The Opera Cake Goes Lemon and Lavender
When the hosts of the month for Daring Bakers are none other than the intrepid founders themselves, Ivonne and Lis, you know it will be something special indeed. These two lovely ladies who have created the web's most wonderful baking community, along with Fran of Apple Peaches Pumpkin Pie and Shea of Whiskful chose a beautiful and very apropos challenge for all who dare to bake: the Opera cake.
The very first time I made opera cake in pastry school, I felt like I'd scaled a baker's Everest, one made of cake and chocolate and cream and sugar. Like all the hard-core classics of French pâtisserie, opera cake offers a full-scale obstacle course to surmount: whipping egg whites, making joconde, mixing up buttercream, assembling multiple centimeter-thin layers of cake...anyone who finishes an opera cake should certainly feel the happy glow of accomplishment!
There's so much to learn from the opera cake: for example, the joconde is an almond genoise. Genoise is the French form of sponge or chiffon cake; these cakes are distinguished by the lack of leaveners in their batter. The only leavening in these cakes comes from the air whipped into the egg whites or eggs, which gives an added dimension to what's going on when you turn on your mixer. Unlike classic butter cakes, where you simply combine all the ingredients with a bit of baking powder or soda and let the chemicals do their thing in the oven, when making a genoise awareness of your actions becomes paramount. If you don't whip the eggs enough, there won't be enough air in the batter to let it rise. If you fold the ingredients together too roughly or let the batter sit out too long, you risk letting the air bubbles deflate, again losing that critical component of a genoise.
Some may prefer the robust, gloriously thick butter cake of American layer cake fame to the finicky, delicate sheets of genoise, but I find they both have their unique charms. Genoises are essential to the refined elegance of petit fours and other tea-time pastries; with the French penchant for individual-sized cakelets, you need thin, light layers for an effective presentation. The classic opera cake, which is composed of seven layers of cake, buttercream, and ganache, should be less that 1.5 inches total in height, meaning you've got to be pretty precise with all your pieces.
Then there's the buttercream: Ivonne and Lis chose a rich French buttercream for the opera cake filling. French buttercream is always a favorite because of its creamy, buttery flavor, but it can also melt faster because of its high fat content - I think I saw several DBs commenting on the softness of the buttercream. You need to work quickly with this buttercream, and don't be afraid to chill it if it's getting too soft. Myself, I tend to be more partial to the Italian meringue buttercream, because it's more stable and workable, and because it forces me to get over my fears about sugar cookery. Whichever form of buttercream you use, be sure to keep the layers of buttercream about the same thickness as the genoise layers - the genius of opera cake is the balance of textures and flavors between all the various components.
Finally, the top: classic opera cake is indelibly distinguished by its glossy smooth chocolate topping and swooping "l'Opera" writ in chocolate across the surface. But these days, all the classics are being interpreted and re-invented, and it's not surprising to find opera cake in all guises. I have to say one of my favorite versions is still Sadaharu Aoki's matcha version, which I tried to recreate. Ivonne and Lis specified a light-colored theme for the Daring Bakers challenge, and generously let us play around with flavors of our choosing. My mind immediately drifted to a lemon-lavender theme, and that's where I ended up: an opera cake brushed with lemon simple syrup, layered with lemon buttercream, and topped with lavender white chocolate mousse. Sweet, springy, and still lusciously decadent: I'd like to think French would approve of the modifications!
*By the way, for those that had trouble with making the white chocolate ganache mousse, I think the reason is that making a ganache with white chocolate and cream is quite different from making a ganache with dark chocolate. White chocolate is almost all fat, as is cream. Combining so much fat together can be almost impossible; overagitating the mixture will result in a clumpy curdled mess. The best strategy is to keep the cream and chocolate as cool as possible. Whip the cream to soft peaks, and then fold the melted chocolate in by hand. You can chill the mixture in the refrigerator to firm it up; this method is safer than trying to whip the ingredients together.
I always enjoy an opportunity to remake this pastry classic, and I especially enjoyed doing with all my fellow Daring Bakers! Thanks to Ivonne and Lis for creating the DB version of the opera cake - and for inspiring hundreds of beautiful and scrumptious variants of this fabulous dessert!
This lemon and lavender opera cake is also dedicated to Barbara of winosandfoodies. Barbara is the founder of A Taste of Yellow, and I'm glad to have an appropriately-hued dessert to celebrate LiveStrong Day!
Tagged with: opera cake + lemon lavender + daring bakers + LiveStrong Day
Your cakes look stunning. I too went the lemon and lavender route, great flavour combo.
Posted by: Katie | May 28, 2008 at 12:39 AM
Your cake looks just fabulous! Great Job!
Posted by: Dharm | May 28, 2008 at 01:00 AM
Your cake looks perfect and absolutely delicious! A great combination of flavors!
Cheers,
Rosa
Posted by: Rosa | May 28, 2008 at 01:00 AM
I love the photo and the little flowers. :)
Posted by: Sara, Ms. Adventures in Italy | May 28, 2008 at 01:12 AM
I knew yours would be fabulous Anita...and I was right.
Posted by: peabody | May 28, 2008 at 01:42 AM
Wow! I'm in awe, what a gorgeous professional cake!
