Cake "Kiev"

By popular demand, I'm posting the recipe to cake "Kiev". It's a very famous cake from the city I was born in, there's event a Wikipedia article about it. The recipe is a "GOST" recipe which means it was used by standardized factory where the cake was made. In my opinion, if you follow the recipe exactly (to the gram), the result is always perfect so get your scale out to weight all your ingredients. I do not have pictures and I borrowed them from another blog (http://chadeyka.livejournal.com/176528.html) for which I apologize, hopefully this does not constitute plagiarism. A warning, you have to start the cake 48 hours before serving it, don't be alarmed, it's not difficult, just requires a bit of planning. So here it goes.

Ingredients:
Cake:
200 grams egg whites
50 grams sugar
1/2 tsp real vanilla extract
45 grams flour (may use potato starch for gluten free version)
150 grams roasted cashews
185 grams sugar

Frosting:
175 grams sugar
1 egg
150 milliliters milk
250 grams unsalted butter
10 g cocoa
1/2 teaspoon real vanilla extract
1 tablespoon cognac or brandy

Merengue layers:
1. take 200 grams of egg whites, put in a bowl and set the bowl out at room temperature for 12-24 hours. Don't worry, nothing happens to egg whites at room temperature, you'll see a few tiny champagne like bubbles form. This is done to make the merengue stiffer.
2. Next day, preheat oven to 300 degrees.
3. Line one 9 inch pan and one 8 inch pan with parchment paper. Of you may draw a 9 or 8 inch diameter circle on parchment paper, turn the paper over and put it on the baking sheet. You'll be able to spread merengue inside the circle and get your merengue baked that way. Basically you'll need one merengue layer that's wider than the other, then you'll even the larger one out and will have crumbs to decorate the sides of the cake with.
4. Mix 45 grams sifted flour, 150 grams roasted and chopped cashews and 185 grams sugar.












5. Beat egg whites in soft peaks, add 50 grams sugar and 1/2 teaspoon vanilla extract. Beat into stiff peaks.












6. Into egg whites, carefully add mixture from step 4 and mix being careful to not deflate the egg white.












5. Put your mixture into the cake pans. You have to bake both layers of merengue at the same time which should be not problem. The average height of a merengue layer before baking is 2 cm (a little less than 1 inch).












6. Bake both layers at 300 degrees for 2 hours (don't open the oven). The resulting merengue will be beige in color.












7. Take layers out of the oven, you may remove them from pans when cool but don't remove the parchment paper. Let them rest for 12-24 hours with the paper intact and only then remove the paper.

Frosting:
1. The next day, bring unsalted butter to room temperature.
2. In a sauce pan, whisk 150 ml milk and 1 egg really well (unmixed egg may burn or curdle).
3. Add 175 grams sugar and put on a stove.












4. Bring to a boil and let simmer for 4-5 minutes, stirring from time to time. Your syrup will thicken and will be consistency and color of condensed milk.












5. Remove thickened syrup from heat, transfer to a bowl, cover with wrap and let cool.
6. Whip unsalted butter with vanilla extract until fluffy using a mixer.
7. Add cooled syrup one tablespoon at a time, mixing well.












8. Take 200 grams of the resulting frosting and transfer to a different bowl, add cocoa powder and mix well.
9. Add cognac or brandy to the remaining frosting and mix well.

Assembly:
1. Take the larger layer of merengue, frost with the white frosting (the one with cognac), reserve a bit for decorations.
2. Put the second (smaller) layer of merengue on top, trim the larger layer to match the smaller layer's size. Reserve crumbs.













3. Frost the top and the sides of the cake with the chocolate frosting (reserve a bit for decorations).












4. Sprinkle the sides with the reserved crumbs.
5. Put reserved frostings into decorator bag and decorate the top of the cake with rosettes or shells. Alternatively you decorate with sugared fruit or fruit jellys. Or both.












You're done! Enjoy!