Cake "Napoleon three recipes: classic, with ready-made cakes and puff. Napoleon cake - a classic step-by-step recipe at home

Recently I wrote about a recipe (not a classic version!). And I thought, why is there no traditional Napoleon recipe on my culinary blog?

That same legendary recipe from Soviet times, which was passed from hand to hand, was carefully recorded in culinary notebooks and in some regions was even a kind of “trade secret” - after all, some housewives baked it to order. And don't hesitate to share the recipe...

I can only explain this omission on my part - my blog is very young. I'm just starting to fill it with recipes. And the first places, of course, must be given to the classics. And nothing more classic in the culinary theme than a detailed recipe for the Napoleon cake is impossible to imagine. So, it's decided, today's article is entirely devoted to the traditional, classic "Napoleon"!

The main "secret" of Napoleon cake, cooked at home

I will immediately reveal to you the “secret secret” of this delicious cake: “Do not save, citizens, on products!” Well, everything is right according to the old Jewish joke - “My children, do not spare tea leaves!”

After all, what does a zealous hostess usually save on? It is written in the recipe - "butter", yeah, so let's take margarine! It is written - "add 2 tablespoons of cognac" - replace with vodka .... Well, you can not add vodka at all, and it will do without it ...

But for a real classic Napoleon, these ingredients are very important. Butter is indeed cheaper to replace with margarine, but the taste will be different. Vodka must be added to the dough - for its better "layering", and cognac to the cream - for the subtlety of taste and aroma. Then Napoleon will turn out deliciously delicious, as in ancient Soviet times!

Another feature of this recipe is if you use not one type of cream, but two- the cake will turn out especially tender! But about this just below and I will write in detail in a step-by-step recipe.

I summarize:

Products and composition of the recipe

For test:

• 5 cups flour
• 300 grams of butter
• 1 egg
• half a glass of sour cream
• half a glass of water
• 2 tablespoons of vodka
• a third of a teaspoon of salt

For custard cream:

• 3 eggs
• liter of milk
• 3-4 tablespoons flour
• 1 cup of sugar
• 200 gr. butter
• 2 tablespoons brandy
• 1 sachet of vanillin

For sour cream cream:

• fat sour cream (30%) - 1.5 -2 cups
• sugar 1 cup (it is better to grind into powder)

Cooking dough for cakes.

I must confess that one of the secrets of the classic Napoleon, I still hid from you! It's about how the test is made.

For example, I remember very well how my mother cooked puff pastry, including for the Napoleon cake. It didn’t happen often, my mother always disappeared at work. And when we asked her to make “that delicious layer cake” again, she said that it was a lot of fuss with it, and a lot of time was spent on the dough. Therefore, they made it only on major holidays.

So, that dough was made by numerous rollings, when a piece of butter was added to the base, cooled in the refrigerator, everything was wrapped in an envelope and rolled out again, and again put in the cold, repeating this procedure several times ....

This is an option I will not consider here. The dough for Napoleon that I suggest you make is much easier to make, takes less time, but nevertheless, the result will be just as wonderful and tasty! It was this recipe that was recorded by many hostesses of that time as a quick and trouble-free winning version of the classic Napoleon cake.

I will show you how to make “butter crumble” from a mixture of flour and butter in a blender (chopper), but you can do this procedure the old fashioned way - by chopping pieces of butter with flour with a regular knife, as finely as possible. And then you can still rub the lumps with your hands. Just do it quickly so that the butter does not become too soft and melt on your hands.

First, lightly chop large pieces of cold butter by hand right on the plate.

Then add the oil to the chopper bowl.

From above - all the flour, it is advisable to sift it through a sieve beforehand. We run at high speed, until the formation of small-fine crumbs.

This is the kind of crumb we should get in the end.

In another container, mix the crumbs with the rest of the ingredients - sour cream, water, egg, vodka and salt.

We form a bun from the dough. You need to knead the dough quite quickly, all for the same reason - the butter must remain cold in its composition, not melted. When the dough does not stick to the hands and the table, the consistency we need is reached. We cover our bun with a napkin and leave it to stand for half an hour.

After half an hour, we put it in the refrigerator for another 1 hour, but first wrap it in a film. By the way, now is the time to start preparing the cream, so as not to waste this hour.

After an hour we take it out, you can knead it a little more. And we divide by the number of koloboks that we need to get the same number of cakes. In the photo - 9 pieces, but can be divided into 12 and 15 parts.

We cover them again with a film and put them in the cold. We will take one small kolobok from there and roll it into cakes.

You can immediately cut the rolled cake in shape (for example, by attaching a plate or circle stencil). You can - just mark the cut, without removing the excess - we will remove it easily after baking.

