Chess Boards for Playford

3/31/2004

The Recipe

The basic idea: petits fours in chocolate and lemon alternating, to make two chessboards.

I shopped the week before for ingredients - looked long and hard at the box cakes and decided I Just Couldn't Do that. We've been looking through the cookbooks for variations on a rich pound cake (the proper and true allegation that we "decorate in books" extends to the kitchen as well) and I settled on this:

For an 11" x 17" x 1" sheet pan (or two 9 x 13s)

Preheat your oven to 350°F.
Cream, and I mean seriously let the mixer work on up to medium high for a good long while:
1 cup butter plus 1/2 cup shortening (I used 1.5 cups butter 'cos it's what I had)
3 cups sugar
till fluffy and the sugar is about dissolving into the butter.
add 5 eggs one at a time, never stopping the mixer.
2 tsp. vanilla extract, and
either the juice of 2 medium Meyer lemons, or 2 tsps of lemon extract

Then sift in 3 cups flour, add 1 cup milk, folding these in just till all is combined.
Your batter will be fluffy.

pour into prepared pan(s) and bake.
If you bake a 1" deep 11" x 17" for the chessboard, bake around 20 minutes
This also makes a good bundt pan, but bake around 40 minutes.
Test for doneness, when a butter knife or toothpick inserted into the middle comes out clean adn Bob's your uncle. No, wait. oldbob Bob's my father! okay, you can adopt him for an uncle. he's marvelous, and makes a pretty fabulous buche de noël with marzipan side-goodies his own bad self.

These will be cut into (about) 1-inch squares, and a coating chocolate will be poured over them.

Adjust for a dark chocolate cake, rinse pans and repeat. How I adjusted for a chocolate cake: add 3/4 cup cocoa (we prefer Scharffen Berger) and reduce to 2-1/2 cups flour; don't use any lemon.

Pieces will be arranged on two platters making chessboards.

Drops of the melting chocolate are called for and on hand to make checkers.

We are being extravagantly silly and sculpting some marzipan chess pieces, figuring if they didn't turn out, we would just have to eat the evidence...

Marzipan: the coloring of which! from the manufacturer's page:

How To Color Marzipan

Marzipan is best worked with at room temperature. Always keep marzipan you are not working with covered, to prevent it from drying out. To tint the marzipan, knead in liquid food coloring ONE DROP AT A TIME. A little food coloring goes a long way. For brown, knead in cocoa powder.You can also paint marzipan. Allow your marzipan creation to skin over for two hours. This will prevent the color from “bleeding” Add a drop of food coloring to a tablespoon of kirsh or any other clear liquer. Use a small artist’s brush to apply the color.

I'm personally in favor of the painted concept...

English Country Dancers are nothing if not brilliantly silly in all the right ways.

Here's photo evidence of how it all turned out...

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