try and see if I can find some more and do something with them.

Oh yeah, I mean, you can even do like a strawberry rhubarb. What about something like that? You do anything you like.

I mean, this is a really easy cake.

Raspberries and peaches. Yep. Nice.

Any berries, any really nice berry or any kind of anything along those lines or stone fruit would be wonderful.

Uh-huh. And I love the thin layers. It's just, it's sort of elegant. It's actually very elegant. And it makes you think you're not eating as much cake because it's so thin.

Well, there's going to be a lot of cream, so at first it's going to look good.. And then it's after, you know, besides looking really good, it's going to have a really good flavor to it. It's not going to be overly sweet or anything. So I'm going to get these in the oven and then we're going to start assembling.

Okay, and here we have with— I'm sorry. Here we have with us Julie McCrary. Hello. Hi, and spokesperson for Miele, and you're going to tell us all about the ovens, and we're still in the process of making the cakes. And it looks delicious. Yeah, just beautiful technique. And so, Chef, what are we doing next?

Well, now we're going to start assembly.

Okay.

We start doing the assembly, so— clean up a little as I go.

Now, for the assembly, did you have 3 layers? 3 layers this time too? You just did 3 layers earlier? No, actually I just did 2.

Okay. I'm going to make it a little different, so I'm going to show you how I did that.

Okay. I'm patiently waiting for the strawberries. But for this one—

And Chef, you've also developed technologies to weaken taste, correct?

I wish. So I've got a serrated knife and I'm going to split this layer. Okay. You'll notice I don't go all the way through. I'm cutting about halfway through and I'm turning it as I go.

That's precision, precision.

I'll let you try and then I'm going to— then I'll finish up because if you try to just cut right through, I don't know about you, but with me, it would be all uneven and just really a mess.

Yeah. Well, look at that. That's perfect. There's not even a little bunch in the center.

All right, so that's one layer. And like I said, these are going to be very thin. This did not rise quite as much as I would like it to. But you know, I'm showing you what reality is, and that you can still have a wonderful cake.

You sure can.

That looks great. Jeff, I'm curious, and you were talking about it rising, and I'm curious to kind of get from a baker's perspective as well, just your thoughts on convection baking and kind of the differences that you see in your profession.

Well, in professional kitchens, I've always used convection. At home, I had convection before I moved here, and I always liked convection for even heating, it seemed to really do a nice job spreading the heat. So you didn't have those spots that didn't rise right. You know, it was— it seemed a little bit better for baking for cakes. No, nobody with cookies. It seemed like it rushed them a little too much though.

Okay, interesting, interesting. I'm very curious to hear that. And it's funny too how you said from a professional baker's and from a professional kitchen's perspective how Now the consumer can— has that opportunity to be able to bring those professional-grade appliances into their kitchens. You know, obviously, you know, we have our line of convection ovens, but just in general, how appliances have just elevated over the course of the last 20 to 30 years.

Oh, it's amazing the things that have happened, you know, to make cooking a lot easier. Before I do move on to assembly, though, I want to talk about this frosting a little bit. And what you'll see in here, if you can see, it is a little— it's got all the nice seeds from the strawberries in it.

Yeah, move it up just a little. Yep, good. Oh, nice. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Beautiful.

Almost looks like ice cream. Now, this is where I need gelatin. I almost never use gelatin just because because of other things. It just bothers me sometimes. But with strawberry, you have to because there's so much liquid coming out of the fruit. But I pureed the strawberries with some sugar, and then when I whipped my cream, I sprinkled a packet of gelatin. And it's just as simple as Knox plain gelatin. Now, do you prefer the powdered over the sheets?

That's what kind of—

you see, sheets are very nice if the liquid is more liquidy, I think. I didn't have any sheets, so you use what you have. When I was in the restaurant, I had sheets, so they were easy to use. But when I'm home, you know, I have stuff that I have, and I think most normal bakers would have. I was just saying, readily available too.

Yeah, that's the problem.

