Tonight I was driven to bake. I have actually felt like baking a lot lately, but cake was really what I wanted to make. So I stole a recipe from neverbashbutter:
2 cups sugar
1-3/4 cups all-purpose flour
3/4 cup powdered dark cocoa
1-1/2 teaspoons baking powder
1-1/2 teaspoons baking soda
1 teaspoon salt
2 eggs
1 cup milk
1/2 cup vegetable oil
2 teaspoons vanilla extract
1 cup boiling water
Heat oven to 350 F. Grease and flour a bundt pan.
Sift, then stir together sugar, flour, cocoa, baking powder, baking soda and salt in large bowl. Add eggs, milk, oil and vanilla; beat on medium speed of mixer 2 minutes. Stir in boiling water (batter will be thin). Pour batter into prepared pan.
Bake 30 to 35 minutes or until wooden pick inserted in center comes out clean. Allow the cakes to cool slightly, about 10 minutes.
I added a teaspoon of instant coffee to my boiling water, to accentuate the flavour of the chocolate.
Next up, I wanted to drizzle caramel sauce over the cake:
1 cup of sugar
6 Tbsp butter
1/2 cup heavy whipping cream
First, before you begin, make sure you have everything ready to go – the cream and the butter next to the pan, ready to put in. Making caramel is a fast process that cannot wait for hunting around for ingredients. If you don’t work fast, the sugar will burn.
Heat sugar on high heat in a heavy-bottomed 2-quart or 3-quart saucepan. As the sugar begins to melt, stir constantly with a whisk. As soon as all of the sugar crystals have melted (the liquid sugar should be dark amber in color), immediately add the butter to the pan. Continue to whisk vigorously until the butter has melted.
Once the butter has melted, take the pan off the heat. Add the cream to the pan and continue to whisk to incorporate. Note than when you add the butter and the cream, the mixture will foam up considerably. This is why you must use a pan that is at least 2-quarts (preferably 3-quarts) big.
Whisk until caramel sauce is smooth. Let cool in the pan for a couple minutes, then pour into a glass mason jar and let sit to cool to room temperature. Store in the refrigerator for up to 2 weeks. Warm before serving.
The finished product was not quite as perfect as I hoped, but still looks pretty good – just need more practice I suppose:
