Cake #91 - Snow Paw

Thursday Cat Theme Cake - Snow Paw.

This cake looks to me like a clothes rack with hooks. I could easily imagine hanging it on my kitchen wall - I would just need to turn the dewclaw the other way around.

Then I would hang there my cat apron [except I do not have one, what], my kittycat oven mittens and  my kitten tea towels and then there would still be room for some nice cat stuff they have at Sophie Allport. Which I just love. Have a look! If you, for some reason, are not a cat person, they do have other patterns, too.

So far I have managed to get myself only a Sophie Allport cat iron board cover but the situation will hopefully get better soon. The Husband every now and then flies to Leeds, UK, for business, and Sophie Allport just recently opened a shop downtown Leeds...

***

The cake is a basic sponge with some vanilla in it. The black parts are made of black sugar paste and the snow is desiccated coconut.

Cake #90 - Carrot and Cranberry Cake

Wednesday Natural Ingredient / Healthy Cake - Carrot and Cranberry Cake with Raisins and Seeds

Crazy for craisins? To be honest, I am not, but in this cake they taste great, together with all the other healthy ingredients. If you want to make this cake even more healthy, use wholemeal flour and reduce the amount of sugar by half. 

I do not like sweet treats for breakfast but a slice of this cake was a perfect morning boost. Made with brown sugar, it is not too sweet. Warm up in microwave or toast, and enjoy with butter! Loads of butter.

Carrot and Cranberry Cake with Raisins and Seeds

2 eggs
150 ml brown sugar
150 ml sunflower oil
200 ml plain flour
1 tsp bread soda
1 tsp baking powder
100 g grated carrot
50 g dried cranberries
50 g mixed seeds
50 g raisins

1. Grease and flour a 1 kg loaf pan and preheat the oven to 200C / 400F.
2. Beat eggs and sugar until white and fluffy.
3. Pour in oil and beat until mixed well.
4. Mix all dry ingredients together.
5. Add grated carrot and dry ingredients gradually to the egg-sugar-oil mixture.
6. Pour batter into pan and sprinkle some seeds on top if you like,
7. Bake in the oven for about 40 minutes and let cool before removing from pan.

Cake #89 - Date and Time Cake

Tuesday Humour Cake - Date and Time Cake.

Had I dared to be more experimental, this would have been Date and Thyme Cake. I do suspect the family had appreciated that kind of experiment much. This cake with dates and white chocolate they loved.

Date and Time Cake

300 g butter
400 ml granulated sugar
4 eggs
600 ml plain flour
2 tsp baking powder
150 g chopped dates
150 ml cream

100 g white chocolate, melted

1. Preheat oven to 175 degrees C (350 F) and grease and flour a Ø 23 cm cake pan.
2. Mix flour, baking powder and chopped dates in a bowl.
3. Cream together butter and sugar.
4. Mix in eggs.
5. Add the dry ingredients together with the cream and mix well.
6. Bake the cake in the oven for 45-50 minutes and let cool on a rack before removing from the pan and piping the white chocolate on it,

Cake #88 - Sand Cake

Monday Mood Cake - Sand Cake

Dull, flat, grey mid-November. Sun and the beach!?

Never mind. I am patiently waiting for the summer, sun and the beach. Not going to Malta nor to Italia.

You can find the recipe for this cake here. No fork needed when eating it.

Potato starch is not easy to find in Ireland. This bag I bought at Oriental Emporium on Abbey St, Dublin 1. You can replace potato starch with cornstarch.

Cake #87 - Ellen Svinhufvud Cake

Sunday Classic Cake - Ellen Svinhufvud Cake.

Almond Meringue Cake with Coffee Buttercream and Toasted Almond Flakes.

Ellen Svinhufvud (1861-1953) was the wife of Finland's 3rd president, Pehr Evind Svinhufvud. History tells that Mrs Svinhufvud loved this almond meringue cake, made by Konditoria Stella, and the confectionary later named the cake Ellen Svinhufvud Cake after her.

Dress up (do not forget a hat with feathers!) and enjoy this cake on a Sunday afternoon. Serve coffee in golden cups and preferably speak Swedish. Cheers, ma'am! 

Ellen Svinhufvud Cake

Base
6 egg whites
350 ml icing sugar
150 g ground almonds

1. Preheat the oven to 125 С / 250 F.
2. Line 2 baking trays with baking parchment.
3. Beat egg whites until firm adding icing sugar gradually.
4. Fold in ground almond.
5. Divide the batter evenly into 4 parts and spread each part into a rectangular about 20 cm x 30 cm, 5 mm thick.
6. Bake in the oven for about 90 minutes.
7. Let cool down on a rack.