I usually roll out such thin cakes immediately on parchment, so that it is easier to transfer to a sheet. But if you need to shift the thinly rolled dough onto a baking sheet from the table, roll it onto a rolling pin, transfer it to a sheet and roll it back. Very simple.

We send it to the hot oven for 3-5 minutes. Cookies should reach a light, golden hue, they do not need to be overcooked. Slightly seized, browned slightly - you can get it. The oven is heated somewhere at 180-200 degrees. We bake on parchment - it’s easier to remove the cakes from the sheet.

If it is good to “pierce” our shortcake with a fork in many places, no large bubbles and swellings will form, the cakes will look very even and neat. But I love it more when the dough puffs up during baking, because then additional “layered” places form in these places, and the more layering, the tastier our future Napoleon will be! Well, as in this photo -

Trimmings are also baked and stored separately, until better times. At the best of times, we will make crumbs out of them for sprinkling.

Cooking custard.

It is convenient to make the cream while the dough is standing in the cold. We have a whole hour of time - we will do everything in time!

Part of the milk (2/3 liters) is put to bask in a saucepan on the fire. Mix the rest of the milk with a mixer or a whisk with eggs, sugar and vanilla in a thick foam. Add flour and cognac - beat.

In a saucepan with already hot milk, add our cream base in a thin stream, continuing intensive stirring continuously. It is necessary to cook our cream until it thickens, but bubbles that indicate boiling should not be allowed. And, of course, make sure that the cream does not burn to the bottom of the pan - the taste will immediately deteriorate. If you do not have much experience in this matter, it is better to put everything in a water bath and steam the cream - this way it is easier for us to control the temperature and there is less chance of spoiling something.

We cool the cream. Butter, on the contrary, is taken out to soften at room temperature.

Now we need to connect them together. Someone starts whipping the butter into a fluffy mass and gradually adds the custard base one spoon at a time. Someone just whips everything at once in one container. I don’t see a fundamental difference here - in the presence of modern “beating” equipment in the form of mixers, blenders, etc. - everything is whipped "with a bang!".

However, maybe you have a different opinion and there is some special way of whipping the cream that gives an amazing result - share it in the comments on this article!

We are preparing the second type of cream for a delicious Napoleon - Sour Cream

There are no special secrets here, except for one thing - sour cream should be natural and high-fat, at least 25, and preferably 30%. If you do not have such sour cream, there are two options: the first is simple and fast. And the second one is slow but correct 🙂

1. We take the “Thickener for Sour Cream” (for cream, just a thickener - what can be found in your stores) - and do everything according to the instructions on the package.
2. We take ordinary sour cream - double the volume, and place it for several hours, preferably at night, in thick gauze, hanging it over a water container (or place sour cream in a small colander). The bottom line is that, under its own weight, sour cream squeezes out all the excess water from its bowels (and how does it get there, I wonder?!) and we end up with thick, real sour cream, from which you can already beat a high-quality thick cream.

As sugar, it is better to take powdered sugar, but this does not matter. Pour sugar into sour cream and beat until thick. There will be a short period when the sour cream will thin a little, but keep whisking and it will thicken to the state we need.

Assembling and decorating the Napoleon cake

The most enjoyable moment of making cakes is collecting, smearing, decorating!

Why did we make 2 types of cream? For the best taste, of course!

• So, we put a dry cake and coat it with custard on top.
• We lay the second cake - we coat it again as well.
• First we smear the third cake with sour cream and on top here with custard.
• So we repeat, lubricating every third cake additionally with sour cream, whipped with sugar, until the ingredients run out.
• We don’t smear the last layer with anything yet - we leave our cake to stand for half an hour or an hour. During this time, the cakes will soak and become very tasty and moderately soft.
• Now wrap the cake with foil on the sides and put a clean board (something flat) on top and lightly press the layers down. Place a small (about 1 kg) load on the board and refrigerate for several hours, preferably overnight.

And in the morning we will decorate our soaked and infused cake completely:

Lubricate the remaining cream (any, you can use two at once) on the top layer and coat the sides.
Cover the sides and top of the cake with crumbs. I hope you did not throw away our scraps, but dried them in the air and ground them into small crumbs?

Well, our magnificent Napoleon is ready to use!

I saw on the net many options for decorating this cake with different fruits, berries, etc. , but for some reason I really like the traditional, classic look of this cake - you can immediately see the real, "Soviet" Napoleon - you can’t confuse it with anything!

Cake Napoleon from ready-made puff pastry with condensed milk cream

And now let's look at the "high-speed" method of making Napoleon cake. Fast as possible. It’s faster to just buy a ready-made cake in the store, but this is not our goal!

