“We need an anniversary cake for the ten-year magazine!” That was the request of the editors, and that’s why this time there is a recipe for a number cake so that you can wish all birthday children and anniversaries on every imaginable anniversary for the rest of your life . However, you will have a lot of work if the year numbers then have three digits.
First, make number templates to cut out on A4 paper. The easiest way to do this is with files for printing from the Internet. For example, enter in the search: “Number cake for printing”.
In the end, there are three rows
The bottom line, i.e. the width of a “number leg”, should be a good five centimeters. If necessary, make a sketch with which you can plan the decoration of the cake in advance. The offer on the shelves with baking ingredients is diverse, or you can take, for example, berries, sweets, small figurines and cake candles. It becomes particularly noble with edible gold leaf and dried flowers.
You can easily print out the templates for the cake yourself.
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Image: Claus Eckert
Make a shortcrust pastry using the ingredients mentioned. To do this, sift the flour and powdered sugar into the mixing bowl of a food processor and mix with the ground almonds and the pinch of salt. Add the beaten eggs and vanilla extract to the slow-speed machine, then add the very cold butter, diced into about 1/2-inch chunks. As soon as the butter and other ingredients combine, take the dough out of the bowl and continue kneading it with your hands, forming a ball, which you now wrap in cling film and put in the fridge for at least 30 minutes or keep until further processing.
The cream dabs look good on the shortcrust pastry.
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Image: Claus Eckert
For the cream, also use the food processor to mix cream cheese and sifted powdered sugar, add vanilla extract, salt and the quark. When everything is smooth, gradually pour in the cream and the whipped cream from time to time at a higher speed, stirring everything until you have a firm cream. It must have “stand”, after all it is the filling and the topping of the shortcrust pastry base. Refrigerate.
You will need each of the two numbers twice, as a base and as a top. (Unless you want to make a three-tier cake.) Take a quarter of the now-cooled dough and, with the help of a little flour, roll it out into a five millimeter thick plate. Place the cut-out template on top and cut out the desired number with a sharp, pointed knife. (The pieces of dough can be used later to bake biscuits or a tarte tatin.)
Do the same for the other digits and place them back in the freezer on a flat surface for another 30 minutes. Then bake them for about 15 to 17 minutes at 170 degrees until they look appetizingly light brown. Let cool down. Of course, great care must be taken before and after baking so that you do not produce fractional numbers.
Now fill the cream in a piping bag with a wide nozzle and place balls of cream, about 15 millimeters wide, close together along the outer edges of the two bottom dials and another row in between. So in the end there are three rows. With another piping bag, for example a plastic bag, with a corner cut off about five millimeters wide, you can now pipe smoothened jam between the dots of cream. Now place the upper shortcrust pastry base on the cream layer and apply the cream dots evenly in rows of three. Diligence pays off here, because this is the front side, which you now provide with the decor you have chosen.