Project Chocolate Cake – Cake no 1

Project Chocolate Cake begins. I have 41 days until my Dad’s 80th Birthday party for which he has asked me to make the cake(s). There will be 40 or so guests and the party is being catered, so I’m aiming for 2 – 3 large bunts which should allow for enough cake to go round and room for all those candles.

He’s helpfully requested a chocolate cake saying ‘You remember that one you made me once? That was lovely‘. Not the most helpful of descriptions for someone with a three cake a week baking habit, I was also fairly sure he would want a ginger or fruit cake, so the chocolate request has thrown me somewhat.

The party is on a Sunday afternoon and with family and friends arriving over the weekend the cakes will have to be baked on the Friday – keepability is going to be an important factor. A moist and dense cake, something ‘fudgy’ to allow for good slicing might be needed. But then again after the food that will be on offer during the afternoon, perhaps something lighter? There could be additions, nuts, chocolate chips, a hint of orange perhaps or even a touch of alcohol but at the moment it’s the texture and taste of the base mixture I’m interested in.

Project Chocolate Cake started with a selection of my baking books and some sticky labels spread out before me, the cake below was chosen as cake no 1 simply becuse I had all the ingredients in stock and wanted to start early the next morning and coming from Cake Keeper Cakes, a book I’ve found highly reliable it seemed like a good place to start. I have recruited several friends and neighbours as official testers and reviewers, a task they seem quite eager to engage in, it will be interesting to see if it is possible to tire of chocolate cake.

The batter was easy to mix and a lovely light and moussy consistency. It raised to just above the height of the tin and although I turned the cake halfway through I neglected to check early enough for browning, it needs to be covered at about that point with a piece of foil.

The cake sunk and cracked quite a bit in the ten minutes that it was cooling in the pan. I didn’t add the suggested chocolate chips so I wonder if that changed the structure of the cake, it stuck a little bit, and the outside looked dry and unappealing.

 

I thought, that considering the amount of chocolate and cocoa used, the finished cake should have had a deeper  flavour, the texture was  lovely and light though, it sliced fairly well but I can’t say that I thought it was special enough. Comments from the official testers are at odds with my initial assessment though – it was greatly enjoyed. After baking I thought I had one to discount immediately, but it’s still in the running

Double Chocolate Bundt Cake

(messed around with from an original Triple Chocolate Cake by Lauren Chattman in Cake Keeper Cakes)

114g dark chocolate (I used 70% Green and Blacks)

30g cocoa

250ml boiling water

250ml buttermilk (milk suggested in original recipe)

3 large eggs

1 tablespoon vanilla extract

1 tablespoon instant coffee (my addition)

337.5g plain flour

2 Tsp baking powder

1 Tsp bicarb

1/4 Tsp salt

220g unsalted butter – room temp/softened

450g caster sugar

(original recipe also had the addition of 1 1/2 cups mini chocolate chips)

 

Preheat your oven to 170C, grease and flour 12 cup bundt tin.

Place chocolate, cocoa and coffee in a bowl, pour in the boiling water and mix until smooth. Set to oneside to cool slightly.

In a large bowl sift or whisk together the flour, baking powder and salt.

In a large jug whisk the buttermilk, eggs and vanilla extract.

Beat together the butter and sugar until light and fluffy (they should change colour becoming very pale) add the chocolate mixture and mix until incorporated.

With mixer in low add 1/3 of the flour mix, followed by 1/2 the buttermilk and repeat. Mixing between each addition and scraping the sides as necessary. If you are adding the chocolate chips do so at this point.

Pour the batter into the pan and smooth the top. Bake for 50 – 60 minutes until a toothpick comes out clean, rotating half way through baking and covering loosely with a piece of foil if needed. Allow to cool in the pan for 10 mins before turning out to cool completely.

