Ombre Lime Chiffon Cake with Lime Curd & Cream Daisies

After my aunt saw the ombre lime chiffon cake with lime curd and cream that I baked a while ago, she wanted one too! Just for fun! Since it's not for any special occassion, I decided not to do the layers the "leceh" (troublesome) way with a few rounds of baking and washing, but instead take a risk and do it the way that Susanne did for her Ombre Hello Kitty birthday cake with one round of baking. My aunt is keen on trying it with lime curd so I had to come up with a creative way of including the curd without hiding all that ombre. So here it is! A lime flavored ombre green field with daisies!

Do pardon the amateurish piping :p

Close up view of a daisy against a background of different shades of green!

The recipe is adapted from Susanne's rainbow chiffon cake but I decided to scale it down to see if it works with large eggs. I find it's still better to stick with her 5 yolk 7 white recipe for a 17cm chiffon tin after baking this but I will just type out what I used here. I decided not to stick with my original cooked dough recipe as I personally prefer the more bouncy texture of regular chiffon, although the cooked dough method yields a very soft cake and goes well with multiple separate layers of cake and cream.

I didn't make a fresh batch of lime curd as I still had some leftover from the previous round that I froze. Recipe for yummy and super smooth lime curd and cream can be found here. I used non-dairy cream as I had some on hand as well that needs to be used up. Lazy me! :p

Ingredients (makes one 17cm ombre chiffon cake):
4 large egg yolks (65-68g)
24g caster sugar
52g canola oil
30g fresh milk
26g lime juice
3/4 tsp vanilla extract
Zest of 2 limes
80g cake flour
Green and brown gel food coloring

5.5 egg whites (use 6 if you find it troublesome to measure)
50g caster sugar
1/4 tsp cream of tartar

Steps:
1. Wrap the 17cm chiffon tin with homemade cake strips made out of wet newspaper wrapped in aluminium foil. (Optional but it helps the cake to rise slowly and results in a taller cake. Reduce baking time by 5-10 minutes if you are not using.) Preheat oven to 160 degrees Celsius. Place the oven rack at the second lowest position.

2. Use a hand whisk to beat the egg yolks and sugar until pale and all the sugar has dissolved. Add oil and mix well until thick. Add in fresh milk, vanilla extract, lime juice and salt. Whisk until well combined.  Gradually sift in flour and whisk until no trace of flour is seen. Mix in lime zest.

3. Divide batter into 5 equal portions and add in green/ brown coloring into 4 of them with varying shades of green.

4. Prepare the meringue. Beat egg whites with elextric mixer in a clean metal bowl until foamy. Add cream of tartar and beat until soft peaks form. Gradually add sugar and beat until stiff peaks form and the bowl can be overturned without the meringue falling out. Quickly but gently fold in the meringue into all 5 portions of egg yolk batter in three additions. This may be tricky.

5. Carefully scoop the batter with darkest shade of green into the chiffon tin and gently level it with a teaspoon. Repeat with the other shades of green from darkest to lightest shade. This is my first time doing it and I tried to work as quickly as I could but I think it's still a little too slow as the batter did not fill the tin as much as I expected for a 4 egg yolk recipe.

6. Tap the tin a few times on the table and bake for 20 minutes before reducing the temperature to 150 degrees Celsius and baking for another 30 minutes. Immediately invert the tin to cool. Carefully unmould by hand. I managed to unmould the sides beautifully but got impatient and used the spatula for the base. Ended up with a slightly shaggy appearance for the base. O well :p.

7. I piped some daisies with lime cream as petals and lime curd as flower centers.

I left the cream in the piping bag in the fridge for too long (busy with kids) so it set into mousse-like consistency. As a result the cream petals appear a bit rough. But I like the fact that these flowers are decorative as well as refreshingly tangy.

Hmm... I think aunt would prefer more cream and curd on...so I continued piping more flowers and some dots around the borders. I packed the leftover curd and cream for her just in case she wanted something with stronger lime flavor as I used much more curd and cream for my previous ombre lime cake. The great thing about baking just for fun is it doesn't have to look perfect. As long as it tastes good and looks decent enough, who cares :p.

My aunt only managed to eat the cake 3 days after I baked so the cake did dry out a bit in the fridge (store chiffon cakes at room temperature or freeze them. Refrigeration tends to dry it out. If you have to chill the cake for a more refreshing taste, do consume within 1-2 days of baking.) She said it was delicious and refreshing with extra lime curd and not dry at all. The texture was very much like my pulut hitam chiffon that's popular among my extended family.

 This post is linked to the event, Little Thumbs Up organised by Bake for Happy Kids and My Little Favourite DIY, and hosted by Diana from the Domestic Goddess Wannabe.

With love,
Phay Shing