Strawberries and cream NaughtyStack

The Naughty Cook justifiably enjoys something of a reputation for exploring and expanding ideas for the fillings of NaughtyStacks. We’ve even considered registering the name but we’re having too much fun making them to bother with that. This one certainly ticks all the boxes.

Ingredients

Hotcakes

• ½ ounce / 15g unsalted butter
• 4 ounces / 110g plain flour
• 1 large egg
• 5¼ fluid ounces / 150ml whole milk
• ½ teaspoon of caster sugar
• ½ tablespoon of baking powder
• pinch of salt

Toppings

• 14 ounces / 400g strawberries, sliced
• 10½ ounces / 300g icing sugar, sifted
• 1¾ ounces / 50g unsalted butter, softened
• 4½ ounces / 125g Philadelphia cream cheese (see Trivia below)
• kebab skewers to serve

Method

Melt the butter in a small saucepan and allow to cool.

Place all of the hotcake ingredients (including the melted butter) into a food processor and blitz until you have your batter.

Heat a large frying pan on a low-medium heat and add a knob of unsalted butter.  Using a 1/8th cup measure (about 30 millilitres or 1 fluid ounce), put three dollops of batter around the pan (far enough apart so that when they spread they don’t touch) and once the hotcake starts bubbling on the surface and a skin begins to form, flip over.

Allow to cook for another 20 seconds or so before transferring to a plate.

Clean the pan, put in another knob of butter and repeat until you have five hotcakes.

Leave your hotcakes aside to cool while you make your cream cheese icing.

Beat the icing sugar and butter together in a freestanding electric mixer with the paddle attachment until fully combined.

Add the Philadelphia and beat until combined, before turning the mixer up to medium-high for about 3 minutes or until light and fluffy.

To create your NaughtyStack, take a hotcake and dollop with a couple of tablespoons of icing and spread evenly.

Arrange a layer of strawberry slices and repeat with the remaining hotcakes.  Spear your tower with kebab skewers to keep them from sliding apart.

Trivia

Cream cheese is intrinsically linked with the city of New York. The first cream cheese was made by there by New York dairyman William Lawrence in 1872. In 1880 it was branded “Philadelphia” because the city at that time was associated in the minds of all Americans with top quality food. At the same time, it was distributed in foil wrappers for the first time. In 1903, the Phenix Cheese Company of New York bought the Philadelphia trademark. Then in 1928, Phenix merged with the Mondalez International Cheese Company and the product began to be mass produced in a more consistent way. Philadelphia Cream Cheese was first sold in the UK in 1960 and the first TV commercial was aired in 1963. Over the following years, the product was updated and saw the introduction of different ranges such as Handisnacks and flavours.