It so happens that guests are expected in the evening. Or the children suddenly wanted a cake "right now" and certainly - in their mother's performance ... There are different situations, but there is only one way out - to have a supply of the necessary products at home and 20-30 minutes of free time. Well, good mood, of course! Without it, in general, there is nothing to do in the kitchen 🙂

So, we will need 2 packs of ready-made frozen puff pastry, even yeast, even without, there is no difference.

We spread them out of the package immediately on 2 pieces of parchment and leave them to defrost in this form. We get 2 rectangles of ready-made puff pastry per sheet.

While the dough comes to room temperature, we have time to make the cream.

Making cream from condensed milk (condensed milk)

The fastest cream that everyone knows and loves is butter whipped with condensed milk.

Sometimes they write about 150 grams of butter and 350 grams of condensed milk ... Why such difficulties? Who will measure these grams when it comes to delicious cream?!

I just take a pack of good (82.5% fat) butter and one standard can of condensed milk. I think that this is the most convenient and delicious proportion for cream!

To improve the taste, you can add a bag of vanillin and a couple of spoons of cognac - the aroma will be very memorable. But even banal condensed milk with butter, just whipped into a good smooth cream, will perfectly set off our Napoleon from the finished puff pastry.

Butter cut into cubes and hold at room temperature until softened. We begin to beat, gradually adding condensed milk and vanillin with cognac (if you decide on this option) by a spoonful.

Our task is to get a uniform, thick, smooth mass, which will be our tastiest and fastest cream for soaking and decorating the cake.

The cream is ready. The dough has defrosted, softened and even slightly “swollen” - it's time to bake it.

Preheat the oven to standard 180 degrees and put a sheet of dough in it. We will need 10-15 minutes for one serving of cakes. But make sure that they are not overcooked, but are of a beautiful golden hue.

Now we need to "get" a crumb to decorate Napoleon. We slightly cut off the edges of our puff plates - and we will get the crumbs, and we will align the edges of the cake. You also need to cut - remove the top baked crust from each cake. This will give us both the material for the sprinkle and soften the finished layers.

Here we have such a semi-finished product.

Now we coat each layer with cream.

Cut crusts, if necessary, dry in the air or in the oven and grind into crumbs.

Sprinkle crumbs on the sides and top of the cake. Here he is ready!

Of course, he still needs to be given time to soak in the cream - at least 3 hours, but these are already problems for those who are waiting for a tasty treat, and we are free and can do whatever our heart desires. We have already fulfilled our duty to a hungry family 🙂

For everything about everything, it will take us 20-30 minutes! And this is along with the preparation of the cream. A good, quick option for cooking Napoleon for those who do not want to spend half a day in the kitchen.

Quick Napoleon cake in a pan - step by step recipe with photo

Let's analyze another "non-classic" version of the Napoleon cake, cooked in a pan. It sounds rather doubtful, but, oddly enough, the taste is quite decent!

If you are in a place where you do not have an oven (maybe you were drawn to nature and decided to celebrate the New Year in the country) - you will definitely amaze your guests with a freshly cooked Napoleon! On the frying pan! Fantastic…

I will not disassemble the cream - take any of the above. I met another version of the cream for Napoleon - condensed milk is added to the custard with butter ... I don’t know, I’ve never done this before .. Do you think this is a suitable option? Write, please, who made such a cream - share your impressions!

But let's take a look at the dough for cooking in a pan step by step, or rather, from photographs. It's easier.

For this version of the test, we will prepare:

• 1 pack of butter 190-200 gr. (or creamy margarine)
• 3 cups flour
• 2 eggs
• 50 ml very cold water
• 1/2 teaspoon soda slaked with vinegar (or baking powder for dough - 0.5 sachet)

Some housewives are generally against soda in this recipe, they believe that it spoils the taste. If you put not 2 eggs, but 2-3 yolks, then they will serve as a good softener for the dough and may well replace soda.

Grate the butter on a coarse grater and sprinkle with flour. We mix everything quickly with our hands, grinding the butter with flour to the state of butter crumbs.

We extinguish the soda with 6% vinegar (or add baking powder for the dough), mix the ice water with the egg and add all this to the crumbs. Quickly knead our dough into a large bun. As soon as the dough stops sticking to your hands, we divide it into small koloboks (the size depends on the size of your frying pan, on which we will bake the cakes, but you can see the approximate size from the photo). We pack the koloboks in a film or bags (from winding) and place them in the refrigerator for 1 hour.

We take out one kolobok and immediately quickly roll it into a thin layer.

Here is such a thickness that the hand shines through. This is approximately 1 mm thick dough.

The lid from our frying pan will give us the right diameter for the cake. Press down the dough with a lid.

We remove the extra trimmings - then we will make another cake out of them.

