chocolate cake with brown butter cream cheese icing

chocolate cake with brown butter cream cheese icing

8 Dec 2025

Sometimes I’m a little late to the party. Apparently this chocolate sheet cake with brown butter frosting from Bon Appetit was all the rage a few years ago. I was making a birthday cake for 6-year-old twin girls and as I knew they both loved chocolate, sprinkles and lashings of creamy icing, the sheet cake recipe fitted the brief, but I wanted to make a layer cake. The cake doesn’t rise much so I used the full recipe to make two 8 inch cake layers.

The cake uses a mountain of sugar, so I cut down the sugar in the cake batter. I thought apricot jam would go well with the toasty brown butter icing so I filled the cake with apricot jam.

I’m not much of a cake decorator at the best of times but my piping bag split mid swirl. I put the camera down, covered the icing with sprinkles, packed the cake into a container and drove to my friend’s place. Unfortunately lighting the candles and blowing them out trumped taking any further photos of the cake that day.

The cake was divine, but the icing was so SWEET it made my teeth hurt. When I came home I decided to tweak the recipe a bit. For cake number two I made a single layer gluten free cake and topped it with a different but far less sweet brown butter icing. After levelling the cake, I coated it with layer of apricot jam, then drizzled some jam over the icing. I shared the cake with my neighbours and again it was declared a success.

Here's the recipe for you which will make an 8-inch layer cake. For all my recipes, I use a 250 ml cup and a 20 ml tablespoon. All eggs are 60 grams and my oven is a conventional oven not fan forced, so you may need to reduce your oven temperature by 20°C. 

If you’d like to make a 17 cm single layer cake, use half the batter and the cake will take close to an hour to bake. For the icing use 100g of butter, 100g cream cheese, 30g of milk powder, 125g of icing sugar, a tsp of vanilla extract and a pinch of salt.

Chocolate layer cake with brown butter cream cheese icing
Cake
350g caster sugar
225g plain flour (I used GF)
1 tsp bicarbonate of soda
70g Dutch-process cocoa powder
250mls hot tap water
200mls vegetable oil
2 eggs
180ml well-shaken buttermilk
1/2 tsp flaky sea salt
2 tsp vanilla extract

Brown butter cream cheese icing
150g full fat softened cream cheese
150g unsalted butter, squidgy soft divided in 2
2 tsp vanilla paste
50g dried milk powder
pinch salt
175g icing sugar

Filling
1/3 cup apricot jam or flavour of your choice

Method
Place a rack in the centre of the oven; preheat the oven to 190⁰C, conventional. Grease and line the base of two 8 inch tins with baking paper, then dust with cocoa powder. Set to one side.

Whisk the sugar, flour and bicarbonate of soda in a medium bowl until well combined.

In a large jug, whisk the cocoa powder with the cup of hot tap water and mix until the cocoa has dissolved. Add the vegetable oil, the eggs, the buttermilk, the salt and vanilla extract and whisk again just to combine. Add the cocoa mixture to the dry ingredients and whisk gently until just combined and the batter is smooth. Scrape the batter evenly into the 2 prepared tins.

Bake the cakes on the centre rack of the preheated 190⁰C, conventional oven for about 30 minutes, or until the cake springs back when gently pressed or a tester inserted into the centre comes out with a few moist crumbs attached.

Let the cakes cool in the pan for 10 minutes. Cut around each cake with a knife before inverting onto a wire rack. Peel away the baking paper; invert the cakes and cool completely on the rack.

Icing
Place 75g of unsalted butter in a small saucepan over a medium-low heat and cook until it begins to foam. Stir constantly until the mixture turns a dark nut brown colour. Remove from heat and immediately pour the butter into the bowl of a stand mixer. Place the bowl into the fridge and cool for about 15 minutes.

Remove the bowl from the fridge. Add the cream cheese, the remaining butter, the vanilla paste, milk powder and salt into the bowl. Sift the icing sugar over the top. Beat with the paddle attachment for 10 minutes on speed 4 (below low) until pale, and fluffy then store covered in the fridge until needed. If refrigerated, rewarm in the microwave in 20-second bursts until softened.

Assembly

Level the top of the cakes if needed. Place one cake layer onto a serving platter. Spoon a small amount of the icing into a piping bag fitted with a 1 cm nozzle. Pipe a cm of icing around the edge of the cake to form a dam. Spoon 1/3 cup of jam into the well, level with an off set spatula then gently place the second layer on top.

Spoon or pipe swirls of icing onto the top of the cake. Store the cake in an airtight container in the fridge. Bring to room temperature before seving. The cake will keep covered for up to 3 days.

I am not usually a chocolate cake fan but this cake is really moist and absolutely delicious.

Next week is Christmas Week on the blog where I'll be sharing 5 new recipes with you. I'm looking forward to it, and I hope you are as well.

See you all again next week.

Bye for now,

Jillian

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gluten free brown butter blackberry tart

gluten free brown butter blackberry tart

16 Sept 2019

Last month I saw a version of this brown butter tart on instagram. I was intrigued, so I bookmarked the original Bon Appetit recipe, which had received many favourable reviews, to make at a later date. That later date occurred last weekend. 



The original recipe used raspberries but as I had blackberries in the freezer, that's what I used. I also used my own shortbread crust, one I've used many times before but at the last minute decided to make it gluten free.



I kept my fingers crossed that the GF crust would be sturdy enough hold up in the fluted tin.



As you can see the tart did crumble a bit when it was unmoulded but my problem was the filling. I think it had too much butter and not enough flour. The butter seeped through the crust and I ended up with horror of horrors, the dreaded soggy bottom! Unfortunately not every bake is successful, but I still took the tart into work. 


