Chocolate Cherry Cake with Almond Buttercream Frosting
This past weekend I was enlisted to bake a cake for a Puppet Uprising performance. Poor decision-maker that I am, I had a bit of a time trying to figure out what to make. There are so many options when it comes to cake, from batter add-ins to frostings, fillings, icings, spreads, ganaches, and any combination of these in addition to the trillions of ways a cake can be decorated, not to mention assembled. I’m also well-aware that cake can go horribly wrong, something I attempt to avoid when baking for crowds.
This time, I opted to make a 2-layer mocha cake with cappuccino frosting with dark chocolate ganache à la my recent rendition of this flavor combination in cupcake form.
First: to choose a chocolate cake recipe. Not too long ago, I found a recipe for Chocolate Surprise Cake, written in my grandmother’s neat cursive scrawl. The surprise? Beer and sauerkraut are two of the ingredients — a cake to make my ancestors proud, to be sure. But this time around, I figured I needed something a bit more standard.
Moosewood’s 6-Minute Chocolate Cake has always served me well; it’s tasty and finished in a flash. Unfortunately, even after greasing and flouring the pan, this cake really resists being removed from the pan. Since I was already in cake-baking mode, I figured I’d experiment by comparing a similar-but-different chocolate cake recipe a little later.
When I was but a wee vegetarian, I drooled over the cakes at a vegetarian cafe called Claire’s, piled high with mountainous swirls of buttercream frostings. (I’m pleased to note they now make vegan cake and frosting! Awesome!) This cake got the pile-of-frosting treatment between each layer, which I think made for a pleasing appearance.
And then I covered it in a thick ganache.
It was apparently a big hit at the show!
When I’m thinking about how to improve a baked good, there are lots of things that come up. Sometimes idiosyncrasies can be blamed on my horrible, tiny, false-temperature-reading, gas-leaching, fire-throwing, not-level oven . . . sometimes it’s just the weirdo recipe (which is one of a few reasons I tend to try to work from tried-and-true non-vegan recipes) . . . and sometimes fine-tuning is probably just a matter of chemistry. I would love to know more about the chemistry of rising — considering how the alkalinity of coffee and variously processed cocoas can alter the outcome of a recipe, for example. Too bad I slept through chemistry in high school!
For my third 9″ cake of the day, I turned to my trusty copy of The Joy of Cooking and used the Dairy-Free Chocolate Cake recipe. This was fated to become a chocolate cherry cake with almond buttercream frosting.
I had pounds of black cherries from dumpstering a couple of weeks ago that I needed to use up, so I pitted them and threw a cup into the batter.
Though the Moosewood cakes were nothing to shirk at, see how beautifully this cake from the Joy of Cooking set up. Though there were only slight variations between the recipes, the difference was marked; this cake set up nice and evenly with straight, smooth sides, and popped out of the pan without any fanfare.
Spread with a thin layer of cherry jam. You can make this from scratch by boiling down a 1:1 mixture of cherries with white sugar, or use store-bought if you’re like me and have trash-picked endless amounts of jam that you just can’t bear to chuck.
And top generously with a swirl of almond buttercream frosting. Sprinkle with cherries and almonds (roasted and sliced, if you prefer).
Chocolate-Cherry Cake
1½ c all-purpose flour
1 c and 2 tbsp sugar
6 tbsp cocoa powder
1 tsp baking soda
1/8 tsp salt
1 c cold water
¼ c vegetable oil
1 tbsp white vinegar
2 tsp vanilla
1 c cherries, chopped in half and pitted
Preheat the oven to 375°. Grease and flour a 9″ cake pan. Sift together the dry ingredients in a large mixing bowl. In a separate small bowl, whisk together the wet ingredients. (Don’t just add them directly as you don’t want the reaction to begin prematurely.) Stir til just mixed; some lumps are okay, and the batter will turn lighter in color. Fold in the cherries and pour quickly into prepared pan. Bake 25 minutes or until a toothpick inserted in the center comes out clean. Don’t be tempted to peek before 20 minutes have passed, or your cake may not rise properly!
Almond Buttercream Frosting
1/3 c shortening
1/3 c soy margarine
3½ c confectioner’s sugar, sifted
1½ tsp almond extract
½ tsp vanilla extract
1 tbsp water or soymilk (more as needed)
Cream together the shortening and margarine. Add confectioner’s sugar, coffee mixture, and 1 tbsp water; mix well. If it’s too stiff, add more liquid by the teaspoon and whip. Yields about 4 cups.
And while I’m at it, I might as well give you:
Cappuccino Buttercream Frosting(for 2 layers)
1/2 c shortening
1/2 c soy margarine
5 c confectioner’s sugar, sifted
1 tbsp instant coffee dissolved in 1 tsp cool water
water or soymilk as needed
Cream shortening and butter. Add confectioner’s sugar, coffee mixture, and a teaspoon of water; whip until blended. Add more water as needed by the teaspoonful until you reach the desired consistency.
Dark Chocolate Ganache
1 c semi-sweet chocolate (chips work fine), finely chopped
3/4 c soy milk
In a saucepan, simmer soy milk. Remove from heat, add chocolate, and stir until smooth.
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yum! i am going to have to make the chocolate cherry cake with almond buttercream–it looks amazing!
that dairy-free chocolate cake from Joy of Cooking is my go-to standard. so super fast and easy and delicious. my only change is that I add about 8 Tbsp of cocoa instead of 6 … more chocolatey goodness!
Thank you for posting this! it is yummy!! I made the chocolate cake with a chocolate fudge icing for my husband’s birthday- it was the first chocolate cake he has eaten for over 20 years that actually worked out and tasted good!
Awesome! I’m glad you liked it, Vicky