Grey Jay, Part 3 (Finishing)

We covered the back of the crown and the beak first with blue grey frosting and then with poppy seed filling. Theoretically one can buy poppy seed filling in stores (where it comes in cans and goes by "mohn"), but we couldn't find any, so we borrowed a friend's poppy seed grinder (dang that Article 6!) and made our own. One cup of whole poppy seeds made roughly 1/2 cup ground.



I used a similar process for finding a recipe as with the sour cream frosting. I ended up using this recipe, although this recipe (posting by martmurt a little more than halfway down the page) sounded very tasty, just likely to be too pale for this application. The finished product was fairly dry and crumbly, but moist enough that it could be squished together. Next time I would try making a smoother filling.



If you were going to make a cake with a heavy emphasis on poppy seeds, it would be worth your while to find a source for really fresh poppy seeds - they go rancid quickly. If nothing else, there's mail order. Any ideas on good places to order from?

The eye is a disk of licorice. It didn't contrast much with the poppy seed filling, so Matt added a dab of white frosting.



The leg is two pieces of Panda licorice (stick format) that Matt carved into shape. I think the licorice might have been nice for the beak too - less fuzzy than the poppy seed filling. I also think it might be fun to make an open beak holding a chunk of the leftover cake. Although disturbing if you think about it too hard.



After frosting the cake, Matt sprinkled whole poppy seeds on the wings and tail to sketch in the anatomy - he did a beautiful job of it.

Grey Jay, Part 2 (Frosting)

Crumb Coat

We like to freeze the cake before cutting and frosting it, to minimize crumbs. If you don't have room in your freezer, it helps to chill the cake in the refrigerator. I then apply a "crumb coat" - a thin layer of frosting to stick the crumbs down, so they won't get mixed up in the top coat of frosting. Until now I had just been using the same frosting I used for the top coat. This time, I tried making a thinner crumb coat (1 1/2 T butter, 1 lb powdered sugar, and 4-6 T water). That worked nicely and allowed me to spread it quite thin. I probably have enough left over to coat another cake (depending on the length of the perimeter).



White Frosting

I chose a sour cream frosting to get the white parts as white as possible. Using butter or vanilla would have added too much color. Theoretically one can use shortening but, as mycakes so aptly pointed out, that would violate Article 4 (use only food). I used my usual method when searching for a new recipe - pull as many recipes from the Internet as possible, write them all down, thoughtfully compare them for similarities and differences, and then pick one randomly.

Most of the recipes called for butter, but after I combined 1/2 cup sour cream and 1 lb of powdered sugar, it was obvious that the butter was completely extraneous. If I'd had a lemon, I probably would have added a little lemon juice to pump up the tang, for more contrast with the sweet cake.

Grey Frosting

Figuring out how to make blue grey frosting for the wings and tail was a challenge. When we made the jam cake, we used the bluest jam we could find without high fructose corn syrup. Still, boysenberry isn't terribly blue.

In earlier experiments trying to make green frosting, we had found that powdered spirulina showed promise as a colorant. (Spirulina is another violation of Article 6 - sorry. Health food stores are your best bet.) Matt found that adding about 2 T of jam and 1/4 t spirulina to 3/4 cup of the sour cream frosting produced a creditable grey. Add the spirulina very gradually until you get the color you want - a tiny bit goes a long way.



The only problem with this recipe was that it was too runny. This actually produced a lovely smooth top, but sagged a lot on the sides - I had to clean it up repeatedly. Another time, I would make a separate batch of frosting starting with just the powdered sugar and jam and then adding sour cream until I got a good consistency.



Buff

I was pleased with the buff on the front of the crown. (I tried to find a more technical word for that area. On the dog it would be called a stop, but all I could find in Sibley was crown.) I used cashew butter mixed with a few drops of maple syrup to make it spreadable. There's that pesky Article 6 again. But cashew butter is a lovely food and we recommend you keep some around anyway. It's particularly good for french toast and waffles (do you sense a theme?). In lieu of cashew, you could probably use smooth peanut butter and lighten it up with a bit of the sour cream frosting.



Next post, the finishing touches.

Grey Jay, Part 1

When I started to write about this project, I didn't realize just how involved the explanations would be. As a result, I've divided the write-up into three posts. Today's post is about the design and the cake. The second post will be about the frosting, and the third post will be about the finishing touches.

Background
Matt thought of this cake for the birthday of a good friend who has a terrible habit of luring grey jays when we are out hiking. If you are not familiar with grey jays, they are also known as camp robber birds. Where the jays are prevalent, they will try to steal any exposed food, even if you're only inches away. Melissa Anne, although otherwise a fine outdoorswoman, likes to put food in her palm, hold it up, and chirp to call the jays. We go backpacking with her anyway.

Design
This one was pulled straight from a wee picture in Sibley. Matt was able to freehand the full-size version after only about 3 or 4 iterations. I find this very impressive. I would have headed straight for the pictorial aids, a grid or a pantograph or something. (I hope to do a more in-depth discussion on re-sizing in a future post.)

The design is unusual for Matt in that it is made in only two pieces. Not as efficient a use of the cake as Matt would usually demand, but well within my tolerance.



Cake
Pairing cake and subject is one of the great mysteries. I honestly don't know why a jam spice cake was so apt for the jay when a lemon cake would have been all wrong. Is it all down to personal aesthetic, or are there some larger truths here?

We have three editions of The Joy of Cooking, one from 1953, one from 1975 and one from 1997. Each serves a different function. This cake is the Rombauer Jam Cake from the 1953 and 1975 editions. We increased it 1.5 times to make enough batter for a 9 x 13 cake. The recipe is from a time when spice cakes had the courage of their convictions. It calls for 1.5 teaspoons of freshly grated nutmeg. That is a lot of nutmeg. It also has 1.5 cups of jam (we used Smucker's Simply Fruit Boysenberry Jam). The jam makes the cake quite sweet and moist (and a kind of funky color). The sweetness isn't cloying because it doesn't all come from cane sugar and because the spice balances it out. We will definitely be making this cake again - it's very tasty and unusual.



Using a nutmeg grater was one of several places we deviated from Article 6 of the manifesto (use only basic tools and ingredients). On the other hand, the grater is basic for us. We use it particularly for adding fresh nutmeg as a french toast or waffle topping. If you like nutmeg, we highly recommend this little tool. Plus, it's just a nifty object. Ours is only one of the many kinds available.




Next post - on to the frosting!