So you get what you can get, you know, and it's like anything else. So I used that, you know, you can still— it still works well. So what happened was, is I whipped the cream with the gelatin in it. I got it nice and thick, and then I folded the pureed strawberries with— that were then mixed with— I used cream cheese today since I didn't have mascarpone, so I whipped those together, and I used a whip for that to really get them nice and creamy. Mix the two together. So either use mascarpone with the strawberries or cream cheese with the strawberries, or if you just want to make whipped cream and place strawberries on, you can too. You know, it's very simple. And the instructions are all in the recipe. So now that this is ready, I've let it chill for a while so the gelatin will set up. At this point, I'm going to start putting some on the cake.

Now, so tell me about the strawberries. Are they— I would imagine that they're local in Florida?

Oh, absolutely. Big time. Plant City. We have so many strawberries.

Interesting. And I wouldn't have thought strawberries. I mean, maybe that's being naive, but I've been thinking citrus, obviously.

But oh no, big time strawberries and really good strawberries.

When did it— is it— I mean, it's a silly question, but is it seasonal? Because it's warm there all year round.

I tell you, we've been seeing fresh strawberries now for a couple months. I mean, and I don't think they're done. So I think our season on strawberries goes a long way. All right, so what I'm going to do is I'm going to add just a little bit more to this to make this cake a little even more fun. Now I'm going to load some strawberries in between the layers.

Okay, so then it's a little bit more healthy. So yeah, absolutely.

I'm eating my fruits and vegetables. That's what we can say. That's right.

And your protein with the eggs. You missed it. There were 4 eggs whipped in. So we have protein, we have fruits.

We're good. Mm-hmm. And I'm not making them all go the same way. I mean, if you want to, feel free.

This would have been perfect for yesterday for Mother's Day. Life's beautiful.

See, Julie, if you didn't like yesterday's desserts that you were served, then this is an excuse to make them bake again. Make it today. Make it today. Yeah, we decided earlier you don't need much of an excuse to make a cake. Agreed. Agreed. And you are, you are, you're a baker.

I do. I love to bake. I mean, I love to be in the kitchen, but I love to make things to give to other people. It's funny, I think we joke a lot of times how sometimes there are foodies who— I hate to cook for myself, but if I know that someone else is going to be eating it, it makes it so much better.

Oh, absolutely. Yeah. Absolutely. I rarely cook for myself.

I'm more likely to make peanut butter and jelly sandwich than make myself a dinner.

That's the same thing I eat. I eat peanut butter and jelly or cheese sandwiches. I'm eating alone.

That's funny. Yeah, okay, so now that's, that's the top, and then is the top layer going on top of that, I guess? Yes, it is. Okay. Alright, so that's easy. Kids can help with this assembly.

And you know, if you don't want to split the cake, don't split it. If you don't want to have so many layers, don't do it. Uh-huh. Whatever works for you. Okay. Now if you want it to be 2 layers and just do plain whipped cream and strawberries, that's fine. Yeah, that's— You know, it's all up to you to control what you want to make. Mm-hmm. And it's gotta be fun. So that's why I'm saying, you know, make it what you want to make it. Use what you want. If you want to put a layer of blueberries in it, you know, put a layer of blueberries in it.

Now, Chef, did you have a convection oven in your home kitchen in Philadelphia? Yeah, I did there. Oh, you did? Okay. So how is it getting back to— since you moved? Traditional?

Well, this one—

what did you notice?

Well, I'm still working with times. Like, I have not calibrated this oven to see what it actually is. Okay. Very few ovens, home ovens, are actually calibrated, correct? So it's, you know, you just have to see what you're working with and then you know where you're at. So this one, this took a little bit shorter time And I have not done very much baking since I've been down here, so I don't have a real good handle on how this oven reacts. Mm-hmm.

Well, that's another— that's an interesting point. Now, Julie, you know, he's— Chef is in a warm, very warm area, Florida, and, you know, most people are— they don't want to use their ovens, they're afraid, but but not because they don't want to, but because of heat output. You know, tell me about that in terms of, you know, what you know about the Miele ovens and heat output, and is it really well insulated?