Here's the recipe for you. For all my recipes I use a 250 ml cup, a 20 ml tablespoon, unsalted butter and 60g eggs. My oven is a conventional gas oven so if your oven is fan forced you may need to reduce the oven temperature by 20°C.

Gluten Free Brown Butter Blackberry Tart adapted from this recipe
Crust
100g unsalted butter
¼ cup caster sugar
½ teaspoon vanilla extract
3/4 cup GF plain flour
1/4 cup almond meal
Pinch of salt

Filling
110g unsalted butter, diced
½ cup caster sugar
2 large eggs
Pinch salt
¼ cup GF plain flour
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
350g frozen blackberries

Method
Position rack in centre of oven and preheat to 190°C. Place all the crust ingredients into the bowl of a food processor. Whiz until a soft dough forms around the blade. Transfer dough to 8 inch square tart pan with removable bottom. Using fingertips, press dough evenly onto sides and bottom of pan or if you like you can roll the dough out between 2 sheets of baking paper before transferring to the tart shell.

Bake crust until golden, about 15 minutes (crust will puff slightly while baking). Transfer crust to rack and cool in pan. Maintain oven temperature.

While the crust is in the oven, cook butter in heavy small saucepan over medium heat until deep nutty brown (do not burn), stirring often. When browning butter, use a saucepan with a light-coloured bottom so that you can gauge the colour of the butter. Immediately pour browned butter into glass measuring cup. 

Whisk sugar, eggs, and salt in medium bowl to blend. Add flour and vanilla; whisk until smooth. Gradually whisk browned butter into sugar-egg mixture; whisk until well blended.

Carefully pour browned butter mixture evenly over the tart shell. Arrange berries, pointed side up and close together. Place tart on a baking sheet and bake tart until filling is puffed and golden and tester inserted into centre comes out clean, about 45 minutes. Cool tart completely in pan on rack. When cool, remove tart pan sides. Just before serving, dust lightly with icing sugar then cut into slices to serve.

The tart can be made the day ahead, stored in an airtight container.

Despite my reservations, this was a hit at work but I wasn't happy with the filling and the soggy bottom it created. I have plans to make a non GF version, with a rejigged filling, so stay tuned as the tart will probably reappear sometime during Christmas Week.

See you all again soon with some more baking from my kitchen.

Bye for now,

Jillian

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basque burnt cheesecake

basque burnt cheesecake

12 Aug 2019

I was scrolling through instagram last weekend and saw a photo of a Basque burnt cheesecake. I was intrigued because I didn't know it was a thing. I found a few recipes which looked very much like  my Mum's cheesecake recipe but with way more sugar. Mum didn't use cream cheese in the filling though preferring farmer's cheese with it's distinctive tang. Mum glazed the top of her cheesecake with egg yolk before it was baked so a dark brown sheen on the top of the cheesecake was the norm.



The Basque cheesecake doesn't usually have a base but I thought a cheesecake without a base was just wrong so I made my usual shortbread base and for the filling used Mum's recipe using cream cheese instead of farmer's cheese. 



Mum's cheesecake was time consuming - it had a pastry shell that needed to be par-baked and a filling which required separating 8 eggs. With this recipe I made both the base and filling in the food processor and it came together in no time at all. I think lining the tin was the most time consuming part of the process.



If you'd like to make your own Basque burnt cheesecake, here's the recipe for you which makes a 17cm cake. If you'd like to make a 23cm cake, just double all the ingredients and bake for the same length of time. For all my recipes I use a 250 ml cup, a 20 ml tablespoon, unsalted butter and 60g eggs. My oven is a conventional gas oven so if your oven is fan forced you may need to reduce the oven temperature by 20°C. 

Basque Burnt Cheesecake inspired by this recipe 
Base
50 grams unsalted butter
1 tbs caster sugar
½ cup plain flour
½ teaspoon vanilla essence

Preheat oven to 180°C. Butter a 17cm spring-form pan, then line with baking paper making sure the paper comes at least 2 inches above top of pan on all sides. Grease the baking paper. Cream the butter, sugar and vanilla together until light and creamy. Mix in the flour and combine until the mixture forms a soft dough. Press the mixture into the base of the tin, bringing it slightly up the sides. Bake for 15 minutes or until the base is lightly golden. Set aside to cool while you make the filling.

Filling
375g cream cheese, room temperature
½ cup caster sugar
Pinch salt 
1 tsp vanilla extract
1 tbs plain flour
3 large eggs 
100 mls double cream 

Method
Place a rack in middle of oven; increase the oven temperature to 200°C. 

Place the cream cheese, sugar, salt, vanilla and plain flour in the bowl of a food processor and process until the mixture is smooth. Add eggs and cream and process until the mixture is very smooth and silky. The mixture will be quite runny.

Place the springform pan on a baking sheet then pour the batter into the pan. Bake cheesecake in the preheated 200°C oven until deeply golden brown on top and still jiggly in the centre ~ 50 minutes. If the top is a bit pale, increase the temperature to 220°C and bake for another 10 minutes. Remove from the oven and cool before unmoulding the tin. 



The cheesecake will rise dramatically then fall, this is normal. Let the cheesecake cool completely before unmoulding and carefully removing the baking paper from sides of the cheesecake. 

The cheesecake can be made a day ahead. Cover the cheesecake and refrigerate but let the cheesecake sit at room temperature for several hours before serving. You can top the cheesecake with extra cream if so desired.

The cheesecake is only gently sweet, so if you like a sweet cheesecake you may want to increase the quantity of sugar a little. The cheesecake definitely reminded me of Mum's recipe but without the hard work and I do plan to make it again using Farmer's cheese. 

See you all again soon with some more baking from my kitchen.

Bye for now,

Jillian

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