162 – Yule Log with Chocolate and Chestnut Buttercream

Ingredients :

• Cake: 100 grams of all purpose flour
• Cake: 30 grams of corn starch
• Cake: 130 grams of sugar
• Cake: 4 large eggs
• Cake: 1 teaspoon of vanilla extract
• Chestnut Buttercream: 500 grams of chestnut cream
• Chestnut Buttercream: 250 grams of butter (soften)
• Chocolate Buttercream: 100 grams of dark chocolate + 1/3 portion of the chestnut buttercream
• Syrup: 100 grams sugar
• Syrup: 2/3 cup of water (15 cl)
• Syrup: 1 tablespoon of orange blossom water

Directions :

Making the Cake:
1- Preheat your oven to 360F degrees
2- Using 4 large eggs, separate the egg whites from the egg yolks. Make sure that there are no traces of egg yolks in the egg whites.
3- Add 130 grams of sugar to the egg yolks. Mix using an egg beater until you get a whitish mixture.
4- Add the vanilla extract to the egg yolk mixture and continue beating for another minute.
5- Add a pinch of salt to the egg whites, and using clean beaters, beat the egg whites until you get a firm white mixture.
6- Combine the egg whites with the egg yolks. Using a spatula, gently mix the two with a rotational movement from top to bottom.
7- Combine the cornstarch with the flour.
8- Add the flour mixture to the egg mixture into 2 times. Gently combine both mixtures using the rotational movement.
9- To prepare your baking pan (25×38 cm / 10×15 inches), brush it with melted butter, add parchment paper, then brush the paper with melted butter as well.
10- Pour the batter into the baking pan.
11- And even it out using a spatula.
12- Bake the cake for 10 minutes.
13- Wet a cloth then it twist to get the water out.
14- After 10 mn the cake is ready. When you press the center it should feel firm. Place another baking pan on top of the cake and flip it. Gently remove the parchment paper from the cake.Place the damp cloth on top of the cake and flip it again so that the cloth is underneath the cake. Then gently roll the cloth and the cake together, as if you are rolling a rug. Cover the cake in a towel and let it sit while making the butter cream.

Making the Chestnut Buttercream:
1- Beat 250 grams of soften butter using a stand mixer or an egg beater. .
2- Please meat the best thing in the world – Chesnut Cream! I can eat the whole thing by myself! If you can not find it in a store, you can easily purchase it online via Amazon.com for example.
3- Beat in the chestnut cream with the butter until completely combined.

Making the Syrup:
1- To make the syrup, place 100 grams of sugar in a saucepan and add ⅔ of cup of water. Bring to boil on medium-high heat. When the syrup starts boiling, set your clock and let it boil for 5 minutes.
2- pour the syrup in a bowl and add 1 tablespoon of orange blossom water.

Last Steps: 
1- Gently unroll the cake and brush it with the sugar-orange blossom water syrup.
2- Spread ⅔ rd of the chestnut butter cream on the cake. Dont spread on the edges.
3- Roll back the cake. Dont worry if it tears a bit, it will be covered with icing.
4- cut the edges of the cake and keep them to use later.
5- Talking about icing, melt 100 grams of dark chocolate using the microwave. Only use 15 seconds microwave cycles then stir the chocolate in between, so it does not burn.
6- Mix the melted chocolate to the rest of the chestnut buttercream.
7- Spread the chocolate cream on the cake.
8- Place one of the edges you cut on top of the cake to make it look like a log.
9- Cover the entire cake with chocolate cream and use a fork to make the log lines.
10- Place the cake in your plate.
11- Decorate with chocolate shavings and other decorations of your choice. I made mine with simply Marzipan and food coloring.
12- Place in the fridge for a few hours.
Bring the cake to room temperature before serving.