Autumn Apples

The Sticky Marmalade Tea Loaf from my previous post used up the jar of marmalade that had been mocking me from the fridge shelf. So I promptly went out and bought another one – because you can’t not have marmalade in the house can you? I am aware of the contradiction but should state that unopened jars in the cupboard do not elicit the same anxieties as open ones housed in the fridge – am I revealing too many neuroses in one post here?

I’m glad I did replenish my stock though, because my new copy of Nigel Slater’s Tender V2 arrived and one of the first recipes I flagged was his Apple and Marmalade Cake. I had been given an enormous bag of apples harvested from a colleagues tree so the ingredient gods were smiling on me that day.

I have made this cake again since, doubling the ingredients and making many small loaves as I wanted to give them away to neighbours – it works just as well.

 

Wholemeal Apple and Marmalade Cake

Nigel Slater

220g butter at room temperature
210g light muscavado sugar
4 eggs
250 g wholemeal flour
1 tsp baking powder
1/2 tsp cinnamon
200g (peeled & cored weight) apples chopped into pieces less than 1cm
100g sultanas or raisins (I used a mixture of both)
125g Marmalade
Zest of an orange
Demerara sugar for sprinkling on the top
Pre heat oven to 160C and crease and line a 20cm cake tin.
Combine flour, cinnamon and baking powder
In a separate bowl combine the marmalade, raisins and/or sultanas, apples and zest
Cream together the butter and sugar until light and fluffy then add the beaten eggs, scraping down the sides of the bowl as necessary
fold in the flour followed by the fruit and marmalade mixture
scrape the batter into the prepared pan, smooth the top and sprinkle with Demerara sugar
bake for 1 hr 15 mins (my double recipe made 5 small loaves which I baked for 45-45 mins)

I have also used the apples to make Deb’s Wholewheat Apple Muffins which I first tried last year . I was disappointed last time, but the addition of mixed spice added the depth that I think was missing previously (I reduced the cinnamon to 1/2 a teaspoon and added a teaspoon of mixed spice) I also made sure that the apple pieces were a little smaller, more suited to a muffin. Make sure you fill the muffin cases well, these do not rise that much in the oven so you need to be generous with the batter.

I have found more use for the many apples gifted to me including an apple and date chutney that is currently maturing before I can review it, and an apple and gingerbread cupcake that I will share with you shortly. I have my eye on an apple and courgette cake from Tender (courgettes currently earmarked for my morning porridge though) and of course,  apples and autumn also mean it’s nearly time to make my mincemeat in time for mince pies!

Spice Cakes

I’ve made two different spice cakes recently. The first was the Black Pepper Spice cake (see recipe below) from my favourite Cake Keeper Cakes. I’ve made this before and knew the intended recipient was a fan of black pepper so made it again. I often feel like it’s a bit of a cop-out using a recipe I’ve tried before when baking; there are so many recipes out there to try, why resort to something you’ve made before? But I have to say the cakes in this book are so delicious and the recipes so reliable that I go back to it frequently, especially when baking for a special occasion. I upped the pepper quota a little to ensure it’s presence was felt and also left in the walnuts which I’ve omitted previously and they provided a lovely bite to the soft crumb of the cake. This time I also added the glaze which I left off previously (out of laziness I suspect) and I’m glad I did. It really added another dimension, the zingy citrus offsetting the warmth of the spices. I resolve to pay more attention to suggested glazes in recipes from now on rather than viewing them with suspicion as just another way to add sugar.

I also made this Spiced Brown Sugar Carrot Loaf but wasn’t as enamored. I think I expected something moister having baked so much with courgettes recently, and bolder on the spice front. Having said that I tried it fairly soon after baking and it may be one that develops over time like so many. If I were to make it again I would definately play around, perhaps using half courgettes, half carrots and I would increase the spices, which to be fair the author does recommend – it’s also suggested you eat spread with butter which may get around the moistness issue, and be extra delicious I’m sure! I followed the recipe apart from using half wholemeal flour half plain, and reduced the sugars slightly (light brown from 262g to 225g and the caster from 112g to 75g). I also had to employ the use of my rolling pin to give the base of the tins a pretty good whack to help get the finished loaves out, I did grease and flour the tins, but if you might want to line them too if you give the recipe a go!