Coffee Buttercream Filling
150 ml strong coffee
3 tbsp sugar
150 ml cream
100 g finely-ground almond
300 g soft butter

Topping
80 g toasted almond flakes
Icing sugar

1. Dissolve sugar in hot coffee and mix in cream. Let cool.
2. Beat butter until light and fluffy and then gradually pour in coffee with cream.
3. Fold in ground almonds.
4. To assemble the cake, spread the filling on the first layer, the cover with the second layer and top with filling, repeat.
5. Top the upper layer and sides of the cake with the filling.
6. Cover the cake with toasted almond flakes and finally sieve some icing sugar on top. Garnish, for example, with a fondant or marzipan rose.

Cake #86 - Courgette and Serrano Ham Cake

Savoury Saturday Cake - Courgette and Serrano Ham Cake, Served with Poached Egg.

I baked this cake only because I had just learned how to make a perfect poached egg and I needed a cake to go with one so  I could show you my new skill. It would have been a bit awkward to upload a picture of a single poached egg, wouldn't it? This is a cake challenge in a baking blog, after all.

By the way, the cake was very good! Even without the egg it would have been. It would not have looked that good, though, as the bright and nicely runny yolk made it more appealing. - Agree? I knew you would.

Courgette and Serrano Ham Cake

225 g grated courgette
½ tsp salt
300 ml plain flour
2 tsp baking powder
3 eggs
150 g cream cheese
100 ml rapeseed oil
80 g serrano ham, chopped
2 tsp dried herbs, I used parsley and basil

1. Grease and flour a Ø 20 cm springform  pan and preheat the oven to 175 C / 375 F.
2. Mix flour, salt and baking powder together.
2. Lightly whisk the eggs, milk and olive oil together in a jug.
3. Pour the liquid onto the dry ingredients and fold in.
4. Add the serrano ham and herbs together with the grated courgette.
6. Pour the batter into the cake pan and bake in the oven for 45 to 50 minutes.
7. Serve warm with poached eggs and serrano ham slices.

Cake #85 - Peanut Butter and Chocolate Chip Cake

Friends First Friday Cake - Peanut Butter and Chocolate Chip Cake.

For the Irish weather! I love you most of the time - pouring rain many days in a row can be truly inspirational but please give me a break every once and a while. 

'What an ugly cake' was my first thought when I got the pan out of the oven. 'What a truly ugly cake' was my second thought when I placed the cake on a plate and started taking pictures of it. 

But. Never judge a cake before a third thought! And first bite.

The cake looks dry but it was very moist in a nice way - not soaking wet like the Irish weather that day.

The cake looks dull and grey but it did look very appealing in real life - much more colourful than the Irish sky that day.

The cake was very tasty - far more tastier than the Irish rain water that day.

Note to self: if you think your cake looks dull, think about a grey day with pouring rain and have another look after that.

The recipe is from here. As I made a cake instead of muffins, I used a 23 cm x 23 cm square pan and baked the cake in 175 C / 375 F for about 40 minutes.

Cake #84 - Ice Cream Cat

Thursday Cat Theme Cake - Ice Cream Cat.

I do not like making cat faces on cakes because I can never get them look lively or lovely or soulful. Every now and then I try and every time the end result is just about like this one I created now. 

Which is good. Because if I ever managed to create a gorgeous and lively cat face on a cake I  could not eat it as cats are to be admired and worshipped, not to be eaten. [I am not mentioning Chinese food here, no.] Cakes, instead, are to be eaten!

Pastry

150 g butter

4 tbsp granulated sugar

350 ml plain flour

1 egg

1. Mix all ingredients together in a food processor and refrigerate for at least half an hour.

2. Divide the pastry into two balls.

3. Roll each ball into a circle, about Ø 28cm and cut the edges nicely. Use the leftovers for making the cat's ears.

4. Preheat the oven to 175 C / 350 F and bake the bases for 15-20 minutes.
5. Let cool before decorating.

I used white chocolate, milk chocolate and sprinkles for making the cat's edible face, Just before serving I scooped vanilla ice cream on the bottom layer of the cake and lifted the decorated one on top. 

Remember to eat this cake fast as the ice cream will melt in no time!