We prick our layer of dough with a fork so that it does not bubble very much.

Place on a dry hot frying pan (no oil!).

Cakes are prepared in a pan very quickly - literally 1 minute on one side. And quickly turn over.

We make all the shortcakes in turn. While one is baking, roll out the other. Cool down. We roll the scraps into a common lump and also roll them into cakes.

We coat our "Napoleon from the pan" with cream. Everything is as usual, layer by layer. Leave 3 shortcakes for sprinkling - dry and grind into crumbs.

The main thing that needs to be observed is the soaking time of the cake - at least 3-4 hours, and preferably at night. The longer it stays in the refrigerator, the better it will soak and the tastier, more tender and softer it will be.

PS. By the way, I compared the dough in a pan, made from margarine and made from butter. Where I took the butter - the cakes were softer and more tender, well, it seemed to me so. I didn’t have time to ask the homeworkers - everything was swept away in an instant! In my opinion, some people don’t care at all how much time and effort you spent on this cake - if only it was sweet 🙂

Posted on June 17, 2017

Napoleon cake is so delicious and desirable in almost every home. Even in the distant Soviet times, many housewives shared their recipe for this cake with their girlfriends. Each family had its own recipe for cake and cream, which passed from mother to daughter from grandmother to granddaughter. But probably not everyone knows why this cake was called Napoleon.

There are several versions of the appearance of this particular name. Legend one. The name for this treat first “stuck” in 1912, when the hundred-year-old exile of Boanaparte from Russia was celebrated on a grand scale at the court. And they served a treat in the form of a triangle, which symbolized the cocked hat worn by Napoleon. This treat quickly gained recognition and was named Napoleon. So the name has survived to this day, although it has lost its original form.

It used to be that it was very difficult to cook a real Napoleon. That those chefs who cook Napoleon are simply top-class cooks. It is possible that such a belief developed due to the fact that in those days it was difficult and expensive to get all the ingredients for Napoleon.

Basically, butter was expensive and the hostesses prepared a cake on margarine, which is very indecent for this cake. And those who cooked in butter said that the cake is so delicious because of my secret recipe. So there was an opinion that somewhere there is a real Napoleon cake recipe. That only according to this recipe you need to cook and then everything will turn out great.

Cake Napoleon step by step cooking recipe

INGREDIENTS FOR THE DOUGH:

• 5 glasses of premium flour.
• 300 grams of butter.
• 1 fresh egg.
• Half a glass of natural sour cream is not a sour cream product, but sour cream.
• Half a glass of water.
• 2 tablespoons of vodka.
• Salt on the tip of a teaspoon.

DOUGH PREPARATION PROCESS:

☑ Before starting to prepare the dough, the flour must be sifted. Even if it is pure and of the highest grade, this sifting oxygenates the flour, which allows you to make more airy cakes.

☑ Only use frozen butter. We cut it into pieces. Of course, frozen butter is unpleasant to cut, but this is required by the recipe.

☑ Grind the pieces of butter with flour until crumbs appear. We do this with our hands and as quickly as possible so that the oil does not have time to melt.

☑ Break an egg into a cup, add salt and shake it with a fork or whisk until the salt dissolves.

☑ Pour the resulting mixture into the flour and knead the dough. It is also not worth fiddling with the dough for a long time, it is important to knead it before the butter melts. But it is also important to knead the dough so that all the ingredients make friends with each other. The dough should not stick to your hands. From the resulting dough we form a ball.

☑ It turned out such a bun that you need to leave for 30-40 minutes. Cover it with a bowl or towel and let it sit.

☑ After the allotted time, wrap the dough in cling film and send it to the refrigerator where it will stay exactly 60 minutes.

☑ After an hour, take out the dough, knead a little, roll it into a sausage and pour it into equal parts. From this amount of ingredients, on average, 13-15 equal pieces should be obtained. We form balls from them, transfer them with a film to avoid sticking together and again send them to the refrigerator.

☑ While the dough is cooling in the refrigerator, we will prepare a warm welcome for it, namely, we will heat the oven to 200 degrees.

☑ As soon as the thermometer approaches the mark, you can take one ball of dough and start processing it. Namely, we will roll out a ball of dough into a thin cake.

A small life hack so that the dough does not stick to the table, cover the table with baking paper. And roll out the dough right on the paper. And even when the cake is thin, it is very inconvenient to transfer it to a baking sheet. And with paper, it will be easier for you to cope with this.

☑ When the dough is rolled out to the desired thickness, put a plate on top of it and cut off the uneven edges. We transfer a beautiful and even cake to the oven, but before that you need to poke it with a fork so that the cake does not bubble in the oven.

