Cake Attempt #2

On my recent trip to Medicine Hat, I decided (with full agreement from my hostess) to try another chocolate cake recipe. This time, the aim was to create a denser, heavier chocolate cake that would obtain the illusive (okay not that illusive) 5 out of 5 grading.

My fearless friend suggested the "You are Going to Die Anyways" chocolate cake from the Crazy Plates cookbook. This delightful recipe includes such ingrediants as cream cheese, whipping cream, coffee and sugar...lots and lots of sugar. Although the process was much more complex than the last chocolate cake attempted - it was worth the effort.

First - I prepared the wet ingrediants while Karen prepared the dry. The end result looked something like...well...this....

I then combined the wet and dry ingrediants while Karen entertained my boy - with belly tickles...

We put the cakes (two layers after all - was supposed to be three but we ran out of pans. It will soon become obvious that this was the first in many blunders) into the oven and began to start the icing. The icing was quite complex requiring melting chocolate AND using the stove top. Luckily Karen took over this task while I entertained her boy with my attempts at teaching him my name and of course, playing ball.





Upon taking the cakes out of the oven I discovered a crisis. The cakes were so dense and so moist that they...sadly...were sticking to the pans. WHAT TO DO? Well, I waited till Mama Karen finished putting my buddy Vaughn to bed and asked for her wisdom (figuring that she is the self proclaimed Domestic Goddess while I was only aiming to be Holly Homemaker). Upon her return to the kitchen, Karen offered up this sage advise.... "wack the pan." And so she did. The result - mmmm - not so pretty.

Unfortunately, between cake making and the entertaining of boys it was time for bed so the remaining cake decorating had to be postponed till the next day.

The Next Day...

The next morning, I began to ice the cake and discovered yet another problem. Due to the denseness and moistness of the cake, the cake itself had a tendency to crumble while being iced. To add insult to injury, the cakes were not equivalent in size!!! In a panic, I called DG Karen to advise. Her sage advice was once again profound...."cover it in icing, lots and lots of icing" she said. So, she did.

Now why on earth she would make a pile of icing on top that looked like cow dung, I will never know. Although it could be the eau de Chapeau de Medicine that influenced her.

Not to be outdone by her sweeeeeeeeeet decorating skills I suggested that we added my travel gnome, Seamus, to the cake in honor of St. Patty's Day and drunkeness. The final result looked something like this:

So How Was It? This cake was positively drool worthy. The cream cheese based icing was to die for and the thick dense but ohhhhh sooooo goood cake itself was a wonderful compliment. I give this cake a 5 out of 5 and will definetly make it for others to enjoy.

There is only one problem however. What to perfect now? Ah yes, the lemon cake.