Strawberry Ricotta Cake and Scott’s Strawberry Sauce

in Cakes & Cupcakes, Cherries & Berries, Project Pastry Queen, Strawberries

Strawberry Ricotta Cake with Scott's Strawberry Sauce

Amanda chose this week’s Project Pastry Queen challenge, Strawberry Ricotta Cake. A trifle of angel food cake and a sweet ricotta filling, covered in whipped frosting and sliced strawberries.

I have no idea how I’ve skipped over this recipe the countless times I’ve flipped through the book… but I heard angels singing the second I realized what it was.

Almost 4 years ago (I actually know the exact date, July 14, 2007, because Gmail never forgets anything), I polished off two helpings of the best strawberry-angel food cake dessert that I’ve ever eaten, courtesy of our friends Brooke & Scott. They showed up with a heavenly trifle made with angel food cake, cream cheese, whipped cream, and Scott’s Strawberry Sauce. It’s the sauce that made the dessert so awesome. So I couldn’t make Strawberry Ricotta Cake without trying to recreate the sauce.

I made a few changes to The Pastry Queen’s recipe:
– I only used 1 15oz container of ricotta in the filling
– I added 8oz cream cheese to the filling
– I put a layer of Scott’s Strawberry Sauce (recipe below) down before each addition of The Pastry Queen’s filling.

The angel food cake part of the recipe is awesome. And that’s coming from someone whose favorite part of angel food cake is whatever you put on top of it 🙂 The citrus really brings an otherwise boring (and usually too dry) dessert alive.

A couple of issues/recommendations:
– The assembled cake felt… loose. Unstable. I actually put it in the freezer for an hour after assembling (but pre-frosting) thinking that would help things along. I feel like this could be solved by either (1) making it the night before and letting the cake absorb more of the liquid from the filling or (2) reduce the ricotta in the filling even more (I’d already reduced 4 cups down to 3). Heck, maybe even more powdered sugar in the filling would have helped.
– Make sure you buy too many strawberries because it took more than recommended to cover the outside of the cake.
– I doubled the powdered sugar in the frosting and whipped it passed the recommended soft peaks.
– Make Scott’s Strawberry Sauce. Really. It’s completely worth it.

Scott's Strawberry Sauce

Brown sugar and banana rum add layers of flavor to an ordinary strawberry sauce.

Ingredients

  • 2 Tbsp butter
  • 2 Tbsp brown sugar, packed
  • 1/4 cup banana rum (I used half rum, half creme de banana)
  • 1lb strawberries, hulled and quartered
  • pinch of salt

Instructions

  1. Heat butter in a medium sauce pan over medium heat.
  2. Stir in brown sugar until dissolved.
  3. Take pan off the cooktop, add liquor, and return to the burner.
  4. Add strawberries and a pinch of salt and cook, stirring occasionally and squashing any large strawberry chunks with a spoon.
  5. Cook until almost all of the liquid has evaporated and turn off the heat.
  6. Use warm, cold, and store any leftovers in the fridge for up to a week.

Notes

Yields: ~1 1/4 cups

Source: Confections of a Foodie Bride

Estimated time: 30 minutes

30 comments… add one
  • Mmm, that sauce sounds fantastic! I wish I’d had the recipe when I made the cake! 😛 Thanks for baking with me! 🙂

  • This looks awesome! My mom’s favorite cake is angel food; I think I have a new twist for her birthday this year. Love the idea of the strawberry sauce – sounds delicious!!

  • cake looks gorgeous,

  • That looks amazing! I love how you made it a dome =D.

  • I am so incredibly enticed by the filling in this cake, especially since you added cream cheese to it! And the special sauce…so this is what love at first sight feels like.

  • I’ve never been a giant fan of strawberries (blasphemy!!!), but this I would absolutely try!!!!!

  • this looks delicious! where is the recipe to the actual cake?

  • So beautiful! Looking forward to trying this when strawberries come into season here!

  • Absolutely gorgeous!

  • This cake was so so pretty – and I LOVE this strawberry sauce. Plus it gives us another use for the banana liqueur. I’m tempted to whip it up for the leftover cake 🙂

  • Such a pretty cake!

  • What a pretty cake! 🙂 Congrats on making Top 9! 🙂

  • I love the beauty of this, and the flavours sound fabulous too 🙂

  • Christin Lux Julian

    I like you on Facebook!

  • Christin Lux Julian

    I am following you on Twitter!

  • beautiful cake! love your presentation and the filling!

  • Absolutely gorgeous photo! Really makes me want to dig right into that cake. Congrats on the being in the top 9!

  • Cynthia Soll

    I liked you on Facebook.

  • Following you on Twitter!

  • That is stunning! I love ricotta.

  • karen

    my husbands favorite dessert; beer cake!! and cream cheese frosting of course!! i also like you on face book 😉

  • Colorful and gorgeous! A well deserved spot on the top 9! Congratulations!

  • Oh wow! This is gorgeous! If it tastes half as good as it looks then I bet it is delicious!

  • your cake looks beautiful!!

  • This looks unbelievable! Any chance you can email me the original recipe? I’m hosting a dinner party this weekend and would looooove to make it for dessert. Perfect for summer!

  • Elizabeth

    Thank you for making this cake. I have Rebecca’s book but there was no picture of this cake, and I could not figure out how to put the strawberries around the cake. This cake is gorgeous!

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