Sunday 20 September 2009

The Cake Slice Septembers 09: Triple Chocolate Fudge Cake

This months Cake Slice cake is quite poignant as it marks the end of an era – the end of our year of baking from Sky High Irresistible Layer Cakes. Yes! I can hardly believe it but it has in fact been a whole year since the groups creation and we have baked and eaten our way through 12 delicious cakes from this book, meaning next month we will be baking from a brand new cookbook. We choose our cakes each month by voting, so as you can imagine all eyes were glued to the poll to see which cake would be selected as our last cake. This month there was one clear winner, a chocolate cake. It seems few people can resist the lure of a good chocolate cake and September’s cake choice was not only a chocolate cake, but a Triple Chocolate Fudge Cake that contains the surprise ingredient of mayonnaise!! Yes mayonnaise! It is used in place of butter or oil in the cake and results in a very moist and tender crumb.

The cake not only consists of three layers but also contains three hits of chocolate. One, is the gooey chocolate cake itself, two, is a generous layer of fudgy sour cream chocolate icing and three, is a creamy white chocolate mousse filling that is revealed on slicing, a great contrast to the dark cake and icing.


Wow this cake was amazing. As sponge contains mayonnaise and a fair quantity of strong coffee it makes the cake incredibly moist, with an intense chocolate flavour. I think the coffee helped enhance the rich smoky chocolate flavour and cake the cake its deep rich colour without obviously tasting of coffee. My siblings hate coffee and yet happily devoured the cake without detecting the coffee. The thick layer of icing was lovely and fudgy, while the creamy white chocolate mousse filling was wonderfully light and fluffy in contrast. This cake is definitely one for the chocoholics and one I am sure I’ll be making again.

This was the perfect indulgent cake for our last cake baked from the Sky High Irresistible Layer Cakes book. You’ll have to wait until next month to see the first cake we bake from our newly selected cookbook! If you are a fellow cake baking fanatic and would like to become a member of our group for the upcoming year please email me at: (appleandspice [AT] hotmail.co.uk) and put ‘Cake Slice Member’ in the subject box. Places are limited so first come first served.

In the meantime don’t forget to check out the blogroll to see everyone else’s cakes.

Triple Chocolate Fudge Cake
(Recipe from Sky High Irresistible Layer Cakes by Alisa Huntsman and Peter Wynne)
Dark Chocolate Fudge Cake
270g plain flour
65g unsweetened cocoa powder
2 ¼ tsp bicarbonate of soda
1 ¼ tsp baking powder
1 tsp salt
½ tsp ground cinnamon
65g unsweetened chocolate, chopped
225ml milk
280ml hot, strongly brewed coffee
2 eggs
225g mayonnaise
1 ½ tsp vanilla extract
500g sugar (I only used 300g and it was perfectly sweet)

White chocolate mousse (below)
Sour cream chocolate icing (below)

Method
Preheat the oven to 180C. Butter the bottoms and sides of three 9 inch round cake pans. Line the base of each pan with parchment.
Sift together the flour, cocoa powder, bicarbonate of soda, baking powder, cinnamon and salt. Set aside.
Put the chocolate in a large heatproof bowl. Bring the milk to a simmer. Pour the hot coffee and milk over the chocolate. Let stand for a minute, then whisk until smooth and leave to cool slightly.
In a mixer bowl, beat together the eggs, mayonnaise and vanilla until well blended. Gradually beat in the sugar. Add the dry ingredients and mocha liquid alternately in 2 or 3 additions, beating until smooth and well blended. Divide the batter among the 3 prepared pans. (It’s a runny mix and I found using a ladle helped divide it equally between the pans).
Bake for 25 to 28 minutes, or until a cake tester inserted in the centre comes out almost clean. Let the cakes cool in their pans for 10-15 minutes before un-molding onto a wire rack and carefully peeling off the paper. Leave to cool completely.


White Chocolate Mousse
115g white chocolate, chopped
225ml heavy cream
1 egg white
1 tbsp sugar

Method
Melt the white chocolate with 60ml cream in a double boiler. Whisk until smooth. Remove from the heat and let the white chocolate cream cool to room temperature.
When it has cooled, beat the remaining 165ml cream until stiff peaks form. In a clean bowl whip the egg white with the sugar until fairly stiff peaks form.
Fold the beaten egg white into the white chocolate cream. Then fold in the whipped cream until blended. Be sure not to over mix.