Black Pepper and Spice Cake

Cake Keeper Cakes

330ml Buttermilk

3 large eggs

1 Tsp vanilla extract

300g flour

90g walnuts, toasted and finely chopped

1 Tsp baking powder

1 tsp bicarb

1/2 tsp salt

2 tsp cinamon

1 tsp cardamon

1/2 tsp cloves

1 tsp black pepper

112g butter

225g sugar

I cup icing sugar

Juice of a lemon

Preheat oven to 180C, grease and flour a bundt tin.

Cream butter and sugar in a mixer on high speed for at least 3 mins until light and fluffy, meanwhile whisk together the eggs, buttermilk and vanilla in a large measuring jug and combine the dry ingredients, including nuts, in a large bowl.

With the mixer on low add a third of the four mixture beating until just incorporated followed by half of the buttermilk, scraping down the sides as needed, repeat – ending with the last of the flour mixture. Turn the mixture up to medium high and beat for one minute.

Scrape into the prepared pan, bake for 40 -45 minutes until a tooth pick comes out clean. Allow to cool in the pan for 5 mins before turning out onto a rack to allow to cool completely.

For the glaze, combine the sugar with enough lemon juice to make a smooth mixture – it should be fairly thick to drizzle over the cake and allowed to run down the sides. Allow to set for about half an hour before serving.

Early O’Clock

The other week I took a couple of days off work, and with nothing much planned other than rest, relaxation and a lie in, I made sure that the eggs and butter were out of the fridge before I went to bed in order for them to be at that all important ‘room temperature’ so I could bake the next morning. I didn’t really anticipate the morning starting at 3am, but when I realised sleep was not going to return, and the lie in was definitely not going to happen, I got up, put apron on, and got started.

I had oranges and buttermilk to use which provided a guide for the recipe search and I’d spent a little time at the weekend looking through my books and converting recipes from cups and sticks to grams (the most important part of my prep recently as it’s always a little too much for my mathematically challenged brain first thing in the morning – or even the middle of the night). The Orange Ricotta Pound Cake from Cake Keeper Cakes caught my eye as a good showcase for the rose bundt tin. I swapped the ricotta for buttermilk, but increased the butter from 168g to 220g in order to compensate for the reduced fat. I used wholemeal flour and once again reduced the sugar content. I also added a bag of dried cranberries as I’d had my eye on a couple of orange and cranberry loaf cakes recently an they seem to be paired frequently. I think all of that messing around might have been a little too much. It needed more … flavour. By using wholemeal flour and in reducing both the sugar and fat content there was too much taken away, wholemeal flour can also be quite bitter and a bit of additional sweetness might have balanced this. The texture was also affected it was a dense cake, again I’m not sure whether the culprit is the flour or fat – possibly both. I think using plain flour would’ve made a big difference, perhaps half and half? I would also add a touch more citrus, as I said previously the oranges I’ve been using recently haven’t had much of a zing to them. The cranberries were a nice touch, they hold their form so well and the little zing of sharpness when you bite into on is lovely.

Orange Buttermilk Pound Cake

Based very loosely on a recipe from Cake Keeper Cakes

Cake

450g flour (I used wholemeal)

1 1/2 tsp baking powder

1/2 tsp bicarb

1 tsp salt

220g butter

270g sugar

1 1/2 cups buttermilk

3 large eggs

1 1/2 tsp vanilla extract

zest of two oranges

Glaze

1/2 cup orange marmalade

2 tsp water

Preheat oven 165C, grease bundt tin and dust with flour.

