Claire Bakes Swirled Sesame Cake

Um, I'm gonna start over from the beginning.

[Cameraman] You said you didn't want to say moist.

Yeah, and then I said it.

I'm like what else do you say?

[Cameraman] Yeah you're like

well how do you just-- It's cake.

What is another word? It's not a damp cake.

It's not wet, it's not damp.

Chris, What do you call cake that's moist,

but you don't wanna say moist. A not dry cake.

[jazzy music]

This is one of my favorite recipes

that I've done in the last couple years.

And it's a beautiful, tahini quick bread.

So it's oil-based.

It's relatively easy to mix and put together.

And it stays really moist on the counter

for like many, many days.

It's just a really fun recipe.

It has a beautiful swirl that we make

with some ground black sesame.

So I'm gonna show you how to do it.

The first thing I wanna do is prepare my loaf pan.

So, it's a quick bread.

It's oil rather than butter.

So, what I like about that is,

you don't have to have all room temperature ingredients.

This recipe I make in the mixer

because we actually end up beating the eggs

and the sugar first to give the cake extra lift.

I have a standard size loaf pan

and that measures 8 1/2 by 4 1/2.

Usually you measure from the bottom.

I'm gonna spray it with some just non-stick cooking spray.

If I were using butter in the recipe,

I would just grease the pan with butter,

'cause I already have it out.

But we're using oil.

And I'm gonna line it with parchment.

So, I tend to do this kind of over the trashcan or the sink

so you don't mist everything with oil.

And I just do a real quick coating,

tilting the pan to get it on all four sides.

And I have a piece of parchment paper.

And this has been trimmed

to be the exact length of the pan.

And then I lay just one sheet of parchment in,

so then it's covering the longer sides

with this overlap, sorry overhang, so.

This is lining just the longer sides in the bottom.

And it has this overhang.

And this is what I'm gonna use

to lift it out of the pan after it's baked.

And then, okay, so what I really wanna do

is eliminate any air pockets

and smooth the parchment onto every surface.

You know, I basically use parchment to line like

every baking vessel and it's just

a good insurance policy against sticking.

And then just a quick spray on the parchment.

[hissing]

That's ready to go.

Actually, this is the thing I like to do

for great breads, especially with desserts

that are a little less sweet.

I dust the sides and bottom with sugar.

It adds such a nice, like satisfying crunchy

texture to the outside.

So, I'm gonna go in for a swift, this sesame seeds.

And it sticks to the oil, sorry, slippery.

It sticks to the oiled surface.

And just kind of a light dusting of seeds,

of both colors.

It, to these, you know, I pour the batter in.

The seeds adhere to the batter and it makes

a very cool effect on the outside.

So, I'm just holding the pan and kind of dusting

on top of each surface rather than kinda like

throwing the seeds around.

That just make sure, helps ensure

that it's really gonna stick.

Okay, so you can a nice, fairly even coating

all the way around.

And now on top of that,

I'm go in with just my granulated sugar.

And same thing, I'm angling the pan

and sprinkling downward onto each surface.

Not a lot, maybe, you know it's may not more than

a tablespoon or two total.

So, it's adding as much texture as it is sweetness.

Okay, that's it for the pan.

I have a spice grinder here,

spice grinder slash coffee grinder.

Two tablespoons of black sesame.

And I'm gonna grind this up

and I'm gonna use this mixture

to tint some of my batter.

And it kind of turns like a cool charcoal gray.

And that's how I'm gonna create that swirl effect.

This is a fun recipe that kind of

skirts the edge if sweet and savory,

[grinding]

which is why I like that little coating

of sugar on the outside.

It's just kinda takes it a little bit further

into the sweet category.

[grinding]

Okay, so I'm just basically just milling these seeds

into a fine powder.

Kind of looks like ground poppy seeds.

It's not super, super dark.

So, I'm gonna transfer this to a bowl.

