In chocolate heaven

That's where a bite into this cake will take you. Bitter-sweet, intense, scrumptious - all that a chocoholic wants. Plus added nuttiness of almonds. Need I say more?

I baked this cake on a recent trip to Mumbai. My cousin there told me she wanted to learn to bake a cake. "Easy or complicated?" I asked, "Tasty" she replied. I chose to bake this chocolate cake by Donna Hay that she shared in her 50th Issue magazine. I have tried this recipe thrice before, each time with some twist, each time devoured by happy content faces.

Early morning visit to Juhu Beach

Since baking is not a very common hobby in India, it is difficult to find shops which sell the tools and raw materials. Bakers, especially home-bakers, are always on a hunt for these. Arrife at Bandra West is one such store. It is a familiar name among the baking community and it was on my agenda while I was in Mumbai. A tiny shop selling pans, moulds, liners, fondant-plungers, exotic ingredients for far-away lands… and I almost started dreaming there!

I baked this cake in a microwave oven in convection mode and the cake turned out just fine. This blog post by Suma Rowjee of Cakes and More was very helpful. In the post she has given loads of gyaan and useful tips for microwave convection-mode baking.

I haven't tried baking in microwave mode. You can try, only that the cake will be cooked instead of being baked and you'll not get the trademark crust that a regular oven gives.

The cake has an intense chocolate flavour. I suggest using the best cocoa powder you can find. I used Nilgiri's cocoa powder. I find it better than Cadbury's cocoa powder. Nilgiri's is a bakery-grocery-dairy superstore chain located in southern India. 
The original recipe includes glaze which I omitted, the intended audience wasn't ready to wait. I increased the sugar in the cake batter by 2 tablespoons instead. Since butter wasn't available I used ghee and increased the sour cream. The original recipe uses 2/3 cup butter and 3/4 cup sour cream. The granularity of the almonds can also be changed from fine meal to coarsely chopped, the cake would still be yum. Also sour cream can be replaced with yogurt, not very sour one. My cake top developed some thin cracks all around, maybe a sign of overshooting bake time by 2-3 minutes, but the taste was awesome.  Here’s the recipe:

Chocolate Almond Sourcream cake

Ingredients:

1/3 Cup ghee, thick n grainy

2/3 Cup + 2 Tbsps demerara/brown sugar

1 Cup sour cream

2 eggs

1 tsp vanilla extract

1/2 Cup almond meal

1 Cup All-purpose flour

1/2 tsp baking powder

1/4 tsp baking soda

1/2 cup cocoa powder

Steps:

Preheat oven to 180° C. Grease and dust an 8” round pan.

Sift flour, baking powder, baking soda and cocoa powder. Add almond meal and mix using a wire whisk. Set aside.

Beat the ghee and damerera sugar for 2 minutes.

In a different medium-sized bowl, whisk together the eggs, sour cream and vanilla.

Add egg mixture to the ghee mixture. Mix slightly. Add dry ingredients and mix till combined (do not over mix). Spoon the batter into the prepared cake pan. 

Bake for 35 minutes or until a cake tester inserted into the cake comes out clean.

Cool in cake pan for 10 minutes.  Turn out onto a wire rack to cool completely.

Cut a big slice, take a bite, close your eyes n savour the intense chocolate flavour. The cake just melts in your mouth. And before you know it disappears in a poof!

Happy Baking!

Shwe