I find nostalgia is amplified by living on the other side of the world.
For some this makes them feel like the grass maybe wasn’t greener and draws
them home, for my friends and I this nostalgia effect is evidenced by our desire
for food from home. I think I have consumed more Tim Tams and Cherry Ripe's
since moving to London then I ever did at home. My obsession with chicken salt
has also increased tenfold.
Nostalgia was certainly in play when the Compatriot chose her theme for
her recent birthday cake: hedgehog slice.
For the uninitiated this is an iconic Australian childhood treat made
with chocolate (or cocoa), broken biscuits and coconut. Nuts sometimes make a
guest appearance but are entirely optional. Hedgehog slice is sold in bakeries
and found in lunch boxes across the country and is as common to an Australian
as a chocolate digestive or custard cream to a Brit.
While hedgehog slice is delicious, it didn’t quite meet my lofty
aspirations in terms of appearance for a birthday cake. I like to lean toward
dramatic, if not perfect. I cobbled together some ideas, rejecting others
(no to cheesecake, no to various shapes) and eventually settled on what would
become this:
Hedgehog slice, topped with coffee mousse with a Nutella mousse core,
chocolate mirror glaze and truffles.
The Compatriots 28th birthday
cake. With its shiny top and domed surface this was a hedgehog slice worthy of
a birthday celebration.
The whole concept of this cake rested on a sliceable mousse dome, a sort of mousse I had never made before- previous mousses had always been the type to hide in a solid bowl or cup, no structural integrity needed! Yet here I was aiming to make the majority of a cake with this mystical mousse. I do love to set myself a challenge.
My internet research turned up few options that inspired confidence in the end result- I was after clean slices, not a puddle of mess on a plate. My holy grail was found with one of my go-to bloggers: Sprinkle Bakes. She is amazing and endlessly creative, everything I have made from her website has been perfect so it was with confidence I adapted the mousse portion of this recipe, making some substitutions and scaling
down the recipe for the Nutella core. I also had to make substitutions in the
hedgehog slice as Marie biscuits, the biscuit of choice for this slice in
Australia, could not be found. Instead I used a combination of Nice and rich
tea biscuits but any plain biscuit will do. Now, how to make this domed beauty!
RECIPE
*Note- this mousse cake should be started at least 48 hours in advance
of serving*
EQUIPMENT
2 freezer safe bowls, one roughly a third smaller than the other. I used
the smallest and largest of a 3 piece glass bowl set.
1 cake tin the same diameter of your large bowl, or slightly larger
Small and large saucepan
NUTELLA MOUSSE
Adapted from Sprinkle Bakes
3/4 tsp powdered gelatine
2 tsp cold water
1 egg yolk
2 tablespoons sugar
2 tablespoons hot milk
75g Nutella
½ cup whipping cream
HEDGEHOG SLICE
Recipe from Nine.com.au found here
300g plain biscuits (I used a mix of Nice and Rich tea)
1 cup chopped walnuts (optional)
½ cup desiccated coconut
250g butter, chopped
1 ¼ cups caster sugar
1/3 cup cocoa powder (I use Van Houten)
1 egg
COFFEE MOUSSE
Adapted from Sprinkle Bakes
2 tsp powdered gelatine
2 tablespoons cold water
3 egg yolks
½ cup sugar
½ cup of hot milk
225g white chocolate, chopped
1 ½ tablespoons instant coffee (I used Azeera)
1 ½ cups whipping cream
MIRROR GLAZE
John Whaite recipe, found here
1 gelatine leaf
120g golden caster sugar
60ml water
1 tablespoon golden syrup
75g cocoa powder (I use Van Houten)
60ml single cream
METHOD
NUTELLA MOUSSE
1. Line the smallest bowl with plastic wrap, leaving an inch or so of
overhang.
2. Place water in a small saucepan and sprinkle gelatine over the water,
let stand for 1 minute.
3. Whisk in the egg and sugar, mixing well. Stir in the hot milk then place
over medium heat, whisking constantly for 5 minutes or until it has thickened
(it should coat the back of a spoon)
4. Stir in Nutella and mix until combined. Let cool.
5. Once cooled, whip the cream until stiff peaks form. Gently fold the gelatine
mix into the cream until combined.
