Chef H showed us how to make a blackcurrant mirror cake (Miroir au Cassis) and a lemon mirror cake (Miroir Citrons). I prefer the taste of the lemon mirror cake. The flavour of the lemons is refreshing. The taste of citruses just reminds me of home, where lemons, limes and other kinds of citruses are plentiful.
In our practicals today, we had to make the blackcurrant mirror cake. It was quite a task, because there were so many little steps to making this cake. First, we had to make a biscuit (sponge cake) mixture. Then pipe it onto a tray, in diagonal lines, and then bake it for 8 minutes. We line the cake ring with the biscuit, then pour in the mousse (which has Italian meringue, gelatin, blackcurrant pulp and fruit, and cream). We chill the cake in the fridge for 30 minutes. After that, we glaze the top of the cake, before finishing it off with the decorations (blackcurrants, marzipan leaves and white chocolate piping).
My cake looked fine from the outside, but when Chef H cut it open, he could see that there was some problem with the mousse inside. The meringue inside the mousse seemed to have collapsed, making it rather "soupy" (this is Chef's way of saying too much liquid). Basically, my mousse wouldn't set properly, even though it was in the blast chiller for 30 minutes.
Anyway, I plan to practise making this cake (or the lemon version) again. It is a nice cake to eat, but just really troublesome to make. Still, I am determined to perfect my techniques for this cake, even if I have to keep doing it 10 times. I'll learn from the experience.
