My personal challenge: baking my way through "How to Bake". This post is my experience baking and learning new skills from tackling each recipe in Paul Hollywood's, "How to Bake". I will also document any recipe changes that I made - mainly as a result of not having the ingredients on hand (i.e., we never have regular sugar in the house) - and how the recipe fared. I will not be providing the recipes that are in his book.
Oh, the holidays! This was yet another delicious holiday bake. After gifting the Coffee Date Cake, my husband and I were at home watching The Great British Bake-Off and admiring all of the epic bakes and achievements during the technicals that I decided to flip through the Biscuits, Puddings, and Cakes section to find something with the least amount of prep and baking time. Since a cake was requested, we agreed on the Triple Chocolate Layer Cake with Walnuts. We had to listen to our chocolate craving on this one and it did not disappoint.
Before I would start baking this cake, my husband had to make a grocery run for some of the ingredients like digestive biscuits, walnuts and brandy. Oddly enough, he came home with less ingredients than requested and different ingredients than were on the list because our grocery store did not carry certain items. While I don't know what Paul Hollywood's Triple Chocolate Layer Cake would taste like if I followed the ingredient list precisely, I can say that we enjoyed this cake so much we finished it.
Now, that might sound surprising, but unless we share with friends or family, my husband and I don't always finish the bakes from "How to Bake" because we usually hit our fill of sugar and sweets after a few servings each and most of these bakes make at least a dozen servings. I think we had one slice left that we forgot about and the cake felt too dried out to eat, though my husband was tempted to try.
Here are some of the lessons that I learned while making the Triple Layer Cake with Walnuts from "How to Bake":
Digestive Biscuits Substitute. For this recipe, our cravings begged for a chocolate cake and we obliged. Despite my last bake and making some ingredients work or omitting due to lack of preparation (looking at you, Coffee Date Cake), my husband went to the grocery store to pick up ingredients that we didn't have on hand. I got a call from him after much time had passed and he was dumbfounded that he could not find digestive biscuits. He mentioned that he did a quick Google search to figure out what aisle they would be on and the ingredients that they had. You may know this, but digestive biscuits have a larger quantity of baking soda, which helps with digestion (hence the name) similar to an antacid, and less sugar for a treat at the end of the meal. Well, us American's and our high tolerance for sugar did not have such a biscuit in the cookie aisle. After much debate, we opted to buy graham crackers for our substitute since a digestive biscuit at the end of the day is still a cookie. Honestly, I didn't know how this ingredient would do in the cake, but it was delicious.
No Alcohol. As I have mentioned before, we do not have a lot of choice for alcohol in our home and it does not make much sense to purchase a bottle for a simple recipe if we won't drink it in the future. The Triple Layer Chocolate Cake called for Brandy. No surprise, but we did not have anything similar in our pantry nor could my husband find any at the grocery store. We looked in our liquor shelf and we just had rye whiskey and mead that were gifts from work. I scoured the internet for a substitute thinking it should be fruity or sweeter than a rye whiskey and while whiskey, bourbon, and rum were listed in addition to sherry, I decided to lean on our fresh pressed orange juice instead. I did not want to use my husband's mead since that is actually something he enjoys drinking and I wasn't comfortable with whiskey since it burns my nose hairs. I tried a few of the raisins in the orange juice before adding to the cake and they were plump, sweet, and flavorful. While we might have been missing the depth and warmth of a brandy, we still got some tang and sweetness from the citrus. I also added the orange juice in place of the brandy in the batter, too.
Gentle Batter Mixing. Since making this cake, I have watched a few baking tutorials with Christina Tossi and one of the tips that she says at-home bakers mess up often is the mixing. She says that you should mix the butter and sugar the longest and then slowly mix the flour and dry ingredients as little as possible until just combined. If done right, the cake with be light, airy and moist and if done incorrectly, you get more of a dense and gluey cake texture. At the time of that advice I had already made this cake and I second guessed my mixing intuition, but Paul Hollywood writes something similar in "How to Bake", "cream the butter and sugar together in a large bowl until pale and fluffy; this can take up to 10 minutes". When I was younger, I was never given a time to follow, but I was told to rub the butter and sugar mixture between your fingers and if it was still grainy, keep going. I believe this has helped me to not get impatient with the creaming of the butter and sugar step. But watching Tossi turn the mixer off between each spin when adding the flour was truly eye-opening and for my next cake, I will try that method. For this cake, I still incorporated slowly like Hollywood says, "fold in gently", but I may have still over mixed with all my folding. My tip: keep mixing the butter and sugar but snail pace the flour like a feather.
Chill the Cake. As I have mentioned, my husband and I were craving this cake and by the time it was done, it was too late to wait for it to chill and we were teased by the smell from the oven for far too long that we had to dive in. I completely ignored the advice to "chill the cake thoroughly before serving". Now, it was amazing and ticked all the right chocolate craving desires, but I would highly recommend chilling the cake for a few reasons: 1. the frosting was warm and seeped from the layers, which hid the whole name of the cake (triple layer); 2. the cake and the flavors were more enhanced the next day and tastier cold; and 3. the cake looked more presentable out of the fridge in three distinct layers, which made it feel like even more of an impressive bake. I have always heard that warmth enhances our taste buds to flavors when it comes to sweet and bitter, but in this case, the cold cake tasted better. If I were you, serve chilled.
Health Benefits:
Walnuts: Contains anti-cancer benefits from omega-3s and anti-inflammatory enzyme that blocks two genes (BRCA1 and 2), contains melatonin which normalizes circadian rhythms and is high in fiber, protein and healthy unsaturated fats
Raisins: Contains a good amount of fiber which aids in proper digestion and potassium. Raisins also have iron, calcium and boron. Boron works with Vitamin D to help keep bones and joints strong and healthy.
Chocolate: Contains high amounts of antioxidants, and like blueberries, combats stress and inflammation, which prevents disease especially degeneration and brain cellular death. The flavonoids in dark chocolate may lower blood pressure and increase blood flow. It also prevents high cholesterol. It's loaded with nutrients and minerals from iron, magnesium, copper, and manganese to potassium, phosphorus, zinc, and selenium.
Our Review: Like I said above, I definitely prefer this cake chilled. I was hesitant to add the sultanas (golden raisins) and walnuts to the filling and topping because I was unsure about the texture and I am used to smooth frosting. Well, I am glad that I pushed my hesitancy aside and trusted the cookbook for what it is - a learning aide - because Pul Hollywood did not steer us wrong. I actually enjoyed the sultanas and walnuts in the frosting. I am not proud to admit that I could do with a stronger chocolate flavor - 2 tablespoons in the batter was not enough. Our melted chocolate was a local, small-batch bean-to-bar, so maybe I could have done a different chocolate for the filling and topping, but as far as the cake itself, I'd like more cacao. Did you feel this way too? Let me know!
On that note, I hope that you find a recipe book you enjoy, or this one, that I am currently baking my way through. Either way, enjoy baking and nourishing yourself and your family.
All my light and all my love.
Namaste,
Jordan
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