And in that same bowl, I'll mix part of the batter.

And keep this off to the side for now.

Okay, so now I'm gonna mix my dry ingredients.

I have all-purpose flour.

The leavener is a mix of baking powder and soda.

So those go in.

Kosher salt.

And cardamom, which is the spice

that I love to use in baking.

It's sort of in the warm spice category

and it pairs really well with tahini.

So, not, you know, it can be actually

a very overpowering flavor,

but use it pretty,

you know pretty,

what's the word I'm looking for?

It's very--

[Cameraman] Sparingly. Thank you.

We're using it very sparingly.

[Cameraman] That's the crossword word.

I was like, we're using it liberally,

but I mean the opposite of that.

Dry ingredients, just whisking to combine.

And now, my wet ingredients,

which is a half of cup of tahini.

And you can use any brand of tahini that you like.

Freshness is important.

It can kinda spoil.

It's good to keep it in the refrigerator.

Some brands can tend to be really bitter,

but I don't know, I think this is maybe a 365 brand.

Okay, I'm mixing it with yogurt.

It's not Greek yogurt.

It's a just a full fat, plain yogurt.

And tahini has a tendency to seize

when it's mixed with another liquid,

so if your mixture kinda thickens

in a weird way, that's normal.

Just proceed, it's not a big deal.

You know, with some quick breads

you mix your dry, your wet,

and you just mix them together.

With this recipe, in order to create

a sort of lighter texture,

we're gonna beat the eggs and sugar first.

And eggs and sugar can kind of like whip

into a very frothy, ribbony mixture,

and that's what we're looking for.

That's working air into it and that air is helping,

in addition to the baking powder and soda,

to like rise the bread and give it kind of a fluffy texture.

So, two whole eggs into the mixer.

And I get these going, break them up a little bit.

[grinding]

And I'm gonna add my sugar.

And the vanilla extract.

I'm waiting for it to get thick and pale

and also triple in volume.

This is just gonna go a little bit.

And in the meantime, I have a neutral oil

like vegetable or grape seed.

And I'm adding to that 1 1/2 teaspoons

of toasted sesame oil.

This stuff is very pungent.

It has an intense roasted sesame flavor.

And this is a cool addition because it's giving it

like a really strong undertone of sesame,

that I think could be overpowering

but we're only using a teaspoon and a half.

So I'm gonna add that to my vegetable oil.

This egg and sugar mixture, it's almost white.

It's gone very, very pale.

And tell me if you can see what

that ribbon looks like as it falls into the bowl.

Okay, so my eggs are ribbon.

I'm gonna slowly stream in the oil

to emulsify into the eggs.

It's kind of like making like a sweet mayonnaise

because I'm emulsifying the eggs and oil together.

There's sugar in there.

So it should thicken even more as a stream in the oil.

And don't wanna pour in all the oil at once,

because it will break the emulsion.

I'm just gonna go slowly.

[grinding]

And I'm trying to avoid hitting the paddle,

so this is whip the oil around the sides.

And I'm really just pouring it down the side of the bowl.

All right, so that looks great.

So nice and thick and light.

And now, I'm going to add my dry ingredients

and my tahini mixture, alternating,

starting and ending with dry.

So, three additions of flour,

with only the mixer on slow.

I don't wanna over mix it and I also don't want to,

you know, create a big cloud of flour.

So, eyeballing just a third.

Letting that incorporate.

And then half of my yogurt tahini mixture.

[clinking]

Yogurt is great in quick breads because it adds

like the acidity in it, adds tenderness.

I like sort of the tang that it adds.

It makes for sort of a softer, more moist bread.

Cake, I should say.

Okay, the rest of the flour mixture goes in.

I'm gonna stop the mixture before I see the last

of the flour disappear and then finish mixing by hand.

So, it's a little bit under mixed at this point,

'cause I'm gonna finish it by hand.

[clinking]

So, I'm just folding this to combine.

