Birthday Chocolate

Another February brings another birthday for my dad and I made him his customary double-decker chocolate cake. This year, instead of using a cake mix for his cake, I just went ahead and used the cake recipe on the back of the Hershey's Cocoa container. I've made it before, but I haven't put it on here for some reason. Anyway, I used the recipe for the Perfectly Chocolate Frosting, as well, which just so happens to be the same recipe as usual.



No matter how many chocolate cakes I try, this recipe is still my favorite. Kept covered at room temperature, it stays moist and perfect for almost a week, although it usually doesn't last that long in my house. This is just an excellent recipe for a straightforward chocolate-chocolate cake.



Hershey's Perfectly Chocolate Chocolate Cake
Makes about 12 servings

2 cups sugar
1 3/4 cups all-purpose flour
3/4 cup HERSHEY'S Cocoa
1 1/2 teaspoons baking powder
1 1/2 teaspoons baking soda
1 teaspoon salt
2 eggs
1 cup milk
1/2 cup vegetable oil
2 teaspoons vanilla extract
1 cup boiling water

Heat oven to 350 degrees. Grease and flour two 9-inch round baking pans.

Stir together sugar, flour, cocoa, baking powder, baking soda and salt in large bowl. Add eggs, milk, oil and vanilla; beat on medium speed of mixer 2 minutes. Stir in boiling water (batter will be thin). Pour batter into prepared pans.

Bake 30 to 35 minutes or until wooden pick inserted in center comes out clean. Cool 10 minutes; remove from pans to wire racks. Cool completely. Frost and serve.

On the Twelfth Day of Christmas, My True Love Gave to Me...

As you can see, I've been cracking open Dorie Greenspan's Baking from My Home to Yours more frequently as of late; and instead of just sighing at the beautiful pictures, I've been more motivated to try recipes out.



For Christmas dessert, I made this Brownie Cake with a caramel topping. The cake was really a no-brainer and it ended up tasting just like a brownie leaning more toward the cake-end of the brownie spectrum. The caramel was exciting for me; I've only made caramel once or twice before and each time I forget how to do it.



More notably, I forget how boring it is to sit there and wait and wait and wait and wait and wait for the caramel to change colors slightly while worrying that you'll miss it and that it will burn and everything will be ruined forever. That may be an exaggeration, but that's how I felt watching the caramel for seven minutes without blinking once. In the end, the waiting paid off and the caramel was salty and sweet and the brownie cake paired with it perfectly.


Caramel-Peanut-Topped Brownie Cake
Makes about 12 servings

1 cup all-purpose flour
1 teaspoon baking soda
1/4 teaspoon salt
8 tablespoon butter, cut into 8 pieces
5 ounces bittersweet chocolate, coarsely chopped
3 large eggs
1/2 cup packed light brown sugar
1/4 cup sugar
3 tablespoon light corn syrup
1/2 teaspoon vanilla extract

2 cups sugar
1/2 cup water
1 1/2 tablespoons light corn syrup
2/3 cups heavy cream
2 tablespoon unsalted butter, at room temperature
1 cup salted peanuts

Center a rack in the oven and preheat the oven to 350F. Butter an 8-inch spring-form pan, dust the insides with flour, tap out the excess, line the bottom of the pan with a parchment paper. Place the springform pan on a baking sheet.

To make the cake, combine the flour, salt and baking soda in a small bowl. Whisk together to mix and set aside. Add the butter and chocolate to a heatproof bowl and set over simmering water. Heat, stirring occasionally, until the ingredients are melted - do not let them get so hot that the butter separates. Remove the bowl from heat and set aside.

In a large mixing bowl, whisk together the eggs and sugars till well-blended. Whisk in the corn syrup, followed by the vanilla. Add in the melted butter and chocolate mixture, and whisk till combined. Gently whisk in the dry ingredients, mixing only until they are incorporated. The batter should be thick, smooth and shiny. Pour it into the prepared pan and jiggle the pan a little to even out the batter.

Bake for 40-45 minutes or until a thin knife inserted in the middle comes out almost clean. Transfer rack to a pan to cool for 15 minutes, then run a knife gently between the pan and the cake and carefully remove the sides of the springform pan. The cake may have puffed up during baking, but don't be concerned if it develops a crater in the center while cooling. Allow to cool to room temperature. When the cake is completely cool, invert it, remove the base and peel off the parchment paper. Wash and dry the pan, place the cake back into the clean pan, right side up, and fasten sides.

To make the topping: combine the sugar, water and corn syrup in a heavy, medium-sized pan, stirring just to combine the ingredients. Place the pan over medium high heat. Heat, without stirring, till the caramel turns amber (5-10 minutes). As the sugar is caramelizing, wipe down any splatters on the sides of the pan with a pastry brush dipped in cold water. To test the color of the caramel, drop a bit onto a white plate. Don't be timid about the color - if it's too pale, it won't have much flavor.

