Apricot Cake

Apricot Cake

I am very excited about my new dessert. It is apricot cake, marzipan, chamomile, lemon balm ice cream. It is pretty much summer and one of my favorite summer ingredients are apricots. I love all stone fruits, cherries, peaches, etc.  The focal point of the dish is the apricot. The cake is a pound cake, but made with about 40 % apricot puree. The outside of the cake is an intense apricot gel. I learned a great technique from chef Alex Stupak when I was working on the wd-50 kitchen. He made a cheesecake covered in a pineapple gel. The gelling agent in the pineapple gel was pectin NH. Unlike regular pectin, pectin NH only gels in the presence of calcium. The cheesecake contained a high ratio of calcium. Small dollops of the cheesecake would be dropped in the pectin liquid and a thin gel would set on the outside of the cheesecake. I really wanted to try this technique with a cake. I was able to add a ratio of calcium lactate to the cake batter and then soak them in an apricot bath that contained the pectin NH. Even after the cake was baked, it worked beautifully. A very thin, intensely flavored apricot gel set, very thinly, completely around the cake. Not only does it taste great, but the gel actually keeps the inside of the cake very moist. I was very happy with the results.

One of my favorite flavor combinations is stone fruit and almonds, especially apricots. I really enjoy pairing apricots with almonds but also with amaretto. Amaretto is often described as tasting like almond but in reality is made from the pits of stone fruits. (almonds also technically come from the pit of a fruit) Marzipan and artificial almond flavor have a strange synthetic flavor but they trigger a flavor memory of amaretto. I hate the texture of marzipan. It reminds me of play-dough and marzipan based confection never taste that great. In this dish I decided to make a marzipan gel and dehydrate it to achieve a very delicate, crunchy texture (like a potato chip). It is paper thin but packed full of intense almond, amaretto flavor. The dish also has a caramel made with amaretto. To accent the floral notes of the apricot I added chamomile to the dish. I pulsed dried chamomile flowers and made a shortbread-esque streusel, that is very buttery but also very floral. I love chamomile and lemon balm so a lemon balm ice cream was only fitting. Lemon balm is in the mint family but it has a "pine-sol" smell to it. When steeped in cream, it gives the cream mild floral, lemon flavor notes that rounds out the entire dish. The dish is garnished with some flowers and some compressed apricots as well.

Here is the recipe for the Apricot Cake

Apricot Cake

Yield: 1 half sheet tray

226 g butter (melted but cool)
202 g whole eggs (room temperature)

500 g apricot puree (strained and room temperature)
100 g creme de peche (or any onther apricot/ peach liquor)

500 g sugar
450 g cake flour
20 g baking powder
4 g salt


- In a blender, blend the apricot puree, liquor, melted butter, and eggs until emulsified. Transfer to a bowl
- Sift all the dry ingredients and fold into the liquids
- Pour batter into prepared half sheet tray and bake at 350 in a convection for 22 minutes