Cake #83 - Date and Walnut Cake

Wednesday Natural Ingredient / Healthy Cake - Date and Walnut Cake with Honey and Banana.

Banana cakes represent me autumn. Simply because when my younger daughter was born it was September, and a few weeks before she was actually born I started keeping bananas in the house to take some for me and The Husband to the hospital as an easy and nutritious snack when the time would come. It was a very warm autumn, back then in 2002, and the bananas got overripe too fast so I had to start making something (cakes, obviously) of the overripe ones - and keep buying new ones for the time to come. She was born one week before her due date but still it was a good few banana cakes I baked!

Date cakes, again, represent me Christmas because they remind me of the traditional Christmas Date Cake which I always bake for Christmas and which I already baked in September as cake #31 for this challenge .

In mid-November it is not quite Christmas yet but not autumn any more, either. I am definitely getting into Christmas mood more and more. So let this cake, made of both bananas and dates, be a rite of passage. A cake not autumny any more but not quite Christmassy yet. Until tomorrow comes and Christmas lights are set up all around the house. 

Recipe for this gooey cake is from here.

Cake #82 - One Sort Licorice

Tuesday Humour Cake - One Sort Licorice Cake.

Tuesday was one of those days with no inspiration whatsoever. Not even perspiration to help as it was so cold and rainy that I had to switch on constant heating in the house for a few hours - and even that did not make me feel warm.

Thanks to my local Centra I finally got the idea for my humour cake. 

I felt like buying a little bag of licorice allsorts but they had no little bags in the whole shop. Instead, they had 800 g boxes on sale - "was 8€, now 6€". Yay!  The point is that I did not open the box until when I was back home and I could actually see the various licorice and be inspired by them. If they had had the small bags in the shop I would have probably just eaten all the licorice when walking home without actually seen them. Empty bag, no inspiration.

For the cake, I baked a sponge the batter of which I coloured orange. First I thought I would just use black icing for the middle licorice part but then I got the idea of placing a cup full of licorice inside the cake and covering it with a lid - which was a digestive cookie with black icing on it. Worked out well  as a surprise element! 

PS A few days later the shop had reduced the price of the licorice boxes to 5€ so I have now a whole lot of inspiration!! And if I run out of ideas they still have a few boxes left, I just checked.

Cake #81 - Strawberry Dream Delight

Monday Mood Cake - Strawberry Dream Delight.

A miserable Monday. Pouring rain, a very grey day indeed. 

Monday afternoon my younger son (9) was still a little bitter about the Father's Day cake decorating episode when the Big Sis' (12) took over and did 99% of the work leaving the Lil Bro' crying.

So to make the miserable Monday brighter, we went to the shop after school and I let him choose something for my Monday Mood cake. 

Fresh strawberries. Yes!

When we walked home from the shop my son was very bubbly and talkative and obviously very happy that finally he could decorate a cake all by himself. He even found something positive to say about his sister.

"Mommy, you know there is one thing in the world me and her agree on. We hate the same song!"

Strawberry Dream Delight

Base
100 g butter
100 g granulated sugar
2 eggs
50 g self-raising flour
50 g ground almond
1 tsp baking powder

250 ml whipping cream¨
fresh strawberries
almond crocant crush (or grated milk chocolate)

1. Heat the oven to 200 C / 375 F and grease and flour a Ø 28cm springform pan.

2. Mix together the dry ingredients.

3. Cream together butter and sugar.

4. Add eggs and mix well.

5. Add the dry ingredients.

6. Spread the mixture onto the pan. 

7. Bake in the oven for 15-20 minutes until solid in the middle.

8. Let cool completely on a rack.

9. Whip the cream and spread over the cake.

10. Decorate the cake with strawberries and almond crocant crush or chocolate.

Cake #80 - Father's Day Cake

Sunday Traditional Cake - Father's Day Cake.

The Finnish Father's Day is celebrated the second Sunday of November.

Mystery Box ingredient used: Wienet Nougat Almond Crocant Crush.

A Father's Day cake is not that much about the recipe but about teamwork in the family. Sometimes it goes well, sometimes it does not.

I got the easiest part which was to bake the sponge so I was ready and out of the kitchen in no time. Then the Decorating Team took over. - My only requirement was that they should use the almond crocant crush as that was my last Mystery Box ingredient not used yet.

The cake itself turned out excellent with whipped cream and banana slices in the filling, and whipped cream, almond crocant crush and piped milk chocolate on top.

