Every now and then I am visited with a feeling of great happiness at being in just the right place and doing just the right thing at just the right time. Saturday was like that.
Our older son was coming up for an early celebration of John's upcoming birthday and I was in the kitchen, making a chocolate cake. It was raining gently--a much needed rain-- and the warmth of the stove was welcome.
And I was using my mother's flour sifter and my grandmother's cake racks. Like the letter I posted about on Saturday, it was a living connection across the years.
Later, there was fried chicken, mashed potatoes and gravy, green beans, and salad--an archetypal family meal.
Josie showed off for her uncle and later, after she and her mama had gone home, Justin returned and the brothers talked late into the night.
I'm not really a fan of cake -- except my grandmother's pound cake. Every year I make the same chocolate layer cake with raspberry jam between the layers for John's birthday and am always kinda disappointed in it. Too blah, too ... cakey.
So this year (John's birthday is today but we had a birthday celebration on Saturday so Ethan could join us,) I went on line to find a cake that was really dark and really moist. And we were all pretty much in agreement -- this is the Ultimate Chocolate Cake. Almost black, not too sweet, and definitely for adults. (The Genius Kitchen, from whence the original recipe came, calls it Deep Dark Chocolate Cake. I made a few changes.)
2 cups granulated sugar
1 3/4 cups all-purpose flour
3/4 cup unsweetened cocoa (I used more- almost a cup)
2 teaspoons baking soda
1 teaspoon baking powder
1 teaspoon salt
2 large eggs
1 cup buttermilk (I used plain yoghurt)
1 cup strong coffee
1/2 cup canola oil
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
2 0r 3 teaspoons Tunisian Five Spice (my addition -- see below.)
DIRECTIONS
1. Preheat oven to 350.
2. Grease and flour one 13x 9 inch baking pan OR two 9 inch pans. (I also line the bottom of the pan with a piece of waxed paper cut to fit and then greased.)
3. In a large bowl, stir together sugar, flour, cocoa, baking soda, baking powder, salt, and Tunisian Five Spice.
4. Add eggs, buttermilk (or yoghurt,) coffee, oil, and vanilla. Beat on medium speed of electric mixer for 2 minutes. Batter will be thin. (Really, really thin -- I wondered if I'd made a mistake but it was fine.)
5. Pour into prepared pan(s) and bake till toothpick inserted in center comes out clean. (30 -35 minutes for 2 round pans; 35-40 for 1 rectangular pan.)
6. Cool 10 minutes. If using two round pans, remove from pans and cool on wire racks before frosting.
FROSTING
This is an amped-up version of my usual chocolate frosting)
1 stick butter, softened
4 tablespoons cocoa
2 cups confectioners sugar
3 tablespoons dark rum (or maybe more -- whatever it takes to get to a nice spreadable consistency.)
I put a generous amount of raspberry jam between the layers. Citrus marmalade would be good too. Or currant jelly or lingonberry or cherry . . . whatever tickles your fancy.
Tunisian Five Spice is my favorite for all sorts of things -- apple pie, tea, hummus, and this cake. There's more info on it HERE. You could substitute a combination of cinnamon, nutmeg, allspice, and pepper -- but you'd miss out on the Grains of Paradise . . .
Yesterday was John's birthday and we began the celebration at breakfast -- as we've done since we were married almost 46 years ago -- with champagne and Eggs Benedict.
Well, actually it wasn't champagne -- it was Prosecco, a sparkling wine from northern Italy. Come to that, maybe it wasn't Eggs Benedict as I made Bernaise sauce, not Hollandaise.
Whatever it was, it was really, really good.
In the afternoon, I made a chocolate pound cake for the family celebration. More butter. Lots more.
This cake has long been a family favorite -- as you can see by the condition of the page in the Southern Junior League Cookbook. I've modified the recipe over the years, adding a dab of cinnamon and making more icing so that it fills the center of the cake. Everyone likes a little extra icing, don't they?
The dinner itself was nothing fancy. At John's request, I made fried chicken, mashed potatoes and gravy -- family comfort food. And there was more champagne -- or rather, more sparkling wine -- this time Spanish rather than Italian.
A bitter-sweet occasion -- Ethan and Aileen were with us but after dinner they had to get on the road to Atlanta. The movers came today and packed up their household stuff and will be unloading it at the new house in Atlanta tomorrow.
Here's my Bernaise recipe, given to me a long, long time ago by Eleanor in Tampa.
1 stick butter (1/4 pound) 2 Tbs. lemon juice 3 egg yolks Salt and pepper 2 thin slices onion 1/2 tsp. cayenne pepper 1/2 tsp. dried tarragon a few sprigs of parsley
Put the egg yolks in a blender, along with all the other ingredients except the butter. Melt the butter till bubbly. Blend the yolks and other stuff for 15 -20 seconds then slowly add the bubbling butter while the blender is still running. Run blender a few more seconds.
At this point, the sauce will be quite runny. I like to put it back in the pan I melted the butter in and set that pan in another pan of hot water while I fix the English muffins, Canadian bacon, and the eggs (which should be poached but which I fry over easy, never having quite gotten the hang of consistently turning out a perfect poached egg.)
When these elements are assembled, the sauce will have thickened a bit and be ready to crown the lot. Finish off with a drift of paprika and another sprig of parsley.
Cream together butter and sugar. Add eggs, one at a time. Add sifted dry ingredients, alternating with milk. Add vanilla.
Bake in a well-greased and floured tube or bundt pan at 325 F fo one hour and twenty minutes. Turn out of pan and ice while still hot.
The Icing on the cake
1 stick butter 3 Tbs. cocoa 2 cups confectioners sugar 3 or more Tbs. strong hot coffee
Cream butter well. Sift sugar and cocoa together and stir in. Add coffee to make a spreadable consistency. (This is more of a glaze than a traditional American cake frosting.)
And the cake is especially good if you make it late in the day so that it's still a little warm when you eat it. With vanilla ice cream on top.