They are really well insulated, and I think what's an interesting note to talk about, especially in places, you know, warmer climates, that people wouldn't think of using are the steam ovens, and to be able to use the steam ovens that Miele makes as opposed to cooking things on your cooktop. So say you're making pasta or you're heating up something on your cooktop, you know, vegetables and steaming, as opposed to kind of standing over a cooktop and waiting for the water to boil and you kind of getting that facial that way, put everything into your oven, you know, make your pasta in the oven, walk away, and you don't have any of that residual heat coming into your kitchen. I think it's something that people would never think about.

No, that's a great point. That's a wonderful point. But in terms of the ovens, when something's in the oven, does it give out residual heat? It does not.

I mean, it is in the oven and you will not feel it unless you open up the door and obviously you're going to feel the heat. Right, of course. But that's it. But that's it. I mean, even the fronts of the ovens are a little bit cooler to the touch. They're not completely cool. Obviously you'll know that they're on, but very well insulated.

I think that's a great, you know, great aspect, that's for sure. So, all right, finished, huh?

It's pretty much it. Now it does have to sit in the refrigerator for a little bit, so I can't cut it quite yet because it's got to set up. Whenever you do this many layers and you have this much frosting on it, It's a little precarious. Looks great.

It looks delicious. Wow, that's a tall cake too. What is that, about 5 inches?

Probably at least. That looks—

wow, that looks great. Now, would you put strawberries on top? Yes, I will. You will? Okay. All right, that's great. So let's take a moment and— so, Julie, tell me You know, so many new things are coming out with Miele, and tell me how Miele ovens, particularly this is, we're talking ovens, how is Miele differentiated in terms of performance, let's say, compared to others?

Sure, I mean, they've always been an innovator, and you know, I think obviously working with Chef Dennis here, I mean, things that people are always trying to replicate what they see in professional kitchens And that's one of the things that Miele has always prided themselves on, is really being able to help make you a better chef. You know, sometimes whether with our ovens, we have what's been called Miele's MasterChef technology, which has been in their ovens for years, which again is an ingredient menu, driven menu that's built into the appliances that helps walk you through the process. So you might come home from work and, and be baking a roast chicken or a beautiful beef tenderloin, and you may not necessarily know how long it needs to cook, well the oven will tell you how to do it. It'll walk you through the process so that you get those perfect results. But I think what chefs will find really interesting, and a lot of professional bakers especially, have been two things that Miele has come out with. One was most recently, Susan, you saw this last fall when we were in Seattle was their new combi steam ovens, which is incorporating a steam oven and a convection oven. And what it does is it almost makes the ultimate proofing box. So people who are baking breads and baking different types of baguettes and rolls and brioche can have that beautiful moist environment because I think there's a misconception about how steam can be best utilized with cooking. It's not just for making— Yes, I—

yeah, and I'd like to talk about that in a moment, but look at this finished product. It looks delicious, Chef. This, this is just delectable. Wow. 1, 2, 3, 4 layers. 4 layers of— and look, they're so thin, it makes you feel like you're not even eating cake. And you have the cheese, the cream cheese, so you don't feel like you're eating a ton of sugar.

So I think that icing looks so light. It does. It looks really light.

I was surprised. It does look light.

There was a cheese in there, like a cream cheese base, because it looks very light and airy. That looks wonderful.

And is the cream, is that sort of a tinted pink? Well, that is a tinted pink because of the strawberries. Chef, do you hear me? Uh-oh. Yes, I do. I hear you. Okay. All right. I just had myself muted. Yep. So this looks wonderful.

No, that's beautiful.

That just looks wonderful. So yeah, can you turn it around for us a little bit? Mm-hmm. So it could— you can have the, you know, the dripping cream, or it can be You know, all together or however you want. It looks terrific. It really looks great.

Yep, beautiful. Strawberry for the top.