The cooking time of the cake is 3-4 minutes. Don't keep it in the oven for too long. Cakes should be baked but not burnt. The color of the cakes should remain light.

Well, in general, the algorithm of actions is as follows. One cake is baked, the other is rolled out and so on until the victorious last cake.

When baking cakes, bumps or bubbles may appear on them, this is not scary and do not be upset if your cakes are all bubbling. It's not scary, it's the way it should be.

But what to do with those scraps from the cakes? We collect the remains in a lump, knead a little so that all the pieces are combined into one and rolled into a thin cake (possibly of irregular shape), we throw it into the oven. Bake until done.

This cake will go to decorate the cake. You can bake the leftovers immediately with the cake. They cut off the cake and, together with the remnants, threw it into the oven. You can also bake the cakes without cutting them, and then cut them off after baking, but it is so likely that the cakes will simply crack or break. So it's best to trim the cakes before they go into the oven.

Cakes are ready now you can start preparing the cream. Although this can be done while the dough is being prepared. Remember that we sent it to the refrigerator for an hour, during this time, while the dough cools and soaks, you can prepare the cream for the Napoleon cake. You can read more about custard on my friend's blog by clicking on this link. How to make custard.

CREAM INGREDIENTS:

• 3 fresh eggs.
• 1 liter of milk.
• 4 tablespoons of flour.
• 1 heaping glass of sugar.
• 180 grams of butter.
• 2 tablespoons brandy.
• 1 teaspoon vanilla.
• Salt a pinch.

PROCESS OF PREPARING CUSTARD:

In a deep bowl, beat the eggs, add a pinch of salt, and sugar. Using a blender or mixer, beat the eggs until foamy. But not too thick mass should remain liquid.

Add flour, cognac to eggs and mix well. Mix until you get a homogeneous mass without flour lumps.

Add milk to room temperature and stir.

We transfer the bowl of creams to the stove with low heat. And we start heating the mass. It is important to constantly stir the cream, otherwise it may burn and all your efforts will be in vain.

Bring the cream to a low boil and cook it a little. The longer the cream boils, the thicker it will turn out.

The cream is almost ready, it remains to add butter to it.

Beat the butter with a mixer until creamy and add it to our custard. Constantly mixing with a mixer. When all the ingredients are mixed, let the cream cool a little in the refrigerator.

FORMING A CAKE:

The cream has cooled down, the cakes have also cooled down, now it's time to start forming the cake.You can mold the cake on a tray if the cakes are of sufficient size or on a beautiful dish.

We put the cake on a dish and thoroughly coat it with custard.

We put the second cake on the first cake and grease it with cream in the same way. And so on until the last cake is missed.

Do not rush to smear the topmost cake with cream, let it remain without cream, as in the future it will interfere with us a little.

We do not regret the cream. When the last cake is smeared, the cake will need to be left for impregnation. This takes 40 minutes to an hour. The longer it sits, the better the cakes will soak.

After soaking the cakes, you need to press down the cake a little from top to bottom. We take something flat and large, preferably something that is larger than the cake and press the cake on top. But don't overdo it.

After this procedure, the cream will certainly come out between the cakes. If there is too much of it, then a part can be transferred to the top cake, and if not too much, then evenly distribute the rest of the cream on the sides of the cake.

From the remains of the cakes we make crumbs. Just breaking the cake with cookies. With this crumb we decorate the Napoleon cake from all sides. So crumble everywhere.

In this form, we leave the cake for another 5-6 hours for further impregnation. Then another 5-6 hours the cake should stand in the refrigerator. And only after 12-15 hours the cake is completely ready for use. The cakes were soaked infused and absorbed the taste and aroma of the cream.

Now you can serve the cake on the table and treat the guests.

Bon appetit.

Napoleon recipe video

Bon appetit.

To cook "Napoleon" according to the classic recipe of the Soviet era, you need to tinker. Make the dough, bake a lot of cakes, cook the cream, assemble the cake, let it soak. It's a whole story. But the result is a delicious, tender, melt-in-your-mouth cake, worthy of the most exquisite holiday table. You won't make this every day. And if you want? Then there are quick recipes. Today there will be everything - both traditional and its two simple relatives.

Cake "Napoleon": a recipe with custard, the most delicious

In my opinion, this is a very successful homemade cake recipe. The dough for cakes will be chopped, custard. I tried to make the most detailed step-by-step photos so that it would be clear to everyone who will bake for the first time.

Cake Ingredients:

• flour - 2.5 cups * (400g);
• sugar - 2 tbsp. (50gr);
• salt - a pinch;
• butter - 300g;
• water - 6-7 tbsp. (110-120ml).
• Cream Ingredients:
• egg yolks - from 4 eggs;
• powdered sugar - 8 tbsp. (200gr);
• milk - 400 ml;
• butter - 150g.

