Recipe: Glaced Petit Fours

These little cakes have been a favourite of mine since I was a kid but when I arrived in France I found that what I thought named a single sweet treat was in fact a much more general term.  In fact Petit Fours in French translates literally to, well,  'small ovens' but is used to describe a variety of mini baked treats.  After a bit of research I tried to recreate what I knew to be a tasty dessert for a special occasion and a perfect dessert for an apero-dinatoire (cocktail party with many bite sized meal) with friends.  

To begin I needed a good almond sponge cake and found a good recipe for oh-so-English Battenburg cake and went from there.  A little jam, marzipan and fondant glaze et voila! Cute little cakes to add to the buffet table.

Recipe

Cake

175g butter, room temperature

175g sugar

140g self-rising flour

50g almond powder

1/2 tsp baking powder

3 eggs, large

1/2 tsp vanilla extract

1/4 tsp almond extract

Assembly

1 jar of seedless raspberry jam

175-250g marzipan

Glaze

750g powdered sugar

juice of one lemon

warm water

3 tbsp maple, corn or golden syrup

Mix all the ingredients for the cake together until smooth. Spread evenly into a greased and floured baking sheet and bake at 180°C/350°F for 15 mins or until a toothpick stuck in the middle comes out clean.  Let the cake cool and once at room temperature place in in the fridge until completely cold.  I made the cake the day before so it would be nice and cold and easier to cut and fill the next day.

Once ready to cut and fill, cut the cake down the middle and then each piece into two layers.  I wanted a three layer cake so I used three of the layers for one cake and cut the fourth layer piece into three equal pieces to make a second smaller cake. 

Spread a layer of jam between each cake then wrap the cakes in film and cool in the fridge again for about an hour. 

Once ready, powder a surface and your rolling pin with powdered sugar and roll out the marzipan to about 2 mm thick.  Place the marzipan of approximate size over the cake spread with another thin layer of jam and use some kitchen scissors to cut to the size of the cake.  Repeat for the second mini cake.

Cut the cake into somewhat equal squares.  Now its time to mix up the syrup, powdered sugar, lemon juice and a bit of water.  Add more water if necessary but not too much, a thicker consistancy is better then one that is too thin.  Something like the consistancy of warm honey should do.

If you want several colors you can seperate the fondant glaze into two bowls and color with just a bit of food coloring.  

I placed each cake on a fork and put it over the bowl of fondant and used a spoon to cover each piece.  This part is a bit tricky but takes some getting used too.  After one coat I placed each cake on a grill in a tray and put it back in the fridge to set.  Then repeat for a second coat.  This really helps make it look more opaque.

Et voila! You can add a little decor on top and then ready to serve!

What do you think?