Cake #98 - Irish Winter Cats

Thursday Cat Theme Cake - Irish Winter Cats.

Gingerbread Cheesecake with Shortbread Cookies Covered with Milk Chocolate.

I love mixing together ground cinnamon, nutmeg, cardamom, ginger and cloves, and spicing cakes with that combination which is warm, earthy, cosy, welcoming and Christmassy, too.

My younger daughter loves mixing together cinnamon sticks, whole cloves, cardamom pods, fresh ginger, bay leaves and orange slices to cook a lovely fragranced simmering pot for Christmas. She pours the liquid into beautiful little jars which she places all around the house for us to enjoy the fragrance and for the cats to knock over.

So on lazy days and busy days, on good days and bad days, on sunny days and grey days - let there always be spices to taste and to smell as it brings harmony and warmth. Just remember to hold your cats tight. Your ginger coloured cat may not want to smell like ginger, too.

The recipe for the shortbread pastry is from here. As you can see above, the first cookies kind of expanded so I had to add some more flour to get the right consistency. The proper final cookies I covered with milk chocolate before sticking them onto the cake.

Note to self: Always bake a test cookie in the oven before making and baking a larger batch! There are differences between plain flour A (used in the original recipe) and plain flour B (you are using) no matter how carefully you weigh and measure your ingredients. Ovens are different, too.

Irish Winter Cats
Gingerbread Cheesecake with Shortbread Cookies Covered with Milk Chocolate.

Base
2 large eggs
100 ml granulated sugar
150 ml self-raising flour
50 g butter, melted
25 ml cream
1 tsp ground cinnamon
½ tsp ground ginger
½ tsp ground cloves
½ tsp ground nutmeg
½ tsp ground cardamom

Filling
200 g cream Cheese
3 eggs
50 ml cream
100 ml granulated sugar
1 tsp vanilla extract
1 tsp ground cinnamon
50 g raisins

1. Preheat the oven to 175C / 350F and grease and flour a Ø 20 cm cake pan.

2. Beat eggs and sugar until white and fluffy.

3. Fold in flour together with spices, raisins, melted butter and cream.

4. Pour into pan and bake in the oven for 15  minutes.

5. Mix together all ingredients for the filling and pour on the cake base.

6. Put the cake back in the oven and bake another 15-20 minutes until the filling is set.

7. Let cool before removing from pan and decorating.

8. Place shortbread cats and Christmas trees on top of the cake and sprinkle with a little icing sugar. The Irish winter cats do not usually get very snowy...