The Chestnut Cake recipe is from the French Kitchen book and it appealed to me because it asks for minimal flour and absolutely NO baking soda or yeast or whatever the hell you bake cakes using them. I. Do. Not. Bake.
Reason? I can't stand to get flour on my hands (or beach sand on my body) and I don't understand the precise amounts called for - I do NOT run the flat side of a knife over a teaspoon of an ingredient. That is for people who care how it turns out and I am not one of them. We are surrounded by places to buy cakes.
CHESTNUT CAKE
2 17-oz. cans chestnut cream - Whole Foods, the author says, has them.*
4 large eggs separated
1 T honey
2 T melted sweet butter
1 teas. pure vanilla extract
Zest from 1/2 lemon
1/2 cup ll-purpose flour
Pinch of sea salt
Oven: 350
Butter a 9-in. pan, line with parchment paper.
Whisk together the chestnut paste, egg yolks then whisk in the honey, butter, vanilla and zest - combine well
Sift in the flour and salt
Whisk the egg whites and add 1/3 of it into the cake batter and then fold in the rest. Bake until the top is cracked, about 40 minutes.
* But I read in this morning's paper that Whole Foods is closing shop. This means that potential chestnut cake bakers need to strike now!
Shopping there will be a new experience for me. I once took an elderly friend shopping there and a can of tuna was $7.00. Haven't been back since. If it turns out this chestnut paste is $10 a jar, I would substitute with an equal amount of marzipan...
See why I don't bake? I'm a living warning against oven use.
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