Beat butter and sugar for 5 minutes until light and fluffy, scraping side of bowl periodically

Add eggs one at a time, scrape bowl again

Add zest, juice and vanilla

Combine dry ingredients in separate bowl

Add one third of flour mixture to mixing bowl with mixer on low speed, followed by half the buttermilk, another third of the flour, buttermilk and last of flour mixing well after each addition and not forgetting to scrape the bowl

Fold in cranberries

Place batter into tin, bake until golden brown approx 1 hour 10 minutes

Cool in the pan for 15 minutes then turn out onto a rack to cool completely

Once cool make the glaze by stirring water and marmalade in a saucepan over a low heat until the marmalade melts then brush the glaze over the cake

Second on the list was a whole-wheat honey nut cake again from Cake Keeper Cakes (I really can’t recommend this book enough). I wanted to make another cake that has a layer of filling running through it, in a more suitable tin than the rose bundt that I used for the Cardamom Cake. I reduced the sugar again but the layer of honey running through with the nuts and the caramel glaze added plenty of additional sweetness. It was a favourite of a few of the tasters.

Whole-wheat and Honey Nut Bundt Cake

Cake Keeper Cakes

Filling

75g flour

28g softened butter

1 tsp ground cinnamon

1 1/4 cups walnuts or pecans coarsely chopped (I used walnuts)

1/2 cup honey

Cake

1 cup buttermilk

2 large eggs

300g whole-wheat flour (original recipe 200g plain flour, 100g whole-wheat)

1 tsp baking powder

1 tsp bicarb

1/2 tsp salt

112g butter

150g light brown sugar (reduced from 175g)

Glaze

56g granulated sugar

1/2 cup honey

1/4 cup buttermilk

1/2 tsp vanilla extract

Grease bundt tin and dust with flour

Preheat oven to 180C

Make the filling by combining the flour, butter and cinnamon in a bowl until crumbly then add the nuts and honey.

Whist together buttermilk, vanilla, and eggs

Combine cake dry ingredients

Beat together butter and sugar in mixer or with electric whisk on medium high speed for 5 minutes

Lower the speed on the mixer, add one third of flour mixture to mixing bowl with mixer on low speed, followed by half the buttermilk mixture, another third of the flour, buttermilk and last of flour mixing well after each addition and not forgetting to scrape the bowl

Beat on high for one minute

Scrape half the batter into the prepared pan, spoon the filling as evenly as possibly over the base layer then add the rest of the batter, smoothing the top with a spatula.

Bake for 50 – 45 minutes or until a toothpick comes out clean.

Cool in the pan for 5 minutes then turn out onto a rack to cool completely

Make the Glaze by bringing the sugar, honey and buttermilk to boil in a small pan, reduce the heat and cook for 7 – 9 minutes until caramel coloured, stirring occasionally

Remove from the heat, stir in vanilla and allow to cool for 10 minutes before pouring over the cake letting the glaze drip down the sides

Allow to cool for about half an hour before serving

Lest the sunflower tin feel left out I also made the Pumpkin Spice Cake that I’ve made previously, I wanted to play around a bit with the spices – basically by being more generous with them all which I think worked, it can take it – and it also took care of the last of the buttermilk.

My sister paid an impromptu visit later that day, so I knew that between her, my dad and various neighbours and colleagues I could easily offload todays output – so I carried on.

Finally I made a Pumpkin and Ginger Spice Cake from Katrina of She’s in the Kitchen. Now this is just lovely, I’ve had several requests for the recipe and will definitely make it again – the original is for ‘Texas’ muffins which I had to google and discovered that they’re just very large muffin tins, some of which I happened to have (probably the result of yet another compulsive Lakeland shopping trip). Katrina suggests that this recipe will make two 8” cakes or one 8” and six muffins. I used a bundt tin and also got six muffins.

