This cornflakes cake is absolutely delightful. The cornflake clusters give it the moorish crunch. And better yet, each bite is coated in a special cornflake cream.
And let me tell you, the cornflake clusters ain’t just regular cornflakes stuck together. I’ve adapted this from Christina Tosi’s recipe, mixing ordinary cornflakes with milk powder, sugar, a bit of salt and butter. This winning combination makes these cornflake clusters like CRACK. They are so addictive – so make sure you make plenty to snack on while you bake!
A mouthful into this cake and you’ll appreciate the cornflake aroma permeating throughout the whole cake. The secret is in the cereal milk. This magical concoction is made by steeping copious amounts of cornflakes in milk. I had some sweetcorn powder leftover from another baking project, so I added some in the sponge and the cream to deepen the cornflake flavour.
The original plan was for the cream to flow down in a magical cascading flow but I whipped the cream a bit too much. If you do want this effect, make sure you make a light cream and even practice the flow by pouring it on the bottom of a cake tin first to see if it flows.
Feel free to mix and match different components of this recipe with your own recipes. I’ve used the cornflake crunch on many other desserts, and it goes well with this decadent chocolate cake too.
Tag your cornflake creations with @ultimateomnoms on Instagram, I’d love to see your spin on it!
Cornflake Cake
Ingredients
Cornflake clusters
- 170 g cornflakes
- 40 g milk powder
- 30 g sugar
- 2 g salt
- 130 g butter (melted)
Cornflake cream
- 1 egg yolk
- 40 g brown sugar
- 120 ml cereal milk
- 5 g cornflour
- 80 g cornflakes (toasted)
- 200 ml whipping cream
- 1 Tbsp sweetcorn powder (optional)
Sweet corn cake
- 65 g oil
- 200 g milk
- 60 g sugar
- 1 Tbsp sweet corn powder
- 6 eggs
- 180 g cake flour
- 1 pinch salt
- 1/2 tsp cream of tartar
- 135 g sugar
Instructions
Cornflake clusters
- Crush the cornflakes with your hands to the desired size.
- Add in the milk powder, sugar and salt and mix.
- Pour in the melted butter and mix to combine.
- Spread the cornflakes out on a baking tray and bake at 140°C for 20min.
Cornflake cream
- Make the cereal milk by mixing 30g cornflakes in milk and steep it for 30min at room temperature.
- Make the pastry cream by mixing the egg yolk, brown sugar, cereal milk and cornflour in a small pan until it thickens. Optional: add sweetcorn powder.
- Leave the pastry cream to cool in the fridge.
- Make the cornflake whipped cream by first steeping the remaining 50g of cornflakes in the liquid cream.
- Strain the cream and whip until soft peaks form, then gently fold in the pastry cream.
Sweet corn cake
- Heat the oil in a small saucepan using low-med heat. Sift in the cake flour and mix.
- Add the milk, sweetcorn powder and sugar and mix. Take the saucepan off the heat.
- Add the egg yolks in one at a time, whisking between each one.
- Add a pinch of salt.
- In another bowl, whisk the egg whites until foamy and add the cream of tartar. Add the sugar in batches and whisk until the egg whites reach stiff peaks.
- Preheat the oven to 150ºC and prepare your hot water bath.
- Add one third of the egg white to the yolk batter and mix well. Using a spatula, fold the remaining egg white in two batches. Do so gently and thoroughly so no streaks of egg white remain.
- Pour the batter into two lined 6” cake pans and smooth the top with a spatula. Tap the pan against the tabletop to get rid of any large air bubbles
- Put the cake pan into the hot water bath, ensuring that the water height reaches at least a third of the cake pan.
- Bake in the preheated oven for 1 hour 5min or until a skewer inserted in the centre of the cake comes out clean.
- Remove from the oven and tap the pan against the tabletop a few times to prevent shrinkage. Transfer to cool on a wire rack pan for 10min before unmoulding.
