July Daring Bakers Challenge Revealed

This was my third Daring Kitchen challenge and I keep waiting for the perverbial ax to fall. I have yet to have a disaster with the challenges (knock on wood). This month's challenge was to make a strawberry frasier. Not only does this cake look pretty, it tastes amazing!! (Eric said it was his favorite cake I've ever made ... and that's saying something considering it doesn't have frosting on it and frosting is the real reason he eats cake!)

The cake is a chiffon cake that is split, drowned in simple syrup, and filled with pastry cream and strawberries. One key is the strawberries must show along the outer edge of the cake. In order to have the strawberries exposed along the edge, I lined the springform pan sides with Saran Wrap (which proved to be the hardest part of the challenge) and then placed the strawberries and held them in place with the pastry cream. When I make the cake in the future, I think I'll wrap the pan with parchment paper instead of Saran. After allowing the cake to set for a few hours in the fridge, I removed the springform side and was thrilled to see the cake kept its form ... and looked mighty pretty.

Jana of Cherry Tea Cakes was our July Daring Bakers' host and she challenges us to make Fresh Frasiers inspired by recipes written by Elisabeth M. Prueitt and Chad Robertson in the beautiful cookbook Tartine.

Ta da!