The White Ramekins

food & photography

Chocolate Cake With Strawberry Cream Filling

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It has been ages since I last blogged baking. Not that I was not baking at home but had been busy in other stuff. I know it took me long to come back, but the urge to be back was constantly thriving in my heart. And what could be better reason, when I had recently bought my new Nikon DSLR D3100 camera, which is an entry level  DSLR, but good enough to get clean and beautiful shots (atleast for the beginner like me). Last Thursday, My friend invited me for a dinner party at his home next day, and his wife had asked for a chocolate cake. As the party was arranged for Friday, so I was little hard pressed as these days, it’s getting little late at work in the evening. So, I thought of baking the cake in two days. Now I had to find a recipe fast, which should not be too difficult and time consuming.

I searched through the internet and found this wonderful recipe with strawberries. I quickly read the recipe and felt happy to see that most of the ingredients I had already stocked in my inventory (did some substitutions and skips). Because of the time constraint, I baked the cake one day in advance, covered it with a cling wrap and piled it up in fridge to be frosted the other day.

While the cake was getting baked, it started puffing up in the center, I don’t know why. Probably I had mixed the batter a little over. But no problem, I cut the puffed up part using a sharp knife and reserved it for using it later for chocolate trifles. I halved the recipe, as I didn’t have two separate spring form tins of same size, nor I had enough time to bake the cakes twice. And the result was really perfect and moist cake.

Note that I halved the below recipe.

Ingredients

Cake

280gm plain flour

50gm cocoa

50gm cornflour

4tsp baking powder

Pinch of salt

300gm powdered sugar

10tbsp oil

10tbsp water

4tbsp milk

6 eggs, separated

2tsp pure vanilla extract

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Filling

300ml low fat cream

200gm strawberries, chopped

1/4 cup sugar

1tbsp balsamic vinegar (substituted with white wine vinegar)

1 tsp vanilla extract

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Chocolate Ganache

275gm dark chocolate, room temperature

150ml low fat cream, room temperature

Instructions

Cake:

  1. Preheat oven to 180ºC. Line 2 9″ spring form tin.
  2. Sift the cornflour, flour, baking powder, salt, icing sugar and cocoa powder together into a large mixing bowl.
  3. Beat the egg whites till they stand in soft peaks & keep aside.
  4. Lightly beat the oil, water,yolks and vanilla extract together & stir into the dry ingredients.
  5. Fold the whites gently into the yolk mixture.
  6. Divide into lined tins & bake for about 45 minutes till well risen & golden brown. Check if it is done with a wooden pick.
  7. Leave in tin for 10 minutes, & then cool completely on rack.
  8. Once cool, cut into 2 or 3 layers.
  9. Sandwich with filling (recipe follows). Allow to rest in the fridge for about 30 minutes, and then frost with the chocolate ganache (recipe follows). Let it sit out for at least 30 minutes before serving.

Filling:

  1. First prepare filling: Place strawberries, sugar, vanilla extract and balsamic vinegar in a sauce pan, and simmer till it becomes thick and jam-like. Cool completely.
  2. Beat cream to medium stiff peaks, and gently fold in cooled strawberry mixture, taking care not to release the volume of the cream.

Chocolate Ganache:

  1. Place the chocolate with 100ml cream in a heatproof bowl and microwave for 30-40 seconds. You can also simmer it in pan until the chocolate melts. Stir until smooth, add the remaining cream and stir well to combine both into a smooth ganache.
  2. Give the cake one basic thin coating with this ganache.
  3. Decorate with some fresh strawberries and dust with icing sugar, if desired.

The Old Fashioned Chocolate Cake

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This old fashioned chocolate cake is kind of everyone’s favorite in my family, so much so that my brother called me up on Friday afternoon and asked me to bake this one for him and bring that home when I visit my natives on weekend. This is so luscious and the fact this is scarcely any harder than baking a cake mix out of a box. This one’s so simple that everything goes into the processor and the processor does the whole thing for you. Obviously, you can make this by hand if you prefer the harder way. But I personally take the easiest and shorter route.

To bake this cake, you need…….

250 gm all-purpose flour
125 gm superfine sugar
1 teaspoon baking powder
1/2 teaspoon baking soda
50 gm best-quality unsweetened cocoa
100 gm soft unsalted butter
2 large eggs
2 teaspoons good-quality vanilla extract
2/3 cup sour cream

2 (each 8-inch diameter) layer tins with removable bases, buttered

Frosting:

100 gm good-quality dark chocolate, broken into small pieces
2 tbsp unsalted butter
100 gm confectioners’ sugar
1/2 cup sour cream
1 teaspoon good-quality vanilla extract

Take everything out of the refrigerator so that all ingredients can come to room temperature. Preheat the oven to 180 degrees C. Put all the cake ingredients: flour, sugar, baking powder and soda, cocoa, butter, eggs, vanilla, and sour cream into a food processor and process until you have a smooth, thick batter. If you want to go the long way around, just mix the flour, sugar and leavening agents in a large bowl and beat in the soft butter until you have a combined and creamy mixture. Now whisk together the cocoa, sour cream, vanilla, and eggs and beat this into your bowl of mixture. Divide this batter, into the prepared tins and bake until a cake tester comes out clean, which should be about 35 minutes, but it is wise to start checking at 25 minutes. Remove the cakes, in their tins, to a wire rack and let cool for 10 minutes before turning out of their tins. Don’t worry about any cracks as they will easily be covered by the frosting later.

To make this icing, melt the chocolate and butter in a good-sized bowl either in the microwave or suspended over a pan of simmering water. While the chocolate and butter is cooling a little, sieve the confectioners’ sugar into another bowl. Add the sour cream and vanilla and then when all this is combined whisk in the sieved confectioners’ sugar. You may need to add a little boiling water, say a teaspoon or so, or indeed some more confectioners’ sugar, depending on whether you need the frosting to be thinner or thicker. It should be liquid enough to coat easily, but thick enough not to drip off. Sit 1 of the cakes with uppermost side down. Spoon about 1/3 of the frosting onto the center of the cake-half and spread with a knife or spatula until you cover the top of it evenly. Sit the other cake on top, normal way up, pressing gently to sandwich the 2 together. Spoon another 1/3 of the frosting onto the top of the cake and spread it in a textured way. If you prefer, you can also go for a smooth finish. Spread the sides of the cake with icing and leave for few hours in refrigerator to get cooled.