Sour Cream Chocolate Icing
340g dark chocolate, chopped
100g unsalted butter
2 tbsp golden syrup
60ml whole milk room temperature
110ml sour cream, at room temperature

Method
Melt the chocolate with the butter and golden syrup in a double boiler over barley simmering water. Remove from the heat and whisk until smooth.
Whisk in the milk and sour cream. Leave to cool until it becomes the thickness of mayonnaise, but be sure to use while still soft.


To Assemble
Place one layer, flat side up, on a cake stand or serving plate. Cover the top evenly with half the white chocolate mousse, leaving a 1cm margin around the edge. Repeat with the second layer and the remaining mousse. Set the third layer on top and spread half the sour cream chocolate icing over the cake, allowing some to run down the sides. Use the remaining icing to cover the cake, smoothing it down the sides.
Decorate with a few white chocolate buttons or as desired. Refrigerate if not eaten within two hours.
Makes an 9inch triple layer cake

32 comments:

Peabody said...

Oh my...come to me fudge cake. Come to me.

Chele said...

How fantastic does that cake look! The mayo seems a bit of a novel ingredient to me, think I'm going to have to try out for myself and see what it tastes like - such a shame lol

Rachel said...

wow you have a real dark crumb...

Snooky doodle said...

oh this is simply irresistible.

Caroline said...

Wow that looks amazing. So rich and moist and chocolately. I'm not a coffee lover, so it's interesting that you couldn't taste the coffee - perhaps I'll have to give similar style cakes a try now!

Issy said...

Are you going to take onnew members now?

aforkfulofspaghetti said...

Oh, my word - that's obscene! In the best possible way, of course... ;)

Well done - what a fantastic cake!

Katie said...

Hi Cupcakes and Cornwall,
Yes we are now accepting new members. Email me if you are interested in baking with us

Jacque said...

Oooh my, look at that. Yours looks perfect! Well done :)

symphonious sweets said...

Your cake is stunning! How did you keep the mousse from running out?

Johanna GGG said...

can you send me a piece - pretty please - that looks so impressive and so delicious - I want to dive into that frosting

steph- whisk/spoon said...

so pretty and love the thick layers of mousse! i will miss this book!

Monica H said...

Your layers of cake and mousse are perfect Katie!

What a great job. I look forward to baking from the new book but I will always have a special place for Sky High Cakes in my heart :-)

Thanks for letting me bake with y'all for the last 6 months!

Jill @ Jillicious Discoveries said...

Beautiful job on your cake! I love the simple flowers for decoration--they are a pretty contrast to the dark chocolate! :)

Mary Ann said...

Your cake looks beautiful! The frosting is so smooth and looks lovely. I love how you decorated it too.

Jo said...

Your cake looks really delish. I love how smooth your frosting and mousse turned out. I had a bit of problem with mine, probably due to the heat and humidity. But one thing for sure is this was absolutely yum!

Lulu the Baker said...

My cake turned out so rotten! It makes me jealous to see that yours was so very beautiful! I'm really looking forward to a break from triple layers for a while!! :)

natalia said...

Beautiful cake ! I love your simple decoration too !

Elle said...

It's hard to imagine a better cakeif you love chocolate...and your is so beautiful, too!

Irmina Díaz-Frois Martín said...

Excelente tarta, maravillosa.

Sam said...

Everything you make always looks so good!

BICE said...

Your cake looks wonderful! I like how your frosting is more shimmery.
Bice

The Caked Crusader said...

that's really interesting. As a coffee hater I've always avoided chocolate cake recipes with coffee in as I was sure I'd detect it. Perhaps not!

creampuff said...

That just looks so unbelievable. I can't even tell you. Really.

Talita said...

So moist and rich! Delicious!

oneordinaryday said...

Yum. This looks positively perfect.

Hilary said...

Now that is a sky high cake! Amazing job - your icing job looks great.

Coffee and Vanilla said...

Beautiful cake and what an interesting recipe... mayo in a cake? :)

The Purple Foodie said...

The tripe choc fudge cake looks so, so decadent. I love it!

Pam said...

oh my god, this cake looks great....you have great recipes here...I love it
xoxoxox

OvenDelights said...

Thank you for the quick link! I'm definately going to have to try this!

Julia said...

I came to your blog from the daring bakers' site and I had to find this recipe after seeing it in your main blog picture! You have so many yummy recipes!