summer mango celebration cake

This week has given me many reasons to be happy.

First and foremost, my pup Snoopy whom most of you know was recently diagnosed with lymphoma, he is now on chemo and doing much better.

Second, my column A Brown Kitchen, turned two last week and this week I am celebrating with this over the top mango cake. There are three different layers of mango in this cake and with some help from my pal, Stella Parks of BraveTart at Serious Eats (who is pastry magician), I’ve used freeze-dried mangoes to make the buttercream and the cake. Canned mangoes were used for the curd that sits in between the two layers of cake. This is a mango lovers dream come true (mine 🙂 ) . The two cakes are made with crushed freeze-dried mangoes and cardamom, then filled with a canned mango lime curd (try to use Kesar or Alphonso Mango canned pulp from India otherwise go with ripe flavorful mangoes that you love) and finally a mango saffron buttercream frosting to add that extra edge of luxuriousness. You can get the recipe here at my column. Also this mango-lime curd is cornstarch based unlike the last mango curd recipe I shared here, this cornstarch version is stronger when it comes to holding the weight of the cake and I prefer it for this use. 

And finally, my upcoming book, SEASON was just listed by Kitchen Arts and Letters in NYC as one of the top cookbooks to look forward to this Fall. It was all I could do to keep calm and not jump up and down the room since this is one of the important cookbook lists, one that I’ve personally used in the past when I’m looking to see what’s new and coming up. You can read all about the Fall 2018 cookbook list here , they also wrote an important follow up here explaining what went into their decision making process and what cookbook season looks like in Fall.  What a wonderful way to start the week and I couldn’t be happier! As always, thank you for your support and I couldn’t be more grateful!

XO 

Nik