* a glass with a capacity of 250 ml.

How to cook "Napoleon" at home:

First of all, we take out the butter, cut off 150 grams for the cream and leave it on the table. We need it softened. By the time we cook the cakes, it will melt. And for the test you need frozen.

I will show you how to cook chopped dough, but I’ll be honest right away - I myself rarely cook it like that. I usually use a blender or grater. However, let's go in order.

1. On a cutting board, sift the flour with a slide, put the salt.
2. Frozen butter (300g) cut into medium-sized pieces arbitrarily. I put them in flour.
   
3. We arm ourselves with two knives, one in each hand, or with such a special tool that you see in the photo, and begin to chop the butter, while mixing it with flour.
   
4. As a result, a mixture similar to wholemeal flour should form in front of you with small inclusions of pea-sized pieces of butter. This is the correct consistency. If you chop all this in a blender bowl, then it will turn out like this without any problems. If you grate the butter, then try to do it as quickly as possible so that the butter does not melt in your hands. The presence of frozen butter in the dough determines its friability after baking. If the butter melts before the oven, you will get a dry sole instead of cakes.
5. For the same reason, we will add very cold water (6-7 tablespoons) to our mixture.
   
   
6. Kneading the dough with your hands for a long time and until smooth is not something that is not necessary, but categorically impossible! Quickly mix, crush, so that a little bit of a lump sticks together and that's it.
   
7. Then we give it the shape of a log, put it in a plastic bag and send it to the refrigerator for 30 minutes.
   
8. While you can do the cream. Separate 4 egg yolks into a bowl, pour powdered sugar.
   
9. Mix with a whisk.
   
10. Pour milk into a saucepan and bring to a boil. In a thin stream, without ceasing to interfere, pour the hot milk into the egg-butter mixture.
    
11. Then pour everything into a saucepan in which the milk was heated, and return to the fire. With low heat, stirring constantly, cook the mixture until we feel that it has begun to thicken, and the whisk leaves traces on the surface.
    
12. Remove from stove and continue stirring for another 2-3 minutes. Then pour the mixture into a deep bowl.
    
13. Cover with cling film so that it lies directly on the mixture. So the surface does not dry out. We leave to cool.
14. We return to the test. Remove from refrigerator and cut into 10 or 12 pieces. In a real Napoleon, there should be no less number of cakes.
    
    
    
15. Bake cakes ideally on a silicone mat. If not, on baking paper. We will roll out immediately on them. To do this, put one piece of dough in the center, cover with a plastic bag and roll out thinly with a rolling pin, no more than 2mm.
    
16. In order for the future cake to be the correct round shape, we put a plate on top and circle around the edge. Don't throw away the dough scraps. Saving them and then rolling out another full-fledged cake will not work, but then baking them for sprinkling is just right.
    
17. To prevent the dough from puffing up in the oven, prick it often with a fork. I have such a tool.
    
18. We bake one at a time in an oven heated to 200 ° C for just a few minutes. Therefore, do not go far, as they are browned - take them out. Ready put on a towel.
    
19. If the cream mixture has already cooled down and become warm, you can continue with it. Put softened butter.
    
20. Beat with a mixer until smooth and uniform.
    
21. When everything is baked, you can proceed to the assembly of the cake. Lubricate all layers with cream, do not forget to leave for the top and sides.
    
    
22. You can decorate the cake with the crumbs that we get when we bake the dough scraps. Sprinkle them on the top and sides. Additionally, you can sprinkle with finely chopped hazelnuts and powdered sugar.
    
23. The cake must be kept in the refrigerator for at least 3-4 hours for impregnation.

From such a classic "Napoleon" of the Soviet era!

Napoleon from ready-made cakes with condensed milk cream

As you understood from the previous recipe, the longest and most effort-consuming process is baking. The cream is prepared relatively simply and quickly. Therefore, for a quick option, we buy ready-made cakes. I can say from my own experience that they are quite good. The cake is ready in 20 minutes.

Ingredients:

• cakes - 1 pack (380g, 6pcs);
• condensed milk - 1 can;
• butter - 150g.

How to make a cake from ready-made cakes:

I am satisfied with the result. Of course, the taste is far from the first, real one, but the cooking speed is definitely a huge fat plus.

Puff pastry cake with sour cream

This one is also faster than the classic version, although it requires baking. But ... if you make a rating of recipes, then puff is in last place. Also tasty, but still not the same. The option is suitable for the case when you need it quickly and there are no store-bought ready-made cakes.

Ingredients:

• puff pastry without yeast - 1 kg;
• sour cream at least 20-25% - 200g;
• boiled condensed milk - 1 can.

