January 2011 Daring Bakers’ Challenge #48: Joconde Imprime Entremets, Chocolate Banana

I know that it's not a usual cake to bake at home but I think it's fun to make ^^. I love the feeling of thinking what pattern that I will make and what I will put together to make the  Entremets, and I know that you might think that I'm crazy, haha.

But for me, thinking about cake or other kinds of sweet is fun to me, the imagination is greatttt!!!!. And this time "January 2011 Daring Bakers’ challenge" we all needed the imagination.
You can do more or less when writing the pattern, you can just  spread the batter and use you finger to make simple pattern or you can pipe it to make more detailed pattern (like me ^^), and yes, the pattern is only the start.
The next thing that you need is "what to put inside ?" and I had so many, many many ideas, anyway I had to choose only one, haha.
Because I wanted to write the pattern with the brown color (from the cocoa powder), so I think if the pattern is chocolate, the inside had to go together too, and then I saw the banana on my table, ^^, Voila! it's going to be my filling. I think I love to make banana look better, it's can be beautiful too, not only going to be the simple banana cake or bread, it's a lot better than that!
I think the hardest part of these cake for me is to find the pattern I used about 3 hours until I got the pattern that I want to use, well, I really wanted to make it more detail, but as I didn't try this recipe before, I didn't know what they will be after baking, so I choose this one. And I found that the this Joconde-Décor Paste batter is very good, and I will make more detailed pattern next time.
As always I think the small cake is cute and easy to lure people to eat it, haha, I make a small individual cake, so I adjust the amount of the batter. 
The only problem that I found is the batter for the paste in the original recipe is too much, so I reduce it to make it more appropriate.
Finally I got the lovely cake,  Entremets Chocolate Banana, and "Thank you Astheroshe" for your recipe, it makes very good Joconde Imprime, that both lovely and delicious. 
I hope you (Ok, I really mean "you", the one who read my blog right now ^^), will be happy to try it too.

"The January 2011 Daring Bakers’ challenge was hosted by Astheroshe of the blog accro. She chose to challenge everyone to make a Biscuit Joconde Imprime to wrap around an Entremets dessert."

Joconde Imprime Entremets, 

Chocolate Banana

Makes 5 (7cm cake)

My adaptation: using 30x30cm cake pan

-Patterned Joconde-Décor Paste-

50g ................................ Unsalted butter, soft

50g ................................ Icing sugar

50g ................................ Egg whites

42g ................................ Cake flour

15g ................................ Cocoa powder

-Joconde sponge-

56g ................................. Almond flour

50g ................................. Icing sugar

16g .................................. Cake flour

100g ............................... Eggs

60g ................................. Egg whites

7g .................................... Superfine sugar

20g ................................. Unsalted butter, melted

50g ................................. Simple syrup

1tbsp .............................. Rum

Filling

- Crème au Chocolat -

40g ................................ Dark chocolate, melted

70g ................................ Whipping cream

- Crème Chantilly-

100g ............................. Whipping cream

10g ............................... Icing sugar

1 ................................... Banana, cut into slice

-BANANE BRÛLÉ-

2 ................................... Banana, cut into slice

¼ cup ......................... Apricot jam

-Original recipe-

Joconde Sponge

YIELD: Two ½ size sheet pans or a 13” x 18” (33 x 46 cm) jelly roll pan

Ingredients:

¾ cup/ 180 ml/ 3oz/ 85g almond flour/meal - *You can also use hazelnut flour, just omit the butter 

½ cup plus 2 tablespoons/ 150 ml/ 2⅔ oz/ 75g confectioners' (icing) sugar

¼ cup/ 60 ml/ 1 oz/ 25g cake flour *See note below

3 large eggs - about 5⅓ oz/ 150g

3 large egg whites - about 3 oz/ 90g

2½ teaspoons/ 12½ ml/ ⅓ oz/ 10g white granulated sugar or superfine (caster) sugar

2 tablespoons/ 30 ml/ 1oz / 30g unsalted butter, melted

*Note: How to make cake flour: http://www.joythebaker.com/blog/2009/09/how-to-make-cake-flour/

Patterned Joconde-Décor Paste

YIELD: Two ½ size sheet pans or a 13” x 18” (33 x 46 cm) jelly roll pan

Ingredients

14 tablespoons/ 210ml/ 7oz/ 200g unsalted butter, softened

1½ cups plus1½ tablespoons/ 385ml/ 7oz/ 200g Confectioners' (icing) sugar

7 large egg whites - about 7 oz / 200g

1¾ cup/ 420ml/ 7¾ oz/ 220g cake flour

Food coloring gel, paste or liquid

COCOA Décor Paste Variation: Reduce cake flour to 6 oz / 170g. Add 2 oz/ 60 g cocoa powder. Sift the flour and cocoa powder together before adding to creamed mixture.

-Patterned Joconde-Décor Paste-

Directions:

1. Cream butter and sugar until light and fluffy (use stand mixer with blade, hand held mixer, or by hand)

2. Gradually add egg whites. Beat continuously.

3. Fold in sifted flour.

4. Tint batter with coloring to desired color, if not making cocoa variation.

Preparing the Joconde- How to make the pattern:

1. Spread a thin even layer of décor paste approximately 1/4 inch (5 millimeter) thick onto silicone baking mat with a spatula, or flat knife. Place mat on an upside down baking sheet. The upside down sheet makes spreading easier with no lip from the pan.

2. Pattern the décor paste – Here is where you can be creative. Make horizontal /vertical lines (you can use a knife, spatula, cake/pastry comb). Squiggles with your fingers, zig zags, wood grains. Be creative whatever you have at home to make a design can be used. OR use a piping bag. Pipe letters, or polka dots, or a piped design. If you do not have a piping bag. Fill a ziplock bag and snip off corner for a homemade version of one.

3. Slide the baking sheet with paste into the freezer. Freeze hard. Approx 15 minutes.

-Joconde sponge-

Directions:

1. Sift almond flour, confectioner’s sugar, cake flour. On medium speed, add the eggs a little at a time. Mix well after each addition. Mix until smooth and light. (If using a stand mixer use blade attachment. If hand held a whisk attachment is fine, or by hand. )

2. In a clean mixing bowl whip the egg whites and white granulated sugar to firm, glossy peeks. 

4. Fold in one third reserved whipped egg whites to almond mixture to lighten the batter. Fold in remaining whipped egg whites. Do not over mix.

5. Fold in melted butter.

6. Remove the decor pattern from freezer. Quickly pour the Joconde batter over the design. Spread evenly to completely cover the pattern of the Décor paste.

7. Bake at 475ºF /250ºC until the joconde bounces back when slightly pressed, approx. 15 minutes (If using small recipe like me use only 8-10 minutes). You can bake it as is on the upside down pan. Yes, it is a very quick bake, so watch carefully.

8. Cool. Do not leave too long, or you will have difficulty removing it from mat.

9. Flip cooled cake on to a powdered sugared parchment paper. Remove silpat. Cake should be right side up, and pattern showing! (The powdered sugar helps the cake from sticking when cutting.)

Assemble:

Cut the cake to 21.5 cmx 5cm /strips
Cut the scraps into small rounds (depending on the space that left in the middle of the center).
Sprinkle with rum syrup, both the bottom and side of the cake. 

- Crème au Chocolat -

Whip the cream until soft peaks forms, pour the melted chocolate into the whipped cream and fold to combine, put the mixture into a piping bag, set aside.

- Crème Chantilly-

Whip the cream with the sugar until soft peaks forms put the mixture into a piping bag.

Pipe the Crème au Chocolat into the cake, and put 1 banana slice over the cream, and top with Crème Chantilly, cover with the plastic warp and refrigerate until ready to serve.  

When ready to serve make BANANE BRÛLÉ:

Heat the apricot preserves in a small saucepan over medium heat until liquid. Remove from heat and strain the jam through a fine strainer to remove any fruit lumps.

Place the banana on the pan, use a small blow torch to burn the banana. Brush the banana with the apricot glaze.

Place the bananas over the top of the cake and decorate with chocolate.

January 2011 Daring Bakers’ Challenge #48: 

Joconde Imprime Entremets, Chocolate Banana