Lower the heat a bit, stand back and add the cream and butter. When the sputters are less vehement, stir to calm down the caramel and dissolve any lumps. Stir in the peanuts and pour the mixture into a 1-quart Pyrex measuring cup or other heat-proof bowl.

You will have more caramel than you need, but you want to get all the peanuts onto the cake, so spoon out all the peanuts out of the hot caramel and onto the cake. Pour or spoon over enough caramel to cover all the nuts, drizzling a little over the edges of the cake for presentation. Allow the topping to set at room temperature, about 20 minutes, before serving. Keep the leftover caramel at room temperature and save for another use.

The Cake that I Lit on Fire

Dorie Greenspan tells a really great story about this cake in her book, Baking from My Home to Yours. I can't top it. She calls it "The Cake that Got Me Fired."



I didn't have any armagnac, so I ended up using brandy. I also didn't have prunes, so I just took those out. This means that I just lit the brandy on fire in a pan - which was easily the most exciting part of making this cake. The cake in itself was really spectacular - moist, dense, and chewy with the heavenly ganache topping it off just right. I preferred it refrigerated, so that the chocolate was even denser and seemed to melt in my mouth.



Chocolate Armagnac Cake (Modified for Wussies)
Makes about 12 servings

2/3 cup finely ground pecans (or walnuts)
1/4 cup all-purpose flour
1/4 teaspoon salt
3 tablespoons water
1/4 cup Armagnac (or cognac, brandy or Scotch whisky)
7 ounces bittersweet chocolate, coarsely chopped
1/2 cup unsalted butter, cut into 4 pieces
3 large eggs, separated
2/3 cup sugar

3 ounces bittersweet chocolate, coarsely chopped
3 tablespoons confectioners’ sugar
3 tablespoons unsalted butter, at room temperature

Center a rack in the oven and preheat the oven to 375 degrees. Butter an 8-inch springform pan, fit the bottom of the pan with a round of parchment or wax paper and butter the paper. Dust the inside of the pan with flour and tap out the excess. Put the pan on a baking sheet lined with parchment or a silicone mat.

Whisk together the nuts, flour and salt. Preheat a pan on the stovetop for three minutes; remove the pan and pour in the Armagnac. Stand back and set it aflame.

Combine the chocolate, butter and water in a heatproof bowl, set it over a pan of simmering water and stir occasionally until the chocolate and butter are melted; or do this in a microwave oven. Remove the chocolate from the heat just as soon as it is melted and not very hot—you don’t want the chocolate and butter to separate.

In a large bowl, whisk the egg yolks and sugar together until thick and pale, about 2 minutes. Switch to a rubber spatula and, one by one, stir in the chocolate and butter mixture as well as the nut mixture.

Working with a stand mixer fitted with the whisk attachment or with a hand mixer in a large bowl, beat the egg whites until they hold firm, glossy peaks. Stir about one quarter of the beaten whites into the chocolate mixture, and then gently fold in the remaining whites. Turn the batter into the pan.

Bake the cake for 28 to 32 minutes, or until it is puffed, firm on top and starting to come ever so slightly away from the sides of the pan; a thin knife inserted into the center will come out streaky—the cake should not be wet, but you don’t want it to be completely dry. Transfer the cake to a rack and let it cool for about 10 minutes, then carefully remove the sides of the pan. Invert the cake, pull off the paper and turn right side up to cool to room temperature. The cake should be absolutely cool before you glaze it.

If the cake has crowned, use a long serrated knife and a gentle sawing motion to even the top. Turn the cake over onto a cooling rack—you want the very flat bottom of the cake to be the top. Put a piece of wax paper or foil under the cooling rack to serve as a drip catcher.

To make the glaze, melt the chocolate in a heatproof bowl over a pan of gently simmering water, or in a microwave oven. Remove it from the heat and, using a small spatula, stir in the sugar, then the butter, a bit at a time, stirring until you have a smooth glaze.

Have a long metal icing spatula at hand. Pour the glaze over the top of the cake, allowing the excess to rundown the sides, and use the spatula to smooth the top of the cake if necessary—usually the glaze is a self-spreader—and to even it around the sides of the cake. Let the glaze set at room temperature or, if you want to speed it up, slide the cake into the refrigerator for about 20 minutes. If you’d like the glaze to be more like a frosting, let it cool until it is thick enough to spread, then swirl it over the cake.

The cake can be served at room temperature or chilled; it is more flavorful at room temperature but intensely fudgy when chilled.