Yeah, I see that. And you cut that beautifully.

So that just is going to sit right on the top. Uh-huh. It's for decoration. You could serve this with more strawberries. You know, if they start to look like they're oozing out, just push them back a little till everything sets up. Now, but they're holding pretty good. And you know, I kind of like how, you know, it may not look perfect, but the cream's just coming down and dripping a little bit, kind of adds to the rustic beauty.

It absolutely does. Absolutely. It looks like a casual come on, sit down, get a cup of coffee, kind of cake, and it looks light and airy and just beautiful.

Yeah, that reminds me of my grandmother, like something, you know, a wonderful, that heartwarming homemade dessert that your grandmother would bring out on a Sunday picnic or dinner at her house. So looks delicious.

Yeah, so Julie, I want to get back with you again. So tell me, you know, we began to talk about steam convection Chef, have you used steam in conjunction with convection? That's a new technology for Miele.

No, I have not. I use steamers quite a lot, but I've never had steam convection. I have seen it coming out, but I've never had it in any of the kitchens I've worked in or at home.

Okay, so Julie, tell me, do I have to wonder how much steam to put in and for what types of foods, or, you know, get anxiety about that? No anxiety at all.

No, it's actually, it's, you know, and a lot of people, the first question people ask is if obviously if there's steam that's being used in an oven, well, then it has to be plumbed or hooked up to a water source, and it doesn't. And, you know, you're using water out of your tap to create steam to create a moist environment. And as I was saying earlier, I think there's this misconception misconception of why you would even use steam, but you can use steam for baking. I mean, you could use steam just in a regular steam oven making, you know, quick breads, making like molten lava cakes, anything where you really want that moist, dense consistency, you know, bread pudding is perfect. You know, applications where you would need to use typically in a regular oven like a bain-marie where you would put a water bath, you know, you don't need to do that. And then with the new convection, with what we call the combi steam ovens, you know, you have an application where the oven will actually almost set it and forget it. So if you wanted to make a brioche or a sourdough bread, it would literally walk you through the steps of letting you know how much steam, how much moisture you needed to help the dough to rise as it was proofing. And then as soon as it had proofed, what the oven will automatically do on its own, readjust itself where it would lower the humidity level and then raise the temperature so you get that moisture inside to create the— a really beautiful, light, flaky interior. And then when the heat comes on, then you're getting that crisp, delicious crust, you know, that you find in bakeries. And it's almost like having your own proofing box.

So it does— it does the thinking for you.

Correct, it does. It'll walk you through, and in some of our ovens we actually have programs that are built in. The new, the Generation 6000 series that Miele just recently launched this past spring actually has now a convection oven that has 14 bread programs completely built into the oven system. Wow. So you can just literally, you put your dough in and then it'll adjust itself automatically throughout the baking process, adjusting humidity and temperatures to give you that perfect result. So it's amazing how innovation and technology has come, you know, all these years.

It is just amazing, it really is. And you're coming up with new colors and— We are, yeah. You know what I like about Miele and I want to get to the comments in just a moment because we have quite— we have comments on the comment stream. But I like that Miele has a sort of classic design. It doesn't change much, but a color may change every few years or the technology. So I like to call it in terms of design a sort of a classic modern design. Correct. It's something about clean lines.

You're never going to see something that's completely different from Miele. It definitely stays within a certain design aspect, but the recent introduction of colors, which last year Miele introduced the Brilliant White, which has been a huge success here in the United States, which is actually a white glass, was hugely successful. And then this, just most recently now, we're launching our Truffle Brown, which is going to going over gangbusters. People are— again, it's a brown glass, so it's different than what I think most people like, which we think looks beautiful with kind of grayish cabinetry.

Yes, I'm going to upload some images to the Around the Table Pinterest page, and I also recently saw it in Milan, and the handles of the ovens, there are so many different different finished handles. There are. They just look so sophisticated. There are. So Julie, we have a couple of more things to do here, so I want to thank you and hang in there with us and we're almost done with the show, but I want to thank you so much for your insight and, you know, when it comes to the—

Does Miele make an induction top stove?