Pumpkin and Ginger Cake/Muffins

Adapted from Katrina’s recipe – She’s in the Kitchen

1 tin of pumpkin puree

275g soft brown sugar (reduced from 2 cups/350g)

225g melted butter

4 eggs

1/2 cup of freshly squeezed orange juice (Katrina suggests cider or apple juice)

525g flour (wholemeal)

2 tsp baking powder

2 tsp bicarb

1 tsp salt

4 1/2 tsp cinnamon

4 1/2 tsp ground ginger

1 tsp nutmeg

1 tsp cloves

1 1/2 cups crystalised ginger, chopped

1 cup currants (optional, but I still have loads left from Christmas and so added them)

Mix together the melted butter, pumpkin and sugar

Add eggs and mix well

Add fruit juice

Sift together the dry ingredients and then and to wet mix

Fold in the ginger and currants

Fill the pans/muffin cases half full and bake the cake for 40 minutes for the cake and 25 for the muffins at 180C.

Crack Open the Cardamom

I bookmarked this recipe for a Cardamom Citrus Cake on Good Life Eats before the new year, I’ve used cardamom a few times recently in various cakes and am quite taken with it. I’m always on the lookout for Bundt recipes and I had yet to use the new rose tin my sister gave me as a Christmas gift.

I also came across a Nordicware Sunflower tin in a sale whilst on a trip to the Cotswolds and seeing as the pestle and mortar were going to be in use to grind the cardamom I wanted to make the most of it and so chose the Black Pepper and Spice Cake from Cake Keeper Cakes to christen this one. My post Christmas baking lull was broken by an early Sunday morning and I set about greasing the tins. This is not easy with the patterned Bundt tins – particularly the Rose. I learned for later use to melt a small about of butter and brush over the tin to ensure you get into all the ridges and don’t end up with globs of butter stuck to the outside of the finished cake.

Opinions from the recipients on the cakes were divided – but only in so far as which was their favourite. I think the Cardamom was mine, but the shape of the tin made the filling layer difficult to distribute easily and it ended up being too thick in places, a more regular shaped tin would’ve been better for this particular cake. I may also up the zest a little, the oranges I’ve been using recently haven’t had that much a zing. As I’ve been doing with most cakes recently I’ve reduced the sugar, I’ve put the original amounts in brackets, but I really don’t think it needs it. I’ve put in metric weights for the dry ingredients but find it easier to continue to use cups when measuring wet ingredients.

Citrus Cardamom Bundt Cake

Adapted from Good Life Eats

450g flour

1 1/2 teaspoon baking powder

1 1/2 teaspoon baking soda

3/4 teaspoon salt

175g (225g) granulated sugar

90g (112g) brown sugar

zest of 1/2 large orange

150g butter, softened

1/2 a vanilla bean split open and seeded or 1 teaspoon vanilla

3/4 teaspoon ground cardamom

3 eggs

1 1/2 cup buttermilk (original recipe called for sour cream)

Filling

zest of 1/2 large orange

100 (112g) cup brown sugar – I used a mixture of light and dark brown as this was all I had

1 teaspoon cinnamon

½ teaspoon ground cardamom

Preheat oven to 180C, grease and flour your tin.

Place the ingredients for the filling in a small bowl and rub the zest through the sugar and spice mix so that the oils from the zest release.

Put flour, baking powder, baking soda, salt, and cardamom in a bowl and set aside.

Beat Sugars and butter till fluffy – about 4 minutes in a stand mixer then add the vanilla and eggs. Continue beating for two minutes scraping down the sides of the bowl a couple of times.

With the mixer on slow add a third of the flour, followed by half the buttermilk, then repeat, ending with the last of the flour.

Spread half the batter into your prepared pan, sprinkle with the filing mixture and then cover with the remaining batter.

Bake for 50 – 60 minute, cook for 20 minutes in the tin on a cooling rack before turning out to cool completely.

Black Pepper and Spice Cake

Cake Keeper Cakes p106

1 ¼ cups buttermilk

3 Large eggs – room temperature

1 tsp vanilla extract

300g flour

1 tsp baking powder

1 tsp bicarbonate of soda

½ tsp salt

2 tsp cinnamon

1 tsp ground cardamom

½ tsp ground cloves

1 tsp ground black pepper (I would use more next time)

112g unsalted, room temp or softened butter

225g sugar

(The original recipe also has 1 cup of toasted walnuts, cooled and chopped which I omitted. There’s also a lemon glaze – 1 cup icing sugar and 2 tbsp lemon juice, combined and drizzled over the cooled cake which I didn’t bother with so I added the zest of a lemon to the creamed butter and sugar)

Preheat oven to 180C, grease tin and dust with flour.