The teamwork turned out not-so-excellent. Every Decorating Team does need a leader but the leader should be able to delegate and not do all the work by herself. Every Decorating Team does need a leader but the leader should not kick the other team member out of the kitchen because of a slight disagreement.

Every Decorating Team leader who does not remember the above from now on shall never be a Decorating Team leader again.

But. Like I wrote earlier, the cake itself turned out excellent and we ate it all. All's well that ends well, right? Yeah, right. TBC - To Be Continued.

Cake #79 - Wild Mushroom Cake

Savoury Saturday Cake - Wild Mushroom Cake with Red Onions and Grilled Peppers Cheese.

Mystery Box ingredient used: funnel chanterelles (Craterellus tubaeformis).

Funnel chanterelle is one of my favourite wild mushrooms. And they are precious, too, when you know that a dear friend has done all the hard work picking the mushrooms fresh from the forest and drying them and then posting them all the way from Finland to Ireland. That really is a genuine present and much appreciated. Unfortunately I am not the only one in the family who likes them.

So I actually need to share them.  Nowadays even with more people as the extended family - my daughter's boyfriend - likes them, too!


Wild Mushroom Cake

Dough
300 ml lukewarm milk
25 g fresh yeast (or 7 g fast action dry yeast)
1 egg
½ tsp salt
1 tbsp sugar
800-900 ml strong white flour
75 g butter
1 red onion, chopped

Filling
30 g dried funnel chanterelles, soak in hot water for about half an hour
170 g Philadelphia Grilled Peppers cheese (or other cream cheese of your choice)
1 egg
100 g grated Mozzarella

1 egg for glazing
sesame seeds
fresh basil

1. Melt butter on a pan, caramelise the red onion in it for about 15 minutes and let cool a little.

2. Dissolve yeast in warm milk.

3. Add salt, sugar and egg and mix well.

4. Start adding flour gradually.

5. After you have kneaded in about half of the flour, add the caramelised onion and any butter from the pan.

6. Knead in more flour until your dough is not sticky any more but still soft. It is better to leave the dough a little too soft than make it too dense as the cake will be too dry and hard after baking.

7. Leave the dough to rise in a warm place until double in size, for about half an hour.

8. Line a baking tray with baking paper. 

9. Roll your dough into a rectangle, about 10 mm thick and cut it into three equal-sized rectangles.
10. Mix together all ingredients for the filling.
11. Spread half of the filling on one rectangle and place another one on top. Repeat.
12. Glaze the top layer with egg and sprinkle with sesame seeds.
13. Bake in the oven at  180 C / 375 F for about 30 minutes.
14. Garnish with fresh basil and serve when still warm.

Cake #78 - Turkish Pepper and Lime Cake

Friends First Friday Cake - Turkish Pepper and Lime Cake.

For my elder daughter who is the best toilet cleaner in the world!

Mystery Box ingredient used: crushed Turkish Pepper candies.



How can someone like cleaning toilets and be so good at it, too? 

My elder daughter, who is now 19, has probably been cleaning our toilets since she was 10 years old. Not that we would have told her to, she just seems to have an interest and motivation for it. Cleaning the toilets, yes.

The more professional she gets the more demanding she becomes. She tells me what cleaners I need to buy and she cannot complete a task if she has run out of something. 

There is not only the usual Domestos or whatever brand toilet cleaner is the best, but there is a separate spray for cleaning the shower and another one for the bathtub, and there is certain mousse for cleaning the sinks. Then you need wipes and you need window cleaner for mirrors. The colour of the toilet blocks used matters, too. And obviously we need to have lots of spare sponges and rubber gloves.

I do not mind buying the stuff she needs. They are all very affordable and they all leave a nice and fresh smell around (not that disgusting chlorite). 

What will happen the day she moves out? Will any of the younger siblings be willing to take the toilet cleaning responsibilities? I am already getting prepared and saving the shopping lists with the names of all the products with the nice smell. If the rest of us cannot learn to clean the toilets as passionately and profoundly as she does now at least we can get the right fragrances.

