Coconut Chocolate Cake

 Recipe base from Restlesschipotle.com (LINK)

On my Bundt quest that has no particular end goal, I stumbled upon this recipe.
Whilst the description talked a big game, about the amazing pairing of coconut and chocolate, and rum, I found it difficult to believe that a recipe that only had coconut milk - which has a very delicate flavour - as its connection to coconut was going to be that flavoursome.

Now don't get me wrong, the cake batter was nice, and after a previous incident with too much density, I bought a new hand blender, and was really taking precautions not to overbeat the batter.

Batter

I unintentionally used under half of the chocolate from the recipe, but I didn't have enough dark chocolate anyway. I don't feel it hurt the recipe.

As the cake has an option of adding a cup of macadamia nuts, I would say that I would probably add a cup of desiccated coconut. This somewhat defeats the purpose of avoiding the texture, however I can't in all good conscious say that this is a coconut cake. Maybe adding tablespoon of coconut extract, or replacing the quarter cup of rum for Malibu could be an option.

with chocolate medley

My batter came out very velvety and rose magnificently from the pan as it was baking. Far too much batter for my 12 cup bundt. I don't blame the recipe, I should have recognised that it was too full, and made cupcakes with the remainder.

Bundt!

After turning the cake out, I decided in a moment of madness/genius to cut the bottom off the cake to even it up. I then discovered what is becoming a recurring nightmare for me: Density. Is that part still not baked properly?! I whipped it back into the oven with a foil hat for another 15-20 minutes, contradictorily still on its cooling rack. After this point I admitted defeat, and took it out to cool entirely.

Finished Product

As the Swedes say, kämpa kämpa. I finished the cake off by pouring half of the coconut rum sauce over it, and reserving the other half to heat up and pour over it the next day.

The cake was still demolished within 10 minutes, and whilst I was lurking in the sidelines, eagle-eyeing the cake and its inner appearance, I discovered to my wary yet somewhat happy bewilderment that the cake appeared to have repaired itself overnight! No dense, doughy patches or anything! Not sure how that happened, but I'm pleased... for now.

Quadruple Chocolate Loaf Cake

Recipe base from Feast by Nigella Lawson through Not Quite Nigella.

I should have known that the recipe was too elegantly simple and indulgent to have come from anyone other than Nigella Lawson.

After my recent spat of sub-par cakes, I have been wandering through the endless wasteland of internet recipes, trying to find an interesting cake to make to somehow redeem my tattered reputation. I stumbled across this recipe on notquitenigella.com and as I had all the ingredients, I figured I could give it a go.

I'm not a huge fan of chocolate cake, and still feeling rather wary of cakes after the succession of relative failures, I didn't have the highest of hopes, but I'm no quitter.

This was a very easy cake to make... the hardest part was mixing the dry ingredients into the wet without over beating it. This was all alleviated once the hot water was added.

First attempt - milk chocolate chips

When I made this cake for a second time, I combined the wet with dry ingredients with a wooden spoon, added the water, and then went back to the hand mixer.

Having made three of these cakes two days in a row, I would say that I preferred the first cake where I used milk chocolate chips. I had nearly run out of milk chocolate for the second batch, so I used dark chocolate chips, that in my mind made it far too rich.

Second batch - mainly dark chocolate chips

I have to say that my first experience of this cake set a positive precedent, and it is so simple to make that I recommend this as The Go-To chocolate cake recipe.


Available at Samara's Baked Goods