Indulgent Russian Honey Cake
Delicate layers of honey-infused sponge and luscious sour cream filling. A classic Russian dessert that's rich, balanced, and totally worth the effort!
Medovik, or Russian honey cake, is a beautifully layered dessert with a perfect balance of deep honey flavour and tangy sour cream frosting. Each thin, caramelised sponge softens as it rests, creating a melt-in-your-mouth texture that's subtle, not overly sweet, and incredibly satisfying. It takes a bit of patience, but the result is timeless and genuinely worth the wait.
Ingredients
For the cake:
75g unsalted butter
100g granulated sugar
5 tbsp honey
3 large eggs
1 tsp vanilla extract
1 tsp baking soda
350g all purpose flour
For the frosting:
250g mascarpone
125ml double cream
100g icing sugar
1 tsp vanilla extract
For the filling:
500ml sour creme
500ml double cream
1 tsp vanilla extract
50g icing sugar
Method
Go ahead and preheat your oven to 200°C / 400°F and prepare two baking trays with baking paper.
After setting up a double boiler over a large pot of simmering water, melt the sugar, honey and butter in the bowl. Separately, beat the eggs and vanilla together and pour this mixture into the double boiler, constantly mixing to avoid creating your breakfast scrambled eggs.
Next, add in the baking soda, salt and 2/3 of the flour, mixing until the dough begins to thicken, once it starts taking shape, take it off the heat and mix in the remaining flour.
Let the dough cool a little bit and knead it with your hands to get to a smooth consistency. Divide into 8 equal parts and cover with a damp kitchen towel to avoid letting it dry out.
Dust your work surface with some flour, and roll out a thin circle slightly bigger than the lid of your cake tin (approx. 23-25cm). Transfer to the baking tray and bake for 4-5mins, keeping an eye on the process as to not burn the layers. Repeat for the rest of the layers.
As they turn golden brown, take them out the oven, and cut out a circle whilst they are still hot.
For the filling, beat the sour creme and double cream, sugar and vanilla until the sugar is incorporated and the whole mixture has double in size. Fill each layer of the cake except for the top and sides.
For the frosting, whisk the mascarpone with the icing sugar, vanilla and double cream until stiff peaks. Cover the top and optionally sides of the cake with the frosting.
It is highly recommended to leave the cake sit in the fridge overnight or 24h before service to allow the layers to soak in the filling.