Also, scraping up anything around the sides

and the bottom that haven't been incorporated.

And now I wanna transfer and eyeball it,

I don't have to be exact,

about half of the batter into the bowl

with the black sesame,

and I'm gonna fold that in

until it's well-mixed.

Okay, so now is where I'm gonna

create the swirl in the pan.

[Cameraman] So, this will give it the black swirl?

Yes, this mixture is going to create the contrast

and color for our swirl.

I'm just gonna alternate big dollops of batter in here.

I don't have to be precise in any way.

I don't have to, I'm not trying to like make

a certain pattern.

I'm just gonna let the dollops kinda fall where they may.

You don't want to put half the batter in.

You don't wanna put all of one color in

and then the other color on top

because then you don't have anything to swirl.

[clinking]

So, anywhere where I see the paler batter,

I'm gonna add a little bit of the black sesame,

and vice versa.

Okay, now all of the batter has been kind of

haphazardly added in like an alternating pattern.

Now, I'm gonna let it settle into an even layer.

And now I have a skewer.

You could use a toothpick,

a metal skewer,

anything like cake tester would work,

although you want something with a little bit of,

like a little wick.

And I'm just gonna make some kinda wide

figure eights all across the cake

pressing the skewer all the way down.

So, I'm gonna hit the bottom.

I don't wanna drag across the bottom

because I don't wanna disturb the sesame seeds,

but really making sure that the skewer

is going all the way through the batter.

And I think I did probably around four figure eights

to make a big swirl.

And I don't wanna go beyond that

because I don't wanna start to then blend the two colors.

But that's really it.

And now this gets a little more sugar

and some sesame seeds on top,

just to mirror the sides and bottom

and adding more of the white and black sesame

and a sprinkling of sugar.

So this is gonna go into the center of a 350 oven.

So, it'll bake about an hour between 55 and 65 minutes

and I'll test it.

When it's starting to look done,

it'll dome and then crack down the middle.

And I want a cake tester inserted

into the center to come out clean.

So, here we go.

So, here's the cake.

It's really beautifully domed.

You can see there are some

of the black sesame area poking through.

So, you already kinda get a hint

that there's a marble going on.

So we use the parchment to lift the cake out.

And this is totally cool,

so no warmth at all anywhere.

And now what I really wanna to do is cut into it,

so you can see what the swirl looks like,

the interior.

I'm gonna cut it in half.

Oh, beautiful, okay.

So you can see, not a dramatic difference in color

but certainly a very distinctive swirl.

So, it looks really nice.

It's fun to sort of see what the interior looks like.

Made this several times

and each one is a little bit different,

depending on how your dollops kind of fall.

So, one thing is the, it's very well baked.

Like there's nice rounding all the way around

but the inside is still soft and moist

and so fragrant too.

I love, you get like the real smell of sesame in there.

[Cameraman] Whoa.

I'm gonna just taste it.

All right.

I love the top because I love the crackly sugar.

Mm, there's good crunch.

Delicious.

One thing I love about quick breads,

anything that's oil-based,

is the longer it sits, the better it gets.

So, if you were having company over,

you can make the whole loaf one or even two days ahead.

Just let it cool completely.

Wrap it at room temperature.

Let it sit.

And by the time you serve it,

it will have really like developed

even better texture and flavor.

So, mm.

Really good with a cup of tea.

This is actually a fun recipe.

It's something you can kinda just keep around,

eat a slice after dinner or when friends come over.

It's really versatile because it's not too sweet

and has such wonderful, like, round sesame flavor, so.

Yeah, try it out.

I hope you like it

and thanks for watching.

Coffee cake, to me, is like a very specific thing

that's like streusel topping, cake.

Coffee cake is--

[metal rattling]

cake.

This is something, I don't know.

For quick breads, it's like,

to me it's always like oil-based

and one of those things

that you can keep on your counter for,

you know, the better part of a week,

even an entire week.