Scratched sponge cake. Baumkuchen

How to make a striped cake or Baumkuchen. This dessert recipe is a traditional German cake that is also known by the beautiful name of ” tree cake “.

Those desserts that seduce us with their marbling, in this case with chocolate. Although you have very simple options on the blog, such as this  Marmorkuchen or striped chocolate cake .

This dessert can be up to a meter long, but this is not the reason for its nickname but the fact that it is made up of multiple layers that, when cut, resemble the rings of a tree trunk.

Achieving that effect is not an easy thing, in fact you need a special oven, a rotisserie spit on which the dough that is cooked is poured as it rotates on its axis in front of an open fire.

It goes without saying that my scratched cake or baumkuchen has not been prepared in this way. But applying a simpler technique and to walk around the house for which I only needed a homemade oven, with grill function, and a removable mold. It is enough to prepare two different masses, one of vanilla and the other of cocoa and bake them one by one, layer by layer, for two or three minutes each.

The process requires some skill to make the layers as thin as possible and a small dose of patience, but the effort is worth it once the baumkuchen is finished and tasted.

And it is that the fine German pastry continues to seduce us on the blog, we started with the famous Black Forest Cake , its delicious Kasekuchen cheese cake or its delicious apple Strudel . Go ahead with this suggestion for a special occasion. At home they will hallucinate.

Preparation of the base of the striped sponge cake or baumkuchen

1. We start preparing the cake and leave the coverage for the end, because it needs to be hot to be able to spread it well.
2. We line the base of a removable mold of 20 cm in diameter with absorbent paper and reserve. We cut the butter into small pieces and with an electric mixer or food processor we beat it together with the sugar until white, that is, until the mixture increases in
   volume and becomes fluffy and whitish.
3. We separate the whites from the yolks of eggs. We reserve the whites and add the yolks to the previous mixture, one by one, stirring until well integrated before adding the next one.
4. Next, we mix the flour with the cornstarch and add it to the mixture.
5. In another bowl, beat the egg whites until stiff with a pinch of salt until they are very firm and add them to the mixture, slowly and with great care, so as not to lose the air incorporated with the smoothie.
6. We divide the dough into two equal parts and add the cocoa to one of them and the vanilla to the other.

Baking the striped sponge cake or baumkuchen

1. We preheat the oven grill to 200º C and begin to bake the cake layers.
2. We take two tablespoons of vanilla dough. We spread it over the entire base of the mold, with the help of a brush or with the back of the spoon, leaving a very thin layer.
3. We introduce the mold in the oven, with the tray in the central position. Cook for two to three minutes or until the surface begins to brown.
4. We remove the mold from the oven and distribute two tablespoons of chocolate dough on top of the previous layer. Bake again 2 or 3 minutes under the grill or until the second layer is cooked.
5. Proceed as before, until both masses are exhausted.

Final assembly of the striped cake or baumkuchen

1. We remove the cake from the oven and let it rest for 20 minutes before carefully unmolding. Let it rest, face down, on a metal rack until it is completely cold.
2. While this occurs, we prepare the chocolate coating. For this we pour the cream in a saucepan and heat it.
3. Just before boiling we remove it from the heat. We add the chopped chocolate and butter. We let them both melt before stirring with some rods and homogenize.
4. Let the coating warm for a few minutes before bathing the cake. Extending it over the entire surface and, if we want, along the sides.
5. Finally, wait for it to cool and harden before decorating to taste (we have used chocolate shavings) and serve.

It is a surprising sponge cake in every way, in its appearance and flavor.

Therefore I recommend that you prepare it on a special occasion. You will see how the guests like it when you bring it to the table.

Curiosities and tips for a striped sponge cake or yummy baumkuchen

• Contrary to what happens with most biscuits, the baumkuchen does not lose juiciness or fluffiness over time. What’s more, he gains a lot with rest. Simply delicious, I assure you.
• Although the recipe is not complicated, it is laborious and it is necessary to read it well. Prepare everything you need before you start and study the recipe well.
• The flavor of this striped sponge cake will gain a lot if we use a quality vanilla essence and pure cocoa powder.
• The grill setting needs to be fine-tuned. Also observe carefully how long it takes for the first layers of cake to cook to apply the same parameters to the following ones.
• It is easier to spread the dough over the already cooked layers if we leave it for a few seconds in contact with the heat so that it loses thickness and does not offer much resistance.
• For the cut to be beautiful, we should not be impatient when cutting the striped cake. You should wait for the coverage to solidify before doing so.

I encourage you to try doing it at home, the result is impressive. You can see all the step by step photos of this  striped cake or Baumkuchen in this album.