Whisk buttermilk, eggs and vanilla in a large jug.

Combine flour, nuts if using, baking powder, bicarb, salt and spices.

Cream butter and sugar for about 3mins on high speed until light and fluffy, scraping down the sides a few times.

On low speed add 1/3 of the flour, half the buttermilk mixture and repeat, ending with flour, scrape the sides of the bowl between additions and mix for 1 minute after the last addition.

Add to prepared pan and bake for 40 – 45 minutes, cool in the pan for 5 minutes before turning out onto a rack to cool completely.

It Must Be Sunday

I know I named this blog Spatulas at Dawn because of my early starts and love of filling the small hours with the smell of baking, but I really think that a 4 am start in November is taking things a little too far. Dawn was still several hours away when sat with coffee and recipe books I tried to decide which cake to bake in honour of National Bundt Day which is celebrated on the 15th November in the US.

I love my Bundt cake tin (and I’m hoping that Father Christmas might be able to fit another in my stocking this year – are you reading this Ces?) and rarely need an excuse to use it. As I mentioned the other day Mary, The Food Librarian, set herself the challenge of baking a bundt cake every day for the month leading up to National Bundt Day and I had a tin of pumpkin puree (thank you Waitrose) set aside for the day itself. After all, what could be a more fitting ingredient for this most American of bakeware than pumpkin? I already had my eye on a recipe for a Pumpkin and Chocolate bundt from the list on The Food Librarian’s site and my newest of books Cake Keeper Cakes (as recommended by Nicole at Baking Bites) had an almost identical one for a loaf cake. The average 9″ by 5″ loaf tin recipe can be doubled to fill a bundt so that’s what I did – see below. The original recipe called for milk but I used buttermilk and I also reduced the sugar slightly. Apologies for the mixture of measurments in US cups and metric, with some ingredients it’s easier to measure out in the original cups so I didn’t bother weighing to get the equivalent measure, sorry if that’s irritating, but it was early!

The resulting cake is so moist from the pumpkin and moorish with the differing textures I’m not sure how to do it justice here and hope that you give it a try soon.

Pumpkin-Chocolate Chip Bundt Cake

adapted from Cake Keeper Cakes by Lauren Chatman

• 300g plain flour
• 2 tsp bicarb
• 2 tsp baking powder
• 2 tsp cinnamon
• 1 tsp salt
• 1/2 tsp ground cloves
• generous pinch of nutmeg
• 225g unsalted butter
• 200g caster sugar
• 6 large eggs
• one 15oz can of unsweetened pumpkin puree
• 2 tsp vanilla extract
• 2/3 cup buttermilk
• 2 cups chocolate chips (I used a mixture of milk chocolate chips and chopped 70% Green and Blacks)
• 2 cups of chopped walnuts

• Preheat oven to 180C, grease your bundt tin and dust with flour
• Mix flour, spices, bicarb, baking powder and salt
• Beat sugar and butter until fluffy then add eggs one at a time, scraping the side of the bowl as needed
• Stir in pumpkin and vanilla then the buttermilk
• Add the flour in three batches, scraping the side of the bowl and then finally stir in the chocolate and walnuts
• Pour batter into the bundt tin of your choice and bake for 55 minutes or until a skewer comes out clean, cool in tin for 5 minutes before turning out onto a wore rack. Allow to cool completely before attempting to cut

Should your bundt be reluctant to release itself from the tin (as mine was today as I forgot the all important ‘dust with flour’ step) pop the tin back into the oven for a few minutes to help release it (you may also require the help of several implements to aid the process, I used a knife, a rolling pin, a plastic spatula and a bit of brute force)