Meemaw’s Chocolate Cake Valentine

PART ONE 
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​We’re finally there! After days of buildup with cupcakes, chocolate covered strawberries, and cake pops, we’ve reached the main event!

​I’m so excited to share this recipe with you because it’s been handed down through generations of my family and it just seems like now, with all of you baking it, too, it’s taking off on it’s own, just like the cake with wings in our logo! So here goes….

Recipe

We’re going to start this project with the cake. Here are the cake ingredients:
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1 cup white sugar 
1 cup brown sugar 
⅔ cup cocoa 
1 tsp baking soda 
1 ½ sticks butter (¾ cup) 
2 beaten eggs 
1 ½ cups buttermilk 
2 cups flour 
1 tsp vanilla 
1 cup boiling water

In the video, you’ll see me use a big, flat pan. It’s a half-sheet pan and you prepare it by lining it with parchment paper. Now, you’re going to have to get the cake out of there when it’s done baking, so you might want to make the paper long enough to overlap two edges of the pan and you can use it for a sling later. 
Preheat the oven to 325 degrees.

In the bowl of your mixer, cream both sugars and the butter. Once they’re creamed and fluffy, add the cocoa. Now, cocoa is really dry and puffs out easily. You might want to start off slow so you don’t get it all over. 

Then add the eggs one at a time. In the video, you’ll see me crack them into a bowl first. There are two reasons for that. First, it’s to make sure it’s a good egg. Every once in a while, you get a bad one and if I’ve already dumped it into the bowl, well, you know, I’d have to start all over. The other reason is that eggs cracking can be unpredictable and this way, I’m sure to not get shells in the cake. 

Mix in the egg until the mixture is light and fluffy. Combine the flour and baking soda in a bowl. Then add that alternately with the buttermilk. This works best because then at no time does the mixture get too watery or too thick. It stays mixable throughout. 

Now add the vanilla and fold in the boiling water to keep all that wonderful fluffiness we worked so hard to put in. Now, this last step is what gives this cake its special character because the hot water lets the cocoa bloom with flavor. You’ll see.

Pour into your prepared pan and bake for 30-40 minutes. Test for doneness with a toothpick. The top should spring back readily and it should smell scrumptious! Make sure it cools completely, then chill it and even out the surface if you need to so it’s completely flat. Bonus: you get to eat the scraps or use them for other treats! Keep it chilled for the next step. 

PART TWO

Strawberry Italian Buttercream

This is what you’ll need:
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1 ¾ cup white sugar 
½ water
8 egg whites. room temperature
1 lb unsalted butter, room temperature
1 tsp vanilla 
25 large strawberries 

First the strawberries. Find berries that are as good and sweet as you can. This will make the icing really special. Remove the leaves and put them in a blender. Process them completely until they’re all mush. 

Then pour them into a strainer over a bowl so that you can remove the seeds. Nobody likes crunchy icing, right? 

This is the workout part of the project. First, swirl the strawberry mush around in the strainer and then, you’ll have to press the last part through to get the good part of the pulp. Just the seeds and the last part of the pulp should be left behind. A spatula works well for this, but a wooden spoon would work, too. 

Now, take the strained pulp, transfer it to a saucepan. Cook over medium heat until it starts to boil. Simmer for a few minutes until it starts to thicken up. It will not be as thick as jam, but will not be runny any more. Remove the pulp from the heat and let it cool.​

On to the next step.

​PART THREE

​If you’ve seen the video, this is the really exciting part. Watch out and wear an apron!

First, add the sugar and water to a saucepan. You’re going to make a simple syrup, which is just lots of sugar melted into a little water. With a little time and heat, it becomes a caramel, but we’re not going that far. We’re just going to melt the sugar and heat it enough to simmer. So turn the heat up to medium, but resist the temptation to agitate it a lot. The heat will do most of the work. Stir it ever so little.

A thermometer will help and if you have one, heat the mixture to just above 200 degrees. When it starts simmering, take it off the heat. 

In your mixer, whip the egg whites with the whipping head on medium high until fluffy and keeping stiff peaks. Next, drizzle in the sugar syrup. (If you make one batch at a time, you shouldn’t have the problem I did with it growing out of the bowl!  And hey, no worries… mistakes are just another way we learn!) Whip the egg whites with the syrup until they’re all fluffed up and cool to the touch.

Now, add the butter one tablespoon at a time. I guess you really don’t have to throw it in from across the room like I did.

You could probably just slow the mixer down a little when you first add each bit of butter, but let’s be honest, it wouldn’t be nearly as much fun. Anyway, mix in the butter.

Remember the strawberry purée? Now is the time. Add it in until it tastes good, starting with one half, but the mixture will take it all if you like the flavor. But, it’s that combining oil and water thing again, and the two need a bit of convincing to play together properly, so you're going to need a stout tool like a big whisk or a wooden spoon to get the mixture smooth. But when you do, YUM!

Moving on….
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PART FOUR

Making ganache sounds fancy and hard, but it’s one of the easiest things in the world.​

You’ll only need one cup (6 oz) of good quality milk or dark chocolate chips (I use Ghirardelli)
And ¾ to 1 cup of heavy whipping cream. That’s it.

Warm the cream in the microwave, but NOT to boiling. Mine took about a minute. Then pour the hot cream over the chips and cover it to keep the heat in.  The heat from the cream will melt the chocolate before you know it. Stir and it’s done. It might look a little ragged at first, but if you haven’t boiled the cream and have used good chocolate, it works every time. ​

Talk about brown silk. Oh my, this is my favorite part!

PART FIVE

​Okay, now… remember that cake you made way back in the beginning? Now it’s time to bring it out of the refrigerator! Make sure it’s out of the pan and leveled and you’re ready to begin! I’ve decided to use a 4.5 inch cutter, which also works for biscuits, but you can really use any shape you want, but you’ll see why I’ve used a circle cutter when we get to the icing part.

Cut as many circles as you’re going to need, remembering that you’ll be using three layers for each little cake. Tape your cake board to the turntable if you have one, then use a generous dot of buttercream to make sure the first layer stays put. 

Pipe a layer of buttercream onto the first layer (I don’t bother with a tip for this, but you can if you want to) then put on the second layer and more buttercream, then the last layer.

Now, I’m going to put a thin layer of icing on the entire outside, the one we call the crumb layer, to give us a stable base for a smooth finish on the decorative layers. Now, into the freezer. 

After the cakes are frozen, you can apply the final coats. Do this carefully with a long, flat spatula. Then take a bench scraper to smooth it out. I show this on the video, and it takes a steady hand, but if you hold the scraper steady and move the turntable under it like I do, you get amazing results! Then pull the top edges into the center to smooth out the top. Remember, sometimes a picture is worth a thousand words. Watching the video really helps here. 

PART SIX

​Ok, we’re almost done!  Time to use the ganache! This next part is easy, but wait ‘til you see what you can do with a few drips!

Fill a piping bag with ganache and again, no need to bother with a tip unless you want to. A smallish hole on the end will do, maybe ¼ inch. If it’s thickened up too much, heat it up a little before you put it in the bag, just enough to let its own weight carry it a little ways down the sides. You might want to experiment before you put it on the cake. 

Then pipe little scallops around the edge of the cake just like I do on the video and the soft ganache will drip down the sides on its own.

Then add some ganache to the top and lay on a single strawberry dipped in ganache. Oh my goodness!

​I sure hope you have as much fun as I did. Still don’t know if I like the baking or the eating better. It’s just so GOOD! Remember to send me pics of your own masterpiece! And, oh, yes, Happy Valentine’s Day!