Turkish Pepper and Lime Cake

Batter
200 g butter
250 ml granulated sugar
3 eggs
400 ml plain flour
1 tsp baking powder
juice of two limes
50 g Turkish Pepper crush

Icing
300 ml icing sugar
1 tsp black food colouring
2-3 tsp water

3-4 tbsp Turkish Pepper crush

1. Preheat oven to 175 C / 350 F and grease and flour a 1.5-litre bundt cake pan.
2. Combine flour, baking powder and Turkish Pepper crush in a bowl.
3. Cream together butter and sugar.
4. Mix in eggs.
5. Add the dry ingredients together with the lime juice.
6. Pour the batter into the pan and bake in the oven for 40-45 minutes.
7. Let cool on a rack before removing from the pan. 
8. Mix the black icing and spread on the cake and then sprinkle Turkish Pepper crush on top.

Cake #77 - 16 Cats

Thursday Cat Theme Cake -  16 Cats. Birthday Cake for my son who turned 16 years.

Mystery Box ingredient used: licorice bars with lemon filling.

A 16-year-old is not quite a man yet but he will soon be. Nearly as tall as his dad, 20 cm taller than me. He can be talkative and again, from time to time, very quiet. He goes to the barber's by himself and decides on his hairstyle. He even changes his socks regularly. His room may not be the tidiest of all but he always knows where to find his glassed. He might have lost his bus card or earphones once or twice but they can be easily replaced. He does not hug but he loves being hugged. He does not show his feelings a lot but he has them, a lot.

He does not cook or bake but he loves my cakes from the bottom of his heart. He actually may be the reason why I started my 365 Cakes / 365 Days challenge. Last summer when he had his Junior Cert exams I promised to bake a cake each day he had an exam and so I did. I baked seven cakes.  And then he started asking for more.

16 Cats Birthday Cake

You can find the chocolate sponge and ganache recipe here.

I did not put any ganache between the layers, only on top. Between the layers I put banana slices (3 small bananas) and spread caramel sauce and whipped cream.

Caramel Sauce

200 ml cream

100 ml  dark brown sugar

100 ml muscovado sugar

2 tbsp butter

1. Place cream and sugars into a saucepan over medium heat and stir until sugars have dissolved.

2. When the mixture starts bubbling, lower the heat and keep mixing until it thickens. Usually this takes 10-15 minutes.

3. Add butter and let cool down just a little - the sauce spreads better when still warm.

For decorating the cake I chopped the lemon filled licorice bars for the cats' eyes, and to form the ears, I piped melted milk chocolate with a piping pen.

A very nice, rich cake with dark and deep flavours! 

Cake #76 - Bilberry Crumble Cake

Wednesday Natural Ingredient / Healthy Cake - Bilberry Crumble Cake.

Mystery Box ingredient used: dried bilberries.

They may be bilberries but I am not the only one calling them blueberries or wild blueberries. Just the way it was taught in English classes in primary school. Strawberry, raspberry, lingonberry, blueberry... 

Old habits die hard. Maybe I just call it the blue berry, to make it easier.

Bilberry Crumble Cake

Batter
200 g soft butter
200 ml  sugar
3 eggs
1  tsp vanilla extract
200 ml flour
2 tsp baking powder
150 ml Greek yogurt
50 g dried bilberries

Crumble
200 ml muscovado sugar
100 ml plain flour
100 ml rolled oats
100 g butter

1. Preheat oven to 175 C / 350 F.
2. Grease and flour a 1 kg loaf pan.
3. Cream together butter and sugar.
4. Add eggs and vanilla.
5. Beat in flour, baking powder and bilberries together with yogurt
6. Pour into pan and spread evenly.
7. Put all ingredients for the crumble  in a bowl and mix until it is crumbly.
8. Sprinkle on top of the cake.
9. Bake in the oven for 40-45 minutes and let cool before removing from pan.
10. Serve with Greek yogurt spiced with vanilla and mint.

Cake #75 - Happy Lemon

Tuesday Humour Cake - Happy Lemon.

Mystery Box ingredient used: white chocolate with a taste of lemon.


I love reading quotes. Especially witty ones. Sometimes they hit, sometimes they do not.

You probably know too well this one related to lemons:

When life gives you lemons, make lemonade.

But how about these ones:

If life gives you lemons, don’t settle for simply making lemonade – make a glorious scene at a lemonade stand.

When life gives you lemons, squirt someone in the eye.

When life gives you lemons, ask why not limes.

When life gives you lemons, bite them and make a funny face.

If life gives you melons, you might be dyslexic.

However, this time I am going to stick to this wonderful quote:

When life gives you lemon chocolate, bake a cake!

***

For the cake I baked two small sponges. The lemon slice is covered with melted lemon chocolate and decorated with yellow icing. The rest is covered with a mixture of whipped cream, cream cheese, sugar, lemon juice and yellow food colouring. Simple, fresh taste. Happy Lemon!

