The last (or first) item I prepared for my Downton Abbey finale party was dessert.
Namely, I used the party as an opportunity to make petits fours – small, baked cakes in a homemade fondant glaze. The petits fours were definitely the most time-consuming of my party offerings, with me starting the preparations about 36 hours in advance of the actual finale viewing. While I wasn't entirely pleased with the outcome (more details below), this attempt was certainly a major step forward for my baking career.
My guide throughout this process was the exceedingly clear and helpful King Arthur Flour (KAF) Petits Fours with Poured Fondant Icing guide.
I started the process by baking a sheet cake, and chose the KAF chocolate cake recipe as my base.
The only change I made to the cake recipe was to bake the cake for approx. 31 minutes because the 28 – 30 minutes didn't seem quite enough for the cake to settle.
I then froze the cake overnight, per the KAF guide, to make it easier to cut the cake into the shapes I wanted.
I thawed the cake the next day in the fridge for 15 minutes before preparing the cake for cutting. Per the picture below, I tried to smooth the top of the cake a bit for an even, flat surface to pour the icing over.
And so began the cutting…which was difficult, to say the least. I think the biscuit cutters I used were not the best, most sharp instruments for the cake cutting. The cake itself also had a lot of air pockets, which made cutting even cakes that much more difficult.
I also should have made smaller cakes for better control and consistency (mine were maybe 1.5 inches in diameter). But ultimately, the mini-cakes – from the top at least, turned out ok.
I then began the process of cutting the cakes in thirds to put in some simple whipped cream filling, which also wasn't as easy as I would have hoped because of the air pockets in the cake.
A thicker, sticky filling like a fruit compote probably would have been better then whipped cream to bind the cakes together. With the whipped cream, the cake pieces were a bit slippery and didn't quite help make one, combined cake to make frosting easier.
I then refroze the cakes as I prepared the KAF Poured Fondant Icing, which was relatively straightforward to prepare, but without a handy candy thermometer I had to guess what the best consistency for the icing was. I added a few drops of blue food coloring for a pastel blue frosting.
Now began the hardest part of the process – getting an even layer of the poured frosting on the cakes, without a dipping fork or a plastic fork large enough to hold these slightly too-large cakes. It was a messy, laborious process, though the outcome looked good from the top of the cakes (accented with some sparkly green sprinkles).
The sides were another story…
Before serving is also where the process got a bit tricky. I wanted to keep the whipped cream frosting chilled, but poured fondant is not supposed to go in the fridge. I was ultimately more worried about food spoilage, so refrigerated the cakes a few hours before serving, which ultimately didn't hurt the frosting consistency.
Would I make petits fours again? Maybe. I think I would need smaller cakes, a different cake batter (or more whipped one without the air bubbles), perhaps an altered frosting (the fondant was super, super sweet), and a different, stickier filling besides whipped cream. That may result in both a better looking and less time consuming party dessert.
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