Let HIM eat CAKE!

Yeah yeah yeah - I know I haven't posted in a while. It's not that I haven't been a cookin' fool - it's just that I ... well... have been a bit busy. If you'd like to keep up with the 'business' you should check out my casual blog (less food, more me). Anyways - since my boyfriend's birthday is TOMORROW I decided to be a good little domestic and bake him a german-choc. cake COMPLETELY FROM SCRATCH... because, of course, that is how I roll. :D

I looked for a good two evenings worth of time looking for the perfect 'cake' recipe... there were a ton of really tasty ideas - some were more 'out there' than others... like this one... but the winning 'base' recipe was this one - supplied by Saveur Magazine. It's tasty looking and semi-cheap on a poor college student's budget. But you really need to pay attention to the directions and don't just dump everything into one bowl because this recipe combines all the ingredients for the cake and frosting.

Ingredients:

3 cups sugar

1 3/4 cups unsalted butter, softened

2 1/2 tsp. vanilla extract

8 large egg yolks

1 12-oz. can evaporated milk

1 1/2 cups roughly chopped pecans

1 7-oz. package sweetened shredded coconut

4 oz. German's Sweet Chocolate, chopped

2 oz. unsweetened chocolate, chopped

2 cups flour

1 tsp. baking soda

1/4 tsp. kosher salt

1 cup buttermilk

4 large egg whites

What'cha need to do to make said cake:

1. Combine 1 1/2 cups sugar, 3/4 cup butter, 1 1/2 tsp. vanilla, 4 egg yolks, and evaporated milk in a 2-qt. pan over medium heat. Bring to a simmer; cook until thick, 12 minutes [it takes a while so be patient - just don't burn it or it will taste gross]. Strain through a sieve into a bowl; stir in pecans and coconut; chill frosting until firm (put it in the fridge).

2. Heat oven to 350°. Grease three 9" round cake pans with butter; line bottoms with parchment circles. Grease parchment; set aside. Put chocolates into a small bowl; pour in 1/2 cup boiling water; let sit for 1 minute. Stir until smooth; set aside. In another bowl, whisk flour, baking soda, and salt; set aside.

3. In a standing mixer, beat 1 1/4 cups sugar and remaining butter until fluffy; add remaining egg yolks one at a time. Add chocolate mixture and remaining vanilla; beat until smooth. On low speed, alternately add flour mixture and buttermilk until just combined; set batter aside.

4. Meanwhile, whip egg whites to soft peaks. Add remaining sugar; whip to stiff peaks. Fold egg whites into batter; divide between pans and smooth batter. Bake until cakes are set, 25–30 minutes.

5. Let cakes cool [they will contract away from the sides of the pan by about 2%] frost the top of each cake and assemble, leaving the sides bare [iffy].

Mah Changes:

To the icing - I put more coconut in it than it called for.. because let's face it - coconut is dang tasty!

I didn't use kosher salt because regular table salt worked just fine and I didn't need to be spending 5 dollars on a little stupid thing of salt that just had the name 'kosher' on it.

Also, I used semi-sweetened chocolate instead of unsweet...because it was on sale. To balance that out I added about 3 tbs of unsweetened coco after I mixed everything together just to give it an extra KICK!

On the subject of 'on sale' I used a buttermilk powder - since I had a jar of it lying around just begging to be used. Trust me, a jar/container of that stuff lying around makes baking a whole lot easier. I can't tell you how many times I've tried to bake/make something and I get all of the ingredients together ... start cooking and then come to find out that I don't have any buttermilk. Problem solved. Plus that stuff has a massive shelf-life.

Being that I don't generally line the bottoms of my cake pans with parchment paper - I found this task to be quite tricky, until I figured out the easy way to do it.spray the bottoms of your pans - stick some paper in there, press it down along the bottom (the sides will get crinkly) and then using A VERY SHARP knife just cut along the walls of the side of the pan.

Most importantly - if you put all 3 pans in at once, MAKE SURE THAT ALL OF THEM ARE DONE BY THE TIME THE BUZZER GOES OFF. I had one pan that the center wasn't done in so I had to put it back in for another 10-12 minutes. Gotta love heat distrubution.

Let the cakes cool for a couple of hours, I left them in the pan while I went to work for 5ish hours and came back and then assembled the cake. Reason being is because when the hot cake meets the cool/cold icing - you get condensation which makes the cake all gushy on the outsides... blah. You want it moist but not soggy. lol.

It also says that you should leave the sides bare on the cake, you don't have to if you don't want to. Go against the man and ice the whole thing! REBELLION OF ICING!

And a little tip - make it the day before you are going to eat it, it does wonders - flavor-wise.

... so yeah - that'd be the cake. What's for dinner, you ask? I'll tell you later- but let me assure you - it's going to be delicious!

As always

CCC me cooking!