Thanks for the info on all the components, it gave me so much more insight. The only thing I need to find out is why my cakes always fall... as in: always. Sigh.
Posted by: Baking Soda | May 28, 2008 at 01:58 AM
Beautiful result! Gorgeous photos!
Posted by: Aran | May 28, 2008 at 03:38 AM
So delicate...
Posted by: Clumbsy Cookie | May 28, 2008 at 03:43 AM
Outstanding! You deserve a standing ovation for your opera cake.
Posted by: Laura Rebecca | May 28, 2008 at 04:28 AM
so elegant!
Posted by: kat | May 28, 2008 at 04:35 AM
Amazing, vraiment merveilleux !
Bravo !
Anne
Posted by: foodie froggy | May 28, 2008 at 04:48 AM
Even though I'm not a member of the Daring Bakers, and probably wouldn't try making this cake, I really appreciated your description and explanation of all of the methods used and their background. In particular, your explanation about white chocolate ganache was so useful to me as I always seem to end up with a mess! Thanks for the tips!
Posted by: dlb | May 28, 2008 at 05:05 AM
Your cake looks great! I love the tiny flowers.
Posted by: Dianne | May 28, 2008 at 06:07 AM
Looks fabulous Anita! lemon lavender is a fantastic combo!
Posted by: veron | May 28, 2008 at 06:26 AM
Sounds like a lot of work went into this one. It is gorgeous and looks perfect. Great work!
Posted by: Maria | May 28, 2008 at 06:57 AM
beautiful. simple. stunning.
Posted by: sarah | May 28, 2008 at 07:41 AM
Yum! Your Opera cake is so pretty...great combo of flavors!
Posted by: sara | May 28, 2008 at 07:45 AM
Beautiful! And thank you for all the words of wisdom on the making of this cake.
Posted by: Susan/Wild Yeast | May 28, 2008 at 08:16 AM
It's simply stunning, Anita.. I knew it would be. Yours was one that I'd been waiting all month for. :)
I love the tips in your post as well.. thank you so much!
Hugs sweetie!
xoxoxoxo
Posted by: Lisa | May 28, 2008 at 08:44 AM
Anita,
We're so glad that you have the opportunity to make this over and over again because you're so good at it. Really. It's stunning!
Posted by: Ivonne | May 28, 2008 at 09:08 AM
Those look absolutely perfect! Fantastic job!
Posted by: one spicy mama | May 28, 2008 at 09:15 AM
GORGEOUS! I'm dying to know how you got the top so even and FLAT! Your cake is so pretty. Love the lavender/lemon combo too...
Posted by: Lesley | May 28, 2008 at 09:15 AM
Gorgeous!
Posted by: Kim U | May 28, 2008 at 09:23 AM
They look extremely delicate, Anita. I love the photos!
Posted by: Patricia Scarpin | May 28, 2008 at 09:38 AM
Anita your challenges are always so lovely to look at and I'll bet the taste even better! Not to mention the lemon and lavender combo sounds particularly light and refreshing.
Posted by: breadchick | May 28, 2008 at 09:54 AM
Oh my God so beautiful and delicate
Posted by: Faery | May 28, 2008 at 10:08 AM
lemon lavender is one of my favorite combos. yum! and so pretty!
Posted by: kate | May 28, 2008 at 10:22 AM
As always, your blog looks delectable!
Posted by: Lauren | May 28, 2008 at 10:24 AM
your cake looks so good, i love the way you have presented it.
Posted by: Medhaa | May 28, 2008 at 10:51 AM
Beautiful cakes! And thank you, thank you for the great tip on the ganache mousse!
Posted by: Madam Chow | May 28, 2008 at 11:28 AM
Your cakes look amazing. I love the taste of lavender and lemon.
Posted by: Mary | May 28, 2008 at 11:47 AM
Beautiful, and so neat!
Posted by: Jennywenny | May 28, 2008 at 12:26 PM
Your cakes look absolutely flawless! Just beautiful! I'm new to your blog, but definitely a new fan! Thanks for sharing!
Posted by: Joy the Baker | May 28, 2008 at 12:34 PM
I love the elegant simplicity of your Opera Cake.Stunning, thanks for the lesson info. Great flavors.
Posted by: Kim | May 28, 2008 at 12:43 PM
Wow! I also made a lemon opera cake (gluten free) but had trouble with the buttercream. I did not get the symmetry like you did. Thanks for all the great tips. I am sure to get it right next time.
Posted by: Natalie | May 28, 2008 at 12:51 PM
I like your opera cake! It is so neat and subtle.
Posted by: Francijn | May 28, 2008 at 01:51 PM
I love the way you decorated your opera cake! So simple yet elegant.
Posted by: Hillary | May 28, 2008 at 01:52 PM
looks so beautiful and delicate! and i love your flavor combination...i'm certain the french would approve!
Posted by: steph (whisk/spoon) | May 28, 2008 at 03:30 PM
your petite lemon lavender opera cakes are just too cute to eat, thumbs up for you! :D
making opera cake just involves so many steps that i felt so accomplished too when we made it in pastry school, even though the cake looked ugly.
Posted by: Verena | May 28, 2008 at 03:43 PM
hmmm lemon and lavendar. Great presentation. Very elegant.
Posted by: Lori | May 28, 2008 at 05:29 PM