Black Forest Cake (No Liquor)

For a first hallway dinner of the semester, I opted once again to make dessert. As it is still the beginning of the semester, and my workload is still manageable, I decided to make something a little fancier than plain cupcakes or something.

One unfortunate side effect due to my procrastination is that I tend to start baking kind of late. In the winter, this means that by the time I have a finished product, I'm required to take pictures with indoors lights instead of natural daylight. This leads to a lot of pictures that are more on the yellow side... As this cake was eaten about an hour after it was baked, I could not wait until tomorrow to take pictures.

I signed up for dessert, as usual, but this morning, I still did not know what to make. On a whim, I opted for chocolate cake. Then the thought of "Black Forest Cake" popped into my head, so I worked towards that. The chocolate cake recipe is from Minimalist Baker.

After the cake was baked, I cut it in half, and put a layer of whipped cream and a layer of cherries (from a jar of pitted cherries, with the juice thickened with some cornstarch). I closed it off with the second layer, more whipped cream, and 8 cherries I had reserved. The rest of the surface was covered in shaved milk chocolate (all I had in stock), as I did not have time to pipe a pattern with the cream, as I had originally intended.

The cake recipe yielded an extremely moist cake that went well with the cherries. Upon hindsight, the cake would have been much better if the top also had an entire layer of cherries, but I had not purchased enough, so had to make do with what I had. Except for the whipped cream, this cake is vegan.

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RECIPE

  Ingredients

     Chocolate Cake (adapted from Minimalist Baker)

• 1 1/2 cup unsweetened almond milk
• 2 tsp vinegar (white or apple cider)
• 1 1/4 cup apple sauce
• 1/2 cup strong brewed coffee (I used decaf)
• 2/3 cup melted coconut oil, or other neutral oil
• 1 packet vanilla sugar, or 1 tsp vanilla extract
• 2 cups + 2 tbs flour
• 3/4 cup cane sugar
• 1 cup unsweetened cocoa powder
• 2 tsp baking soda
• 1 tsp baking powder
• 1/4 tsp salt

     Topping

• 1 jar or can pitted cherries
• whipping cream (use non-dairy cream for vegan option)
• icing sugar (optional)
• chocolate

  Procedure

     Chocolate Cake

1. Preheat oven 176˚C.
2. In a mixing bowl, mix almond milk and vinegar. Set aside a few minutes to activate.
3. Add oil, coffee, applesauce, and whisk until foamy*.
4. Sift in flour, cocoa powder, sugar, baking soda, baking powder, and salt progressively while whisking or beating.
5. Taste and add sugar as desired.
6. Pour into prepared pan. Bake for 25-30 min.
7. Let cool in pan for a few minutes, then remove and cool completely on a rack.

      * Mine didn't foam up, but still ended up fine.

     Assembly

1. Cut the cake into 2 halves.
2. Whip cream with desired amount of icing sugar.
3. Drain cherries, and reserve some for the topping.
4. In a small pot, mix remaining drained cherries, 1/4 cup of their juice, a sprinkling of sugar, to taste, and 2 tsp cornstarch. Heat until thickened, then cool completely.
5. On the first layer of cake, spread an even amount of whipped cream. Add the cooled cherries.
6. Delicately slide the 2nd layer of cake on top of the cherries layer.
7. Spread with cream. 
8. Place reserved cherries as desired.
9. With a sharp knife or a vegetable peeler, shave some chocolate. Cover the rest of the surface with shaved chocolate.
10. Cut and enjoy~