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07/01/1999 Archived Entry: "Chocolate Cake By Demand & A Bake-Off Classic"

What a mistake! On June 18, I wrote in the Maven’s Diary about how three master baking teachers – Rose Levy Beranbaum, Carole Walter, and Nick Malgieri – came on my radio program with the same chocolate cake recipe, to prove that the same recipe made by different hands, now matter how expert, always turns out different. The mistake? I didn’t offer the recipe! I thought it was enough to say that none of us thought the recipe was that wonderful; that we all knew chocolate cakes we liked better. But by popular request – no, more like by popular demand – here it is. It’s from a perfectly reputable book, The All-Butter Fresh Cream Sugar-Packed Baking Book by Judy Rosenberg, who has a bakery in Cambridge, Mass. If I was going to make the cake, I’d use super-fine (instant dissolving) sugar, as Carole Walter did. Her cake was slightly lighter and higher than the others and perhaps that was one reason. Of course, Carole’s meticulous and patient approach can’t be discounted.

I can’t resist leading you to another chocolate cake recipe, though. It’s a Chocolate Praline Layer Cake and it won the 1988 Pillsbury Bake-Off, which was the year I was a judge. I remember the cake causing some controversy because it was so simple. It’s just a Pillsbury mix baked in two layers on a praline layer – made by combining pecans with melted butter, cream, and brown sugar --then stacked with whipped cream as the filling, pecans and chocolate curls as decoration. The judges liked it because it was so simple, and elegant in its ease and simplicity. Other contestants were, I think, envious of same.

To promote the 50th anniversary of the Bake-Off this year, Pillsbury introduced a Hall of Fame, placing 10 of the best/most famous Bake-Off recipes in a booklet and on-line at their new web-site, bakeoff.com. Bakeoff.com also allows you to enter the Bake-Off on line. It also has a very interesting history of the Bake-Off, taking the contest decade by decade and discussing how it has always reflected what’s happening in American culture.

You’ll be surprised at some of the recipes in the Hall of Fame. There are several that have become part of our culinary heritage and you probably never knew they started out as Bake-Off winners. Tunnel of Fudge introduced the bundt pan to the American masses and started a craze for wet-centered cakes that continues to today. The Peanut Blossoms, peanut butter cookies with a Hershey’s kiss pressed into the center, were part of my youth, even though they weren’t invented until I was 10 years old. And French Silk Chocolate Pie, a 1951 best-of-class winner (not even grand prize winner) has become, under its original name and many variations thereof, a standard in America’s restaurants.


Rosie’s Famous
Chocolate Sour-Cream Cake Layers
from “All-Butter Fresh Cream Sugar-Packed Baking Book” by Judy Rosenberg )
Serves 12 to 16 when frosted

4 ounces unsweetened chocolate
2 cups sugar
1 1/2 cups sifted all purpose flour
3/4 teaspoon baking soda
1/2 teaspoon salt
1 cup hot strong brewed coffee or 5 teaspoons instant coffee powder dissolved in 1 cup hot water
1/2 cup sour cream, at room temperature
1/2 cup vegetable oil
2 large eggs, lightly beaten with a fork, at room temperature

Preheat the oven to 345 degrees. Lightly grease two 8 inch layer cake pans with vegetable oil or butter, or line them with parchment circles or inserts.

Melt the chocolate in the top of a double boiler placed over simmering water, then turn off the heat.

Sift the sugar, flour, baking soda, and salt together into a large mixing bowl.

In a separate bowl, blend the hot coffee, sour cream, and vegetable oil with a whisk.

With the mixer on low speed, add the coffee mixture in a stream to the dry ingredients and mix until blended, about 35 seconds. Stop the mixer to scrape the bowl several times with a rubber spatula.

Add the eggs one at a time and mix on medium-low speed after each addition until smooth, about 15 seconds. Scrape the bowl each time. Add the chocolate and mix until the batter is uniform in color, about 10 seconds more.

Divide the batter evenly between the prepared pans and place them on the center rack of the oven.

Bake until the cake springs back to the touch and a tester inserted in the center comes out dry (do not wait for a crust to form), 35 to 38 minutes.

Cool the layers in the pans on a rack before frosting.


Fudge Frosting
Makes 1 3/4 cups, enough to fill and frost a two-layer cake

4 ounces unsweetened chocolate
3/4 cup evaporated milk
1 cup sugar

Melt the chocolate in the top of a double boiler placed over simmering water. Cool slightly.

Blend the evaporated milk and sugar in a blender on medium speed for 2 seconds.

Add the chocolate to the sugar mixture in the blender and blend on high speed until the frosting is thick and shiny, 1 to 1 1/2 minutes. The mixer’s sound will change when the frosting has thickened.

Spoon the frosting into a bowl and allow it to set at room temperature for 30 minutes. Then cover the bowl with plastic wrap and allow the frosting to set for 1 hour more before frosting. Do no refrigerate the frosting, even if you don’t plan to use it for several days.

Note: This recipe can only be made in a blender.