POPS! ICY TREATS FOR EVERYONE By Krystina Castella

Book review: " A WORLD OF CAKE"

This book written by author Krystina Castrella, offers 150 Recipes.It takes you from 5000 BCE to present in detail explaining history behind each cake recipe and with geographical location.The book not only gives you mouth-watering recipes, it also explains and describes that cakes have cultures and customs and have family tree too. It also has a "Cake Holiday" table with each month showing what cakes should be baked for that month and why.
I love this book for the detailed explanations on all kinds of cakes in categories such as Dense, Creamy , Fluffy, Chewy for e.g. Butter Cakes, Chessecakes, Chiffon cakes, Dumplings, Fritters, Flat cakes, Foam Cakes, Fruit Cakes, Honey Cakes, Ice Cream cakes, Meringues, Pasteries, Torts,Trifles and many more.
The Book has also covered topics from selecting bakeware, mixing, kneading, cooling, steaming and using water bath to double boiler.
Pros: The book is just too good for any level of cake-baker or decorator. This book is a must in every cake lover's library and will be very appealing to all who love baking and cake decorating. This book covers 150 global recipes, history and geography along with beautiful pictures which I personally like because I loved the idea that we can relate and explain the cake history to our present and future generations.
Cons: None


Overall:Outstanding Book


About the author: Krystina Castella is a professor at the Art Center College of Design, where she teaches Materials Explorations and Design Entrepreneurship. She is the founder of the Design Entrepreneur Network and has owned a manufacturing and licensing company that created housewares, toys, and stationary products. Her previous books are Pops!, Crazy About Cupcakes , and Discovering Nature’s Alphabet, and she has been published in Craft magazine. Krystina lives in southern California.


Publisher: Storey Publishing
ISBN: 978-1-60342-576-6
Book available at Barnes and Noble. Amazon and at Storey Direct.
Picture and some text Copyright: Storey Publishing


Special Thanks to Storey Publishing for providing the review copy of the book.

Vasiloptia Cake Recipe by Krystina Castella from the book" A world of Cake"

Hello Friends,
Today in the mail i received 3 books for review and 1 of the books among them is " A world of Cake by Krystina Castella". I have just started the book and it is just amazing, just want to bake and make all of them( proper review will come soon).
Dear Krystina allowed me to share the recipe from her book on our blog .

Vasiloptia as she mentions"Best served at a big family breakfast, this coffee cake rings in the first morning of the new year in Greece. You can easily recognize the cake by its tiered shape, with a small round cake set on top of a large round cake. The tradition is to serve the cake to the youngest first, then the next-to-youngest, and so on, and the person who finds the hidden coin or trinkets will have good luck for the year.  In some areas, while the cake is cut a pomegranate is thrown to the ground to scatter the seeds for a fruitful year."
Recipe for Vasiloptia as follows:
{3/4} cup blanched, slivered almonds
 {1/3} cup light brown sugar
 1 tablespoon honey
 3 cups all-purpose flour
 2 teaspoons baking powder
 {1/2} teaspoon baking soda
 1 teaspoon mahlab or 1 tablespoon anise seed
 1 cup (2 sticks) unsalted butter, softened
 2 cups sugar
 6 eggs
 2 teaspoons lemon juice
 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
 1 cup milk
 A coin or hard candy

 Makes 1 cake (serves 8 to 10)


TO PREPARE
Preheat the oven to 350ºF. Butter a 9-inch round cake pan and a 4-inch round cake pan.

TO MAKE THE CAKE

Combine the almonds, brown sugar, and honey in a small bowl, and set aside. Mix the flour, baking powder, baking soda, and mahlab in a medium bowl, and set aside. In a large bowl, cream the butter and sugar until light and fluffy. Add the eggs one at a time, beating well after each addition. Stir in the lemon juice and vanilla. Add the flour mixture to the butter mixture, alternating with the milk, and mix well.

TO BAKE THE CAKE

Divide one-third of the nut mixture between the two prepared pans, scattering it in an even layer over their bottoms. Fill the smaller (4-inch) pan two-thirds full of batter, then pour half of the remaining batter into the larger (9-inch) pan. Bake both layers for 20 minutes, until the cakes become a bit firm. Sprinkle half of the remaining almond mixture in an even layer over both cakes, and lay the coin on top of one of the partly baked cakes. Pour half of the remaining batter on top of each cake. Bake for another 20 to 25 minutes, until a knife inserted in the center of each comes out clean. Let the cakes cool in their pans for 10 minutes.

TO SERVE

Remove the cakes from their pans, and place the smaller one on top of the larger. Top with the remaining almond mixture, and serve warm.

VARIATIONS

Bulgarian Raspberry-Yogurt Vasilopita
Replace the milk with yogurt. Add 1 cup fresh raspberries to the center of the cakes, along with the almond mixture and coin, during the baking.

Hazelnut–Anise–Chocolate Chip Vasilopita
Replace the almonds with chopped hazelnuts and the mahlab with anise seed. Add {1/2} cup chocolate chips to the nut mixture.

Seed Wedding Cake
In Greece everyone is required to eat seeds at weddings to wish the happy couple a fertile life. Replace the nuts with {3/4} cup sunflower seeds or poppyseeds and serve the cake at a wedding brunch.

You can also find this recipe at the link below on her book page:

http://aworldofcake.com/recipe

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Copyright: The recipe and the picture is copyright of Krystina Castrella from her book(A world of Cake). Pls do not copy and paste this anywhere else without the author's permission


Thanks: Thank you so much Dear Krystina for allowing me to share this recipe with my blog readers.

XOXO