strawberry charlotte magic

I have to admit - I am not first friends with the charlotte cake, especially since the first time I made it, it tricked me and did not solidify. Desperate times requiring adequate measures lured me into transforming it very conveniently into "strawberry ice-cream cake-with-some-swimming-biscotti"; but I knew I would come back to tame this wild child into a pretty cake. I do not accept defeat, neither do I give up, so here we are with my second attempt for "charlotte aux fraises". This time it proved irresistible, smooth and b-e-a-t-i-f-u-l

Ingredients

(adapted from Eva Toneva)

400g strawberries

10g powder gelatine

200g biscotti

100g powder sugar

400ml liquid cream (40%)

several introductory notes:

-my round cake form is 18cm, if yours is different form you may need to adjust the ingredients

-don't fool yourself that you can use the whole biscotti biscuit, cut each one in two, plus for better results don't surround-cover the form with them before you pour the liquid (my personal experience shows they always sink inside or get to moist)

-instead cover the whole form with aluminium foil on the inside (i only covered the bottom this time)

preparation:

dissolve the gelatine like it is described on the package and cover the form with aluminium foil, if you so wish make a round and cover the form with biscotti cut in half, next time i will skip this step :)

half or lil bit more of the strawberries are pureed with two tbsp of powder sugar until smooth; warm the puree on low fire until warm-to-become-hot and then dissolve the gelatine in the puree and let the mixture cool off to room temperature.

then gradually beat the cream, mix in the powder sugar that is left and beat the cream again until hard, but creamy. Add one-two tablespoons of cream to the puree and stir until smooth, then gradually add the strawberry/gelatine puree into the beaten cream, keeping it as creamy as possible.

pour the mixture into the form, cover with aluminium foil and leave in the fridge for at least 4 hours.

then open the form and remove the aluminium foil, put in the plate where you will serve; now since, I did not like the looks of my biscotti I added an extra layer around the cake, tightening the cake with a ribbon to hold it.

then decoration goes as far as imagination - i topped my charlotte with sliced strawberries and a row of crunched dark chocolate & hazelnuts around the biscotti to cover whatever little holes there were :)

I would also like to use this post to brag off with my latest tea addiction (which can easily be transformed into summer ice tea) - green tea with pomegranate and cranberry from the "English Tea Shop" brand; really, I love each one of those white smooth packages with a cute teapot on them; the taste of the tea is also very superb - smooth, almost creamy, all in all extremely delightful :)

first and foremost, however, you should enjoy this princess of a cake - it is pretty cute, incredibly smooth in taste and has to be quickly devoured for an ultimate enjoyment :)

I will probably also try other variations of the charlotte cake, and how do you find it? :)