Or, a relatively successful attempt at a pumpkin charlotte. It needs work, but frankly, I found it irritating enough and not quite tasty enough, that I probably won't try again. At least not this year. Martha Stewart's chocolate-coconut charlotte was my inspiration, though I wanted it to be based around pumpkin flavors.
So I started with ginger cake (can't remember which recipe I used) and made a mess of things. If I'd done my research, I would have known that cake butter plus extra flour doth no ladyfingers make. Honestly, Ann.
The second attempt at making ladyfingers went a little better, turns out whipped egg whites really help. Adding pumpkin puree probably doesn't, but I wanted the flavor. I didn't use a specific recipe for those, which I bet would have been a good idea. I need some practice with piping, speaking of which I also need to find my proper tips, cutting the end off the bag isn't the best method.
I also piped discs, but apparently didn't photograph those. They were the layers, with pumpkin mousse (super delicious) and cream cheese mousse (good, but not great) alternated in between and these ladyfingers around the outside, then some whipped cream on top and a ribbon around it all. So maybe the ribbon sort of took over the cake, it was what I had.
I still don't know why my ladyfingers curled, and I should have lined the ribbon to keep the moisture from seeping through, but I'm over it.
As my first attempt at the charlotte didn't work so well, I ended up using those ginger layers and the left over pumpkin batter and mousse to make an extra little cake.
It definitely needed something to cover the mess, so I whipped up some seven minute frosting and I couldn't resist sticking a bow on it
I put them both into little cake boxes from the New York Cake & Baking Supply and they traveled surprisingly well.
I won an honorable mention for presentation. I really should have stuck with my initial idea of warm and gooey pumpkin bread, turns out comfort foods carried the day.
