Baking Addiction 4: Chocolate Walnut cake

Two weeks ago I made a Chocolate Walnut Cake to bring to church. The recipe requires multitasking- mixing, baking, toasting etc. So you can imagine I'll be holding a whisk or a spatula while running around like a headless chicken in the kitchen. But I have to say that it is a straightforward recipe which can never goes wrong. By just using good quality of chocolate compound, you can almost guaranteed that the cake will be yummyliscious. I usually use the local manufactured Beryls Gourmet dark chocolate compound and not some expensive imported goods. You will be surprised that its just cost RM15.80 for 1 kg. Frankly you can make at least 5 cakes with such a big amount of chocolate. 

Well, I dont know whether its a girl thing or what, but I am obsessed about Chocolate. For me its the most versatile food in the whole world.  If you are health (or weight) conscious, just grab a dark chocolate bar rather than Snickers. Dark chocolate has tons of antioxidants which is great for heart, skin and release some chemicals called serotonin in your brain that makes you feel like you're in love! So ditch you bf/gf and start munching chocolate :)

I made my chocolate cake based on www.joyofbaking.com. You can get the full recipe here.

Chocolate Cake:

1 1/2 cups (195 grams) all purpose flour

1 cup (200 grams) granulated white sugar

1/4 cup (25 grams) unsweetened cocoa powder

1 teaspoon baking powder

3/4 teaspoon baking soda

1/4 teaspoon salt

1/3 cup (75 grams) unsalted butter, melted

1 cup (240 ml) warm water

1 teaspoon vanilla extract

1. Preheat oven to 177 degrees C and place rack in center of oven
2. In an ungreased 8 inch (20 cm) square cake pan, stir together the flour, sugar, sifted cocoa powder, baking powder, baking soda, and salt
3. Add the melted butter, water and vanilla extract. With a fork, mix all the ingredients together until well blended
4. Bake in preheated oven for about 30 minutes, or until the cake springs back when lightly pressed and a toothpick inserted in the center of the cake comes out clean. Remove from oven and place on a wire rack to cool.

For Walnut, you can buy at any baking store, I bought mine from Bagus Melawati, it costed me around RM10.50 for a 500g pack. In actual, you maybe just need 1/3 of it for the cake, so just keep the rest for other nutty dishes/desert. Lightly toast the walnut in a hot pan without oil. Caution not to burn the nuts! Once its cooled down just crushed it to smaller pieces, and spread half of it on top of the cake. Sprinkle the rest of the nuts after adding the chocolate frosting.

Chocolate frosting

170 grams dark chocolate, chopped

80 grams of unsalted butter, room temperature

Basically, you just have to put the butter in the microwave, zap with high heat until it melted, took out and add in the chocolate, microwave on high heat again for 2 minutes, stir unmelted chocolate in the butter until its dissolved evenly and pour it on top of the cake. You can do this the "proper way" by melting the chocolate and the butter together in a glass bowl on top of a pot of boiling water. But I find this really tedious plus I have cracked a glass bowl due to the high temperature of the pot. Do you know that Chocolate is technically responsible for the invention of microwave?

Scientists were experimenting with micro waves in hopes of creating better radar detectors and in the wake of World War II, scientists were testing devices called magnetrons. A scientist named Percy Spencer entered the lab with a chocolate bar in his pocket and realized it quickly began to melt. Spencer then realized that the magnetron could potentially be used to cook food.  

Read the full article here.

Anyway, back to the recipe. I've improvised the recipe of the chocolate frosting by leaving out the fresh cream, which causes the chocolate frosting to solidify on top of the cake, well, the texture is abit different from the usual Chocolate Walnut cake, but nevertheless its still tasty. ;)