Japanese Strawberries + Doberge Cake
I woke up early this morning (like every morning) to an Instagram gift. My local Japanese grocery store had Amaou strawberries. Grown in Fukuoka, these strawberries are stunning, perfectly ripe all the way through the fruit and have peak summer season acidity. Here is a great article about them from Bokksu. Bokksu is a Japanese snack subscription service that I am addicted too. Claire gave it to me for my birthday and I look forward to devouring it monthly.
“Its name is an acronym derived from the best attributes of the fruit, and in Japanese it stands for amai (sweet), marui (round), okii (big) and umai (tasty). For these reasons, Amaou is known as the “king” of Japanese strawberries!”
I ate a couple, but I would love to attempt to make something with them. This afternoon I watched Joy The Baker bake a riff on New Orleans doberge cake. Doberge cake is a New Orleans birthday tradition. She encouraged us to use instant pudding as the adhesive for the sake layers and I was MOVED. While traditionally, these vanilla sponge cakes are generously layered with chocolate and lemon curd and frosted with buttercream. Joy coached us to let loose and think outside the box regarding flavor combinations: folks made pistachio/red raspberry/rose and strawberry/lemon. Joy made a banana cream pie AND toasted coconut. A year ago today was her last in house class at The Bakehouse.
This evening I hosted my first Sparkling Sake club meeting for The Koji Club. Everyone shared what they were celebrating today: the sunshine, vaccinations, etc. We discussed the finer details of sake production with the added bonus of bubbly beverages: force carbonation, tank fermentation and secondary fermentation in bottle. A wild evening with lots of questions from inquisitive club members both old and new.
We took a little field trip to Hiroshima to talk about coastal citrus farms and heart shaped lemons (for real). And while everyone had sushi for dinner, I am 100% certain that sparkling sake is the latest and greatest addition to your quar brunch menu and should be paired with Palace Diner pancakes.
Oysters came up as a strong pairing option too. Let’s smuggle a bottle up to Maine soon? Love points + Fukucho Seaside Sparkling sound like best friends.
If my day were a doberge, it would be a Amaou strawberry + Hiroshima lemon with a sparkling sake buttercream frosting.