If strawberries and cream went on sunny French holiday. # 349: Fraisier Cake

Named for the French word for strawberry, “fraise,” a fraisier cake is a fancy sandwich of fresh strawberries, créme mousseline (which I’ve renamed custard buttercream in my head), light sponge cake soaked with a syrup, and if you’re really feeling it, a thin layer of marzipan.

I started laying out the ingredients and felt a sense of déjà vu. Turns out I made a version of a fraisier cake a few years ago! It had the same structure, but with each element swapped out for something already in my repertoire in 2021: a rich olive oil cake in place of a sponge and mascarpone whipped cream swapping out for the créme mousseline. Knowing myself, that was definitely a 10pm I-really-want-cake-but-don’t-want-to-do-any-research kind of bake.

Next time I’ll trim the cake layers down til they’re flat and even all the way across. That way there won’t be any gaps where the cake slopes down along the edges. Wouldn’t it be kind of cute to do a blueberry polka dot version? The filling is thick enough that if you mixed the berries in, they should stay suspended instead of sinking! Then with a thin layer of marzipan on top made with some freeze-dried blueberries to make the color fun, and maybe a sprinkle of edible flowers? And a lemon elderflower cake soak? I’m here for it.

This was another cake that made Ruby Bhogal’s top cakes in the world project, and I went with her recipes for fun. She calls for potato starch, which acts similarly to corn starch in baked goods: it takes the place of some of the flour, reducing gluten formation for a lighter crumb structure.

Forever grateful for my stand mixer when a recipe calls for eight minutes of whisking.

Isn’t it cool how you can see the surface tension around the edges of the flour pile? The egg mixture is so fluffy and full of air bubbles that it looks like a plush pillow.

MY BUBBLES.

Voila!

Sponge cake is truly a blank canvas and is ready to soak up whatever flavor is closest. It’s common to brush kirsch on the cake layers, but Ruby went rogue with a lemon vanilla sugar syrup. Hard to go wrong with a hint of strawberry lemonade!

If pastry cream and American buttercream had a French baby, it would be créme mousseline. You start with a custard/pastry cream and the first change happens with adding the butter once it’s off the heat. Instead of adding in a reasonable 2 tablespoons or so of butter, you go for a full cube and a half. Then you cackle madly as you whip another cube and a half til fluffy and slowly add in your cooled custard. I tried making it in 2022 to go on top of Prue Leith’s sablé breton recipe, but did something wrong and it came out lumpy. Sigh. Second time is the charm though! Might be time for a remake.

Some of the tall strawberries had to get a haircut to give the top layer of cake a flat surface.

All snuggled in.

You ready for some baking magic? Snap your fingers and scroll down and it will turn from night to day. Poof!

Moment of truth: the unwrapping of the cake. Will it hold it’s shape? Drumroll please!

She’s freestanding, baby!

Went with simple and classy for the topping, and then realized it’s the same way I decorated the strawberry cream cake in 2021. Oops!

Still cute though.

Unrelated to cake but entirely necessary: We were in LA for the weekend and there was a restaurant close to our Airbnb called “Fansea Sushi”. We must have walked past it at least four times before it clicked! Much fancy, very pun.

Bonus points if you catch the cake reflection in the window.

Happy munching!

Recipe from Ruby Bhogal’s Instagram