The beauty of making this mouthwatering dessert the day before is that all you have to do on the day is serve and enjoy.

Recipe Rosa Matto | Photograph Brendan Homan | Styling Natalie Homan

Honey and coffee spice cake with coffee ‘schiuma’ and coffee syrup
Prepare this cake entirely the day before you want to serve it.

honey biscuits
1 tsp good quality instant coffee (I used Lavazza)
50g raw sugar
200g honey
115g unsalted butter
3 large eggs, beaten
½ tsp vanilla seeds scraped from a pod or 1 tsp vanilla paste
1 tsp bicarb soda
1 tsp ground cardamom
1 tsp ground cinnamon
610g plain flour, plus extra for dusting

In a small saucepan, dissolve the coffee, sugar, honey and butter over low heat. Allow it to cool, then whisk in the beaten eggs and vanilla.

Meanwhile, sift together the bicarb soda, spices and flour. Add the dry ingredients to the wet mixture very gradually, folding in with a large metal spoon. Do this in four or five lots, folding in until the dough is soft and pliable.

Cut the dough into 8 even pieces of about 140g each. Take one piece and roll it out on a well-floured board to fit a square cake tin 20x20cm (roll each piece just shy of 20cm so that it slips into the tin easily at the end). The dough will be quite sticky so flour your rolling pin as well as the bench. Each square should be thin, no more than 2.5mm thick. Prick the dough all over with a fork.

Repeat with a second piece of dough and bake on baking paper lined trays in a preheated oven at 180C for 4 minutes. Carefully, remove to a wire rack while you continue to roll all eight pieces. Keep all the off-cuts until the end.

Finally, arrange the scraps on baking paper and bake for 5 minutes. When they are cool, pulse in a food processor to fine crumbs. Set aside.

cream filling
300ml thickened cream
750g sour cream
220g icing sugar
3 tsp excellent quality instant coffee
1 tsp cardamom
½ tsp scraped vanilla seeds from a pod or 1 tsp vanilla paste

Whisk the thickened cream into stiff peaks. In a separate bowl, whisk together the sour cream, icing sugar, coffee, cardamom and vanilla. Using a spatula, combine the two creams until fully amalgamated.

To assemble the cake, line an 8cm deep 20x20cm cake tin with baking paper, leaving enough overhang to help you get the finished cake out.

Put one biscuit layer in the bottom and spread it with roughly 100ml of cream filling mixture. Pop a second layer of honey biscuit on top. Repeat with the remaining layers, pressing them down very gently as you go. The top layer will have the remaining cream. To finish, sprinkle all but 1 cup of crumbs over the top. Loosely cover and chill overnight.

When ready to cut, manoeuvre the cake out of the tin and sprinkle with the remaining crumbs. Serve with coffee ‘schiuma’ and coffee syrup.

schiuma
2 tbsp good quality instant coffee
200ml water
100g caster sugar

Put all ingredients in the bowl of an electric whisk. Whisk at low speed for 2 minutes then on high for 5-7 minutes or until it is mousse-like.

Serve immediately or within the next few hours. If the mixture separates on standing, whisk on high speed again for a few minutes.

coffee syrup
Reduce 1 cup strong espresso coffee with 1 tbsp sugar until it is thick and syrupy.

This recipe first appeared in the August 2021 issue of SALIFE magazine.