This is a traditional Danish cake, which you can buy in almost every bakery. The name directly translated is “lodge”.
It looks a lot like the Swedish cake “Dammsugare med pepparkaksdeg” (translation: Pastry roll with gingerbread ) , however, as the name implies, it mainly consists of gingerbread. “Træstammer”, like the Danish “Romkugler” (translation: Rum ball) and “Studenterbrød” (translation: Student bread), mainly consists of yesterday’s dry cake mixed with a few ingredients. Both “Træstammer” and “Dammsugare med pepparkaksdeg” are covered in marzipan and dipped in chocolate.
This recipe does not contain leftover-cake since (in my experience at leased) it doesn’t happen quite often, that you, as a privat person, have uneaten cake in the drawer. And buying a store-brought (and often low-quality) cake just isn’t an option I’m interested in pursuing!
A butter cream layer has been added between the inner layer and the marzipan. This give the cake a creamy and airy dimension. Additionally, it hides the brown part of the cake, so that it isn’t visible through the marzipan.
The cake requires a little more skill and time than e.g. baking a banana bread. The cake doesn’t require an oven, since it is no-bake . It also takes up quite some space in the kitchen. If you need to make more than one portion I would recommend being more than one person, since it will be dramatically faster being multiple people rolling, covering, and dipping!
Danish Træstammer
Ingredients
Truffle Filling
- 50 g frozen black-berry and/or raspberry
- 1 pinch vanilla extract
- 1-2 tbsp lemon juice freshly squeezed
- 5 tbsp rasins
- 50 g hazelnuts
- 75 g dates
- 50 g coconut desiccated
- 175 g flour
- 75 g oatmeal
- 225 g sugar
- 1 pinch salt
- 1 1/2 tbsp cocoa powder
- 100 g dark chocolate (70% coca)
- 1/2 dl heavy whipping cream
- 150 g butter
- 1 tsp instant coffee
- 3 tbsp dark rum
Butter Cream
- 75 g butter room temperature and chopped
- 125 g powdered sugar
- 2 tbsp hot water
- 2 tsp vanilla extract
Marzipan Layer
- 350 g marzipan
- 100 g powdered sugar
- 15 g glucose sirup
Chocolate Decoration
- 200 g dark chocolate (70% coca)
Instructions
Truffle Filling
- Combine frozen berries, lemon juice, and vanilla in a saucepan and let boil. Let simmer for a couple of minuts before removing from heat
- Blend the nuts in a foodprocessor to a rough flour. Add the raisins, dates (chopped), coconut, flour, oatmeal, sugar, salt, and cocoa
- Melt the chocolate and butter in a water bath. When melted, add the whipping cream and coffee and stir till it has an even texture
- Combine the chocolate, berries, content in foodprocessor, and rum in a bowl and stir till it has an even texture
- Let the dough cool in the fridge while making the butter cream and marzipan layer
Butter Cream
- Whisk all the ingredients together in a bowl using an electric whisk til the butter has a thick, airy texture
Marzipan Layer
- Knead all the ingredients together on a kitchen table with your hands. You can grate the marzipan before kneading to make it easier
Putting The Cake Together
- The truffles are rolled into one or mores longe sausages of 3-4 cm in width
- On a piece of baking-sheet, roll the marzipan layer into a thin, rectangular piece using a rolling pin. Sprinkle the marcipan with some powdered sugar if the marzipan sticks to the pin
- Cut the marzipan into strips with the same length as the truffle-sausages' and wide enough to reach all the way around the truffle sausages plus a little more. The width of each marzipan strip should be approx. 10.5-14 cm in length depending on the diameter of your truffle sausages
- Apply a thin layer of butter cream on top of the marzipan
- Each truffle-sausage is placed on a marzipan strip and the marzipan is rolled around the sausage
- The long truffle sausages covered in marzipan are now put in the fridge for 30 min – 1 hour until they are cold
- The sausages are then cut into several small sausages of 8-10 cm in length
- Melt the chocolate (for the chocolate decoration) in a water bath
- The cakes' ends are dipped in the melted chocolate and placed on a clean piece of baking paper
- Let the cakes cool at room temperature and serve