We have a cooktop. We do make induction cooktops. They have not come out yet with a range yet. But they do have induction cooktops, yes.

Okay. Yeah, so, you know, lots of good things coming from Miele. And like I said, go to our Pinterest page and I'll be uploading hopefully this afternoon some beautiful pictures right off the show floor, brand new, beautiful to look at. So we have a few, couple of comments, Chef. And first we have a comment from Coach G. Moore, and he's asking me, is that barbecue from Overland Park? Julie, the barbecue was what I got from my son, two tremendous boxes of barbecue from Kansas City.

Well, can I tell you, I know exactly where Overland Park is. I have been there, and my brother lives in Kansas City, so I am a Kansas City barbecue fan.

Oh my goodness, do you know where came from. Do you know Jack Stack? I do not.

I've been to— I'm trying to think now where we have eaten most recently. I have to ask my brother though because he lives down in the Plaza in Kansas City. So, okay, well, that was in Overland Park, so I'll have to ask him.

Yeah, that was my Mother's Day present from my son, from Jack Stack Barbecue, flown in from FedEx. So, so thank you for that, Coach. And now, of course, from our Good friend Nazim Beltran, always adding an Italian touch, mascarpone in the cream. So that's something, Chef, that's part of the recipe. Yep.

And like I said, if you don't want to use that or can't get it, you can always use cream cheese, either one, or like we talked about earlier, even some Greek yogurt might work for you. Mm-hmm.

And from Kristen Drysdale, I just checked in and I'm exhausted. Are we cooking or exercising? And Julie, you missed Chef. He was whipping this and whipping that and stirring this and folding that. How about it, Chef? You got a workout?

Yeah, well, not quite. I still got to go do a little bit more later.

Did you manually whisk your egg whites, or were you—

Well, I whisked the eggs for a while, and then all the folding was really quite— gets quite tedious. So that can take a little bit of strength, and you get up— you have to watch you don't start mixing it too fast just to get get it over with. So, but you know, I have, you should have been on the tiramisu one, that was all done by hand for about 10 hours.

One of my favorites. Yeah, that was the, and the comment from Sarah Altair, convection baking, lower heat and possibly shorten time. It is even and makes baking fantastic. And I've always had a convection oven, I fully agree. I've never cooked with anything other than convection.

You know, you're lucky, Susan, I will say you are very lucky to say that. I don't think many people can, but Sarah is correct. I mean, that's where you're getting that consistent heat all the way around. 4 trays of cookies all in the oven at one time. You don't have to move trays around.

That's right, rotate. And electric convection is really better than gas convection, I think, too. So that's when having an electric stove isn't a bad thing. No, unless you've got dual fuel.

Yep. And we have another one from Sarah Altair. Now, Chef, what do you think about this? You can also use—

what do you think? You can use dental floss to cut thin layers. That's absolutely true. Wow. But I'm not coordinated enough to do it. So I use my hand on it, because then you got to use two hands to cut it with, and, and it would be just as bad as me cutting straight through. So true.

I've also seen skewers before? Have you ever used skewers to kind of put in kind of skewers to use as a guide? Because I'm not— I don't have a steady hand as you do.

Yeah, well, that's why I only go halfway around at a time because I can pretty much see what half is if I'm turning it and turning it. But if I'm going straight through, it'll, it'll end up looking like the Leaning Tower of Pisa.

Oh yeah, me too. Me too. So Chef, I think we're at the end end of our show today. Mm-hmm. And what a great show it was and delectable, and I've given you many excuses to make this dish, so.

Well, I'm glad we got to finally make the cake today, and I thank everybody for coming. And Julie, thank you so much for being in here today.

Well, thank you for having me. It was my pleasure, and I mean, your recipes look amazing, so I'm anxious to try them out in one of our Miele kitchens. Sounds good.

Okay, bye-bye everybody, we'll see you next season.

Bye-bye.