6. Pour into the small bowl. Cover with plastic wrap and place in the
freezer until set (mine took at least 3 hours)
HEDGEHOG SLICE BASE
Once the Nutella mousse is in the freezer make a start on the hedgehog
slice.
1. Line a cake tin the same size as the base of your large bowl with
baking paper.
2. Chop/crush biscuits into small pieces, place in a bowl along with the
walnuts and coconut
3. In a medium saucepan combine the butter, sugar and cocoa powder. Stir
over medium heat until the butter is melted and sugar is dissolved.
4. Remove saucepan from heat and whisk in egg.
5. Pour chocolate mixture over the biscuit mixture and mix well. Press
into the prepared pan, the slice should be around 1 ½ to 2 cm deep. If yours
looks to be getting taller than that you can put some of the mix in a separate tin
to set separately and eat as a snack.
6. Cover and refrigerate until set (mine took around 4 hours. It wasn’t
fully set but firm enough to cut and hold its shape).
COFFEE MOUSSE
Start to prepare the mousse once your hedgehog base is suitably set
1. Unwrap your hedgehog slice. If the slice is larger than your large
bowl trim the slice to size so it fits snugly in the widest part of the bowl.
2.Line the large bowl with plastic wrap, leaving an inch or so of
overhang.
3. Place water in a small saucepan and sprinkle gelatine over the water,
let stand for 1 minute.
4. Whisk in the egg and sugar, mixing well. Stir in the hot milk then place
over medium heat, whisking constantly for 7-10 minutes or until it has
thickened (it should coat the back of a spoon)
5. Stir in white chocolate and instant coffee, mix until combined. Let
cool.
6. Once cooled, whip the cream until stiff peaks form. Gently fold the gelatine
mix into the cream until combined.
7. Fill the large bowl with around a third of the mix.
8. Remove the Nutella mousse from the freezer and unmould from the bowl,
discarding the plastic wrap. Place the Nutella mousse into the coffee mousse
with the flat side facing up. Pour the rest of the coffee mousse mix into the
bowl or until almost full (leave enough room for the base to fit at the top of
the bowl.)
9. Place your hedgehog slice on top of the coffee mousse (if one side of
your slice is smoother than keep this facing up.
10. Fold the overhanging plastic wrap back over the base of the slice.
Cover the bowl with plastic wrap and freeze for at least 24 hours.
MIRROR GLAZE.
1. Soak the gelatine in a bowl of cold water for 5 minutes
2. In a small saucepan heat the sugar, water and golden syrup. Allow to
boil for a minute and then remove from heat and whisk in the cocoa powder. Once
combined, whisk in the cream then return to medium heat for a minute, stirring
constantly. Remove from the heat.
3. Remove the gelatine leaf from the water and squeeze to remove the
excess water. Add to the chocolate glaze and stir until dissolved. Pass the
glaze through a sieve into a bowl.
To use the glaze it needs to cool but still be pourable. You can either
wait until it cools or place in the fridge until needed. On removing from the
fridge microwave on short, low power bursts until pourable.
ASSEMBLY
.1. Set a wire rack over a tray.
2. Remove the cake from the freezer. Remove the plastic wrap from the
bottom and invert the cake onto the wrack, peeling away the remaining plastic
wrap.
3. With your glaze a pourable consistency, pour the glaze over the cake,
letting the excess glaze drip down into the tray. If you need more glaze use
the excess that has dripped into the tray.
CONFESSION NOTE: This was my first time using mirror glaze and I was
terrified it would melt the mousse so didn’t warm it up as much as I should
have- it was pourable but still quite thick. In the end it was too thick and
stopped spreading before it fully reached the bottom of the cake which left a
few bald patches. This meant there was a mad scramble as I scrapped excess from
the tray and reheated before trying to apply to the side. Luckily gravity
worked its magic and smoothed it all it so you couldn’t tell where the touch
ups had been.
4. Refrigerate until ready to serve. Mine was in the fridge
for 24 hours before serving. You could serve it once the glaze has set but it
may be frozen/semi-frozen (which is also delicious, though the hedgehog slice
may be a bit solid!)
To serve I cobbled together some homemade truffles (dark chocolate, Kahlua and dark chocolate as well as white chocolate and coconut) adding them
to the finished cake as decoration along with some Ferrero Rochers.
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| Blurry interior shot- too thankful it didn't collapse to focus! |
