i'm not sure if anyone has seen or heard of the ladurée sucré book. i didn't know about its existence until the lovely felicia very generously loaned it to me (she bought it on her recent trip to paris). the book is unlike all other books i've seen - velvety suede cover with gold trimmings and delicately packed in a ladurée's signature pastel green box with lilac tissue paper (hubby commented that it looked harry potter-ish lol). i fell in love with it at 1st sight but was even more fascinated with the recipes as i flipped the pages. i don't think i've ever classified any cookbook as totally "my type" but for this one...YES! the book features lotsa dainty and feminine desserts like rose petal ice cream, pistachio financiers, vanilla eclairs, raspberry rose verrines etc.

and one of them that caught my eye was the guimauve fraise et fleur d'oranger, or strawberry & orange flower marshmallows. the name itself is very lovely and it was after i made it that i realize what a fantastic pairing it was. the orange blossom water is both floral and fruity and is a great complement with the strawberry puree. really delicate. i also felt it was about time i made marshmallows again since i wasn't exactly satisfied with my previous attempt on the passionfruit version.

i bought some really beautiful purple sweet potatoes during the weekend and immediately set my eyes on this. i've seen this on several blogs and the violet amethyst-like cubes embedded within the cake really caught my attention. i guess i just hv this weakness for pretty desserts (and purple sweet potatoes).




the cake turned out fluffier than i thought, consider that the purple sweet potato puree was rather thick and heavy. tastewise its pretty mild since the sweet potato doesn't really hv much taste/aroma to begin with but i do like the subtle sweetness and the contrast of the cubes with the cake. i also think that its better eaten fresh from the oven coz that raw eggy smell will be more apparent upon cooling.



recipe is adapted from here and the original yields a 17cm cake but i scaled it up since i only hv a 22cm tin. also, i don't like the idea of using cream of tartar when whisking egg whites coz i don't see a difference in the results. japanese pastry chefs don't use it in their recipes either so i'll usually omit. sugar and egg whites alone will give you a beautiful meringue so you don't need cream of tartar, or vinegar, or lemon juice.

my first recipe from hidemi sugino's le goût authentique retrouvé and i'm really happy with it. i think i must be crazy to purchase a japanese book when i don't understand a word of it but i just couldn't resist coz first, he's a famous pastry chef, secondly the recipes are all so fantastic! some of my friends were really kind to offer help to translate but i just don't wanna impose on them. they can afterall help translate one but not the whole book, which is frankly what i need. you would wanna fully utilize the book too if you had spent close to a hundred bucks on it. so while half-heartedly trying to memorize all the hiragana & katakana characters, i gave up in the end and went ahead with this recipe. luckily the ingredient portion was written in french as well so i could understand a little. it was not all that difficult since this is not the 1st time i've attempted to make a cake without the given methods/steps.