Cake #74 - Licorice Rocky Road Cake

Monday Mood Cake - Licorice Rocky Road Cake.

Feeling grateful for thoughtful friends.

The postman brought me a surprise parcel this morning from a dear friend in Finland and it really made my day as the day did not only start as a Monday but the Monday after the kids' mid-term break which is always an extra effort to get things going smoothly again.

The parcel was a really inspirational Mystery Box. To be honest, that friend of mine had hinted earlier that she might at some point send me some dried wild mushrooms she had picked herself but the rest really was a surprise and an overwhelming one, too. Thank you again, Inari!

I have always loved those cooking programmes (for example Chopped) on TV where the contestants open a Mystery Box and then they have to cook something from scratch using the ingredients in the box. Of course they do have access to some basic kitchen cupboard stuff like flour and oil and tomato puree. I find that very entertaining and inspiring, and challenging, too. Not only what the contestants actually end up making but the way they approach the ingredients in the box - if they want to play it safe or take a small or bigger risk.

So now that I got a Mystery Box of my own, I am so going to entertain you by challenging myself and use the ingredients in the box for my cakes this week.

In the box there were the following goodies:

- wild mushrooms (porcinis and funnel chanterelles)
- milk chocolate
- white chocolate with lemon taste
- dried bilberries
- almond crocant crush
- crushed pepper candies
- licorice bars with lemon filling, blueberry-raspberry filling and wild strawberry filling

I decided to start with the licorice bars with blueberry-raspberry filling (the Moomin ones) and wild strawberry filling (the Angry Birds ones) as my elder daughter had some time ago suggested that I should bake a Rocky Road cake with licorice, and these bars looked more than suitable for such a cake!

To make it a cake instead of just Rocky Road, I baked a gooey base first.

After the base had cooled down, I topped it with chopped licorice, mini marshmallows and walnuts and then covered it with milk chocolate and put it in the fridge for an hour to set. 

The cake really turned out nice. Gooey and chewy as I wanted it to be and you could taste the berrylicious licorice well which was my aim. These Finnish licorice bars really rule!

Licorice Rocky Road Cake

Base
150 g butter
150 ml soft brown sugar
100 ml granulated sugar
2 egg yolks
1 egg
100 g milk chocolate, melted
300 ml plain flour
1 tsp baking powder

Rocky Road Filling
200 g milk chocolate, melted
100 g (your favourite) licorice, chopped
100 g mini marshmallows
50 g walnuts, chopped

1. Preheat the oven to 175 C / 350 F.
2. Cream together butter and sugars.
3. Add yolks and egg and mix well.
4. Mix together flour and baking powder and add to the butter-sugar-egg mix together with the melted chocolate.
5. Line a square cake pan 23 cm x 23 cm with baking paper. My favourite way to do this is to wet a piece of baking paper and crumple it into a ball to get rid of the excess water and make it softer so it is easier to line the form.
6. Spoon the batter evenly in the pan and bake in the oven for about 20 minutes. The base needs to be left a little sticky.
7. Let the base cool but do not remove it from the pan.
8. Spread some melted chocolate on the base and then evenly licorice, marshmallows and walnuts. Pour the rest of the chocolate on top evenly and press a little.
9. Place the pan in the fridge for an hour before serving.

Cake #73 - Pavlova

Sunday Classic Cake - Pavlova.

Light and fluffy. Elegant. Classy.

The Husband was cooking Chili con Carne for Sunday dinner, and he baked baguettes, too, so I thought I would not bake anything heavy for my Sunday cake. Pavlova seemed like the perfect choice and it was one, too! 

Pavlova reminds me of Pavlov. Which reminds me that I have not told you about the Pavlovian conditioning happening in my family. Nowadays, whenever a family member sees me holding a bowl in my hand (I may be emptying the dishwasher and therefore holding one) they eagerly ask me what cake (note, cake - they always say cake) I am baking today and when it is ready. This did not happen before my 365 Cakes / 365 Days challenge. I have always baked a lot but not until now the family has been madly interested in my bakings other than the edible results nicely set in front of them, and certainly the default has not been cake, but cookies, buns, donuts.

What will happen after the last cake for this challenge is baked?

The recipe for this Pavlova Cake is from here. Instead of berries, I used canned peaches and pears, and fresh pineapple, pomegranate seeds and bananas.