Hot Chocolate Cake #CakeSliceBakers

 When I saw that this cake was one of October's choices, I knew I would have to make it. This cake appears on the cover of Zoe Bakes Cakes, and my children have been asking me to make it since the book first appeared in our house almost a year ago. Layers of chocolate cake with a cooked chocolate frosting, topped with homemade, toasted marshmallows, this cake is pretty tasty.


I cook book provides instructions in the back for making marshmallows. It was easier than I imagined, and I plan to make them again. There were plenty leftover that we floated in cups of hot chocolate later in the week.


The recipe says to toast them using your kitchen torch or over a fire, but I don't own a kitchen torch and cooking over a fire seemed a little risky for me, so I just piled them up on top of the cake untoasted. Besides, we don't toast them before we put them in our cups of hot chocolate.


The cake itself had a nice chocolate taste - not too sweet or too bitter. It was also moist. The frosting recipe had you melt the butter and chocolate first and then, after it cooled a bit, pour into your mixer with some heavy cream and then start adding the powdered sugar. The end result is a frosting that is more like ganache in texture than buttercream. It was perfect for this cake.





Each month The Cake Slice Bakers are offered a selection of cakes from the current book we are baking through. This year it is Zoë Bakes Cakes by Zoē François. We each choose one cake to bake, and then on the 20th - never before - we all post about our cake on our blogs. There are a few rules that we follow, but the most important ones are to have fun and enjoy baking & eating cakes!

Follow our Facebook, Instagram, and Pinterest pages where you can find all of our cakes, as well as inspiration for many other cakes. You can also click on the links below to take you to each of our cakes. If you have a blog and are interested in joining The Cake Slice Bakers and baking along with us, please send an email to thecakeslicebakers at gmail dot com for more details.

The Cake Slice Bakers also have a new Facebook group called The Cake Slice Bakers and Friends. This group is perfect for those who do not have a blog but want to join in the fun and bake through this book.





It is a new year and a new book - Zoë Bakes Cakes - and our choices for October 2022 were ~


Apple Cake with Honey Bourbon Glaze

Pumpkin-Mocha Swirl Bundt Cake

Hot Chocolate Cake

Comments

  1. KarenOctober 20, 2022 at 10:55 AM

    Aren't homemade marshmallows a revelation? The first time I made them I felt so fabulous! Your cake looks amazing.

    ReplyDelete
  2. SusanBOctober 20, 2022 at 2:22 PM

    That looks wonderful. I'm going to have to try those homemade marshmallows!

    ReplyDelete

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Strawberry-Rhubarb Rouleau with Lemon Buttercream

Image
I had a hard time choosing my cake this month. I felt like I should bake the Apple Cake as our apple tree was full of fruit waiting to be used, but nothing speaks to me quite like a rhubarb dessert. Then I went to the grocery story. Strawberries were on sale, and right next to them was a huge stack of rhubarb. Rhubarb is hard to find where I live. Rarely does anyone have it at the farmer's market, and there's only one store I've ever successfully bought it at, and that's always been in June. So to find such an abundance in early August - it was a sign.   This recipe provides instructions for either a layer cake or a roll (think Yule log or pumpkin roll). I opted to make the layer cake. The recipe as written produces an extra layer which I didn't want, so I halved the ingredients. The Genoese layer gets cut in half, filled with a strawberry-rhubarb compote and frosted with lemon buttercream. In general, I found the recipe easy to follow, though both the compote and b
Read more

Breton Butter Almond Cake #CakeSliceBakers

Image
The Breton Butter Almond Cake recipe is an easy-to-make recipe that uses ingredients that I generally have on hand, making it convenient for anytime I need a simple dessert. It's described as being similar to shortbread which it definitely is, but with a more complicated taste and