Black Magic Cake
Deep, dark, and delicious mean anything? This cake speaks to the inner chocoholic in all of our chocolate hearts.
I have decided that the next few blogs will center around one peculiar ingredient, coupled usually with chocolate. The darker the better. The key ingredient? Leftover coffee. Hold on, now, haven’t we all had pots of leftover coffee, and regret having to throw it out? After all, coffee is expensive these days! And coffee and chocolate go together beautifully. So over the course of the next several weeks, we will look at a cake, fudge sauce (you might want that with the cake, see photo), Tiramisu, and the one savoury entry, a coffee glaze for BBQ and fish.
The cake in question originally came from an old cookbook of mine, but as usual, has been tweaked here and there. I’ve made this one many, many times, and felt it needed sharing. It’s pretty simple to put together, and bakes in a 9X13 pan, two pluses in my mind. The book in question is an oldie but goodie, and goes by the appropriate name of Choice Chocolate Recipes, put out by Farm Journal in the 70s. I’ve made many of the recipes in this book, but this one remains my favourite.
Ingredients:
1 ¾ cups all purpose flour
1 tsp. salt
2 cups sugar (Please note, when I make the cake, I only use 1 cup white sugar)
¾ cup baking cocoa
2 tsp. baking soda
1 tsp. baking powder
2 eggs
½ cup vegetable oil
1 cup strong black coffee (*see note)
1 cup buttermilk (**see note)
1 tsp. vanilla
Stir together flour, sugar, cocoa, baking soda, baking powder and salt in mixing bowl. Add eggs, oil, coffee, buttermilk and vanilla. Beat with electric mixer at medium speed 2 min. Pour into greased 13X9” baking pan.
Bake in a 350 oven for 40 minutes or so, until cake tests done. Cool pan on rack. Makes 16 servings.
Next blog: How to make the fudge sauce, so stay tuned.
References:
Manning, Elise W., Editor. “Farm Journal’s Choice Chocolate Recipes.” New York: Doubleday Company, Inc., 1978.
Notes:
1. If you don’t have leftover coffee, but still want to make the cake, you can use 2 tsp. instant in one cup hot water. Let cool.
2. If you don’t have buttermilk, you can use a scant 1 cup of milk with 2 tsp white vinegar, cider vinegar will also work. Stir together and let sit for a couple of minutes.
You can follow the further adventures of Sue or sign up for a class at her website: wwwsvanslooten@icloud.com.