How to cook:

Here are three Napoleon cake recipes, from complex to simple, for all occasions and situations. Print yourself step-by-step photos, experiment and please your family and friends.

Napoleon cake is a favorite delicacy in many families. It is always cooked with great pleasure. Because they know for sure that if there is a store-bought version and a home-made cake on the festive table, then it’s not even worth guessing which one will be eaten first!

But not everyone knows that this recipe was not always as accessible as it is now.

When we lived in Uzbekistan in the 80s, cakes in the store were a rarity. And so a lot of recipes for various desserts of our own production went from hand to hand. Each hostess certainly had a notebook with recipes for their preparation.

Since there was always a special attitude to their preparation, the notebook was usually separate, only for them - loved ones. In Uzbekistan, any housewife cooked pilaf, shurpa, lagman, manti, samsa ... and everything else with ease. But the one who knew how to cook a real tasty Napoleon was considered a real culinary specialist.

And there were special reasons for this. First, it was difficult to buy enough good butter. Margarine was mainly used for baking, and for Napoleon cake, margarine is by no means suitable.

But there was also a more compelling reason. The recipe was kept a huge secret. The thing is that since it was almost impossible to buy a good cake, and for the holidays everyone wanted to surprise the guests and feed them deliciously, Napoleon baked, you can say on a commercial basis, but more simply - for sale.

Of course, they baked other cakes, but this one always came first. It was not easy to order. Not less than a month, there was a queue for its baking.

It is clear that the craftsmen who baked such cakes kept the recipe under lock and key with seven seals. The people went, of course, recipes, but Napoleon according to these recipes turned out to be not so tasty. And I couldn't find that recipe.

But when we left Uzbekistan, they simply gave it to me. I will not waste your time and tell how it happened.

Today I want to offer you this “secret” recipe. I really hope you like it too!

We will need:

For the test

• flour - 5 cups
• butter - 300 gr. 82%
• egg - 1 pc.
• sour cream - 0.5 cups
• water - 0.5 cups
• vodka - 2 tablespoons
• salt - 1/3 of a teaspoon

For custard

• egg - 3 pcs.
• milk - 1 liter
• flour - 3 - 4 tbsp. spoons
• sugar - 1 cup plus 3/4 cup more
• butter - 170 gr. 82%
• cognac - 2 tbsp. spoons.
• vanillin - 1 teaspoon (without a slide)

For sour cream

• sour cream fat, thick - 1.5 cups
• sugar - 3/4 cup

Test preparation:

1. Sift the flour through a sieve into a large bowl. It is necessary to sift it, preferably even twice, so that the flour is saturated with oxygen. Then the cake will turn out really tender and tasty.

Cut the cold butter into pieces into flour. Rub everything with your hands until crumbs form. Try to rub quickly so that the butter does not have time to melt.

2. In a separate bowl, beat the egg with salt.

Add boiled cold water, sour cream and vodka. Stir everything until smooth, you can whisk. Vodka is an essential ingredient; without it, the cakes will not be so tender and layered.

3. Add the resulting mixture to the flour, and knead the dough. This must be done quickly so that the butter does not have time to melt. It is not necessary to form an even bun, the main thing is that everything is mixed and the dough does not stick to your hands.

4. When you have achieved the desired state, cover the dough with a napkin and leave for 30 minutes.

5. After 30 minutes, put the dough in cellophane, or wrap it in cling film. Put in the refrigerator for at least 1 hour.

6. Then we take it out, knead again and cut into sausages, which in turn we divide into 12-15 identical parts, roll up the balls.

We put the balls in a bag so that they do not stick together and send the bag to the refrigerator.

7. We put the oven to warm up. We need a temperature of 200 degrees.

8. We take out one ball at a time from the refrigerator, roll it out very thinly. It is better to use parchment for this, and now baking paper is also sold. We roll right on it. A thinly rolled sheet without paper will be difficult to transfer to a baking sheet later.

9. We put a template on top in the form of a large plate, and cut out an even circle on it. I have a plate with a diameter of 24 cm.

10. We make punctures with a fork all over the sheet so that the finished product does not bulge, but remains even, and set to bake directly on paper.

11. Each sheet will be baked for 3-4 minutes. We need light baked cakes. No need to bake until brown. The color of the cakes should be light.

12. While the cake is baking, roll out the next sheet, and so on until the end. While the cakes turned out bumpy and uneven. It's because of the vodka and oil. But we need it, it's good that they are. When impregnated with cream, the layering we need will appear. Each layer will be soaked and this will give the delicacy an impeccable taste.

13. Knead the trimmings with cakes again until smooth, roll out thinly, and also bake. This cake can be of any shape. We need it for decoration.

14. Or you can bake the cakes first, and then cut them into shape. But that's how they crumble. Therefore, I always use the first method.

Cooking custard

1. While the dough is gaining strength, first on the table, and then in the refrigerator, you can cook the custard.

2. Beat eggs with sugar until foamy, add 1.5 cups of milk, mix.

3. Add flour and cognac. Mix well until lumps disappear.

4. Boil the remaining milk in a separate saucepan. When it boils, make a funnel in the milk with a whisk and gradually pour the resulting mixture into the center of the funnel. We stir constantly. This is a very important preparation step.

5. It is necessary to cook the resulting mixture to a creamy state, but the mixture must not be allowed to boil. If it boils, the cream will lose its delicate texture, thicken greatly, and then the cakes will not be able to soak in it. And this is very important for the finished cake.

6. Without letting the cream boil, cook it until it thickens, then remove from heat.

7. Cool the cream.

8. Beat room temperature butter until creamy.

9. Mix the cream with butter, adding a little vanillin. It should turn out not too thick, but not a liquid mass, so that it is convenient to coat the cakes with it.

sour cream

1. It is better to take sour cream rustic, thick and oily, so that there is no liquid in it. If you use store-bought sour cream, I’ll tell you a little further how to make cream from it.

2. Grind sugar into powder.

3. Put the sour cream in a deep bowl, put the bowl in cold water. It is better to cool the water in advance in the refrigerator. It will help to achieve a more airy cream.

4. We start whipping sour cream, slowly adding powdered sugar. Beat for 15-20 minutes (preferably with a mixer, the whipping time is reduced by 2 times). But it is better to beat at a low speed.

5. The cream should not be liquid, and not thick. The thicker the sour cream, the thicker the cream.

Now that the cakes have completely cooled down and two creams are ready, we begin to collect the Napoleon cake.

How to properly assemble a cake

• we take a flat dish, or if the cakes are very large, you can use a tray.
• We spread the first cake on it and generously grease it with custard.
• then lay out the second cake and again grease with custard
• on the third cake, spread the first layer of sour cream, and the second - custard

• then again grease 2 layers with custard

• and the sixth layer again with two creams
• that is, every third cake is smeared with two creams
• when the turn reaches the last layer, we also lubricate it with cream. If there is sour cream left, you can smear it with it.
• There was a lot of cream, if you now put pressure on the cakes, then it will literally crawl out from under them. But we are not pressing anywhere yet, but we leave this not yet quite beautiful and even mass in this form.

• leave the cake, let it stand for 30 - 60 minutes in this form, during which time it will soak all the cakes
• then put baking paper on the last cake in size
• take a large flat plate, and preferably a cutting board, put it on the finished product, and pressing a little, crush the cakes. They are already slightly soaked, and should not break. Do not press hard so as not to break the cakes
• leave it under the board for a while, so it will settle a little more
• remove the paper, remove the remaining cream from it, put it back on the top layer
• we report on the last layer as much cream as necessary
• we make crumbs from the last cake, which was made from scraps
• sprinkle on top

• leave for 10 - 12 hours at room temperature, soak
• then refrigerate for 12 hours
• then we take it out, cut into pieces and eat with pleasure

The taste of our Napoleon is simply the most delicate. I must say that this cake is not too sweet. And this is good, not only the taste of sweetness is felt, but also the whole variety of tastes!

Secrets and features of making Napoleon cake

1. After the advent of the Internet, I met many different Napoleon cake recipes. Some of them were similar to those that we once cooked, and complained that our Napoleon's taste was not the same anyway.
2. Later, analyzing what was the matter, I realized one thing. Apparently the whole main secret is in only two things - the dough contains vodka, and the cream is used not one, as in the classic version, but two. Thanks to this, the finished product has a distinctive taste and incredible tenderness.
3. An important aspect is that the cakes are moderately thin, and there is enough cream on them. I always make a cream with a margin, according to the principle "let it be better than not enough." And always in such cases, I remember a joke about pies ... What you need for pies to be tasty - you don’t have to feel sorry for the filling! So the cream is also not to be regretted. Our cake should be well-soaked and not dry.
4. She promised to tell me about store-bought sour cream. If you can’t find fat and thick sour cream, then take a colander, put gauze in it in two layers, and put sour cream there. Place the colander in a bowl or saucepan. Put the whole thing in the refrigerator for 3-4 hours, excess water will go through cheesecloth to the bottom of the bowl. In such sour cream, you can additionally add 2 tablespoons of heavy cream.

There is another delicious recipe according to which this delicacy turns out to be very tasty. This

She told me everything, tried not to forget anything. Now the matter is small. Take and cook a Napoleon cake according to an old recipe that was kept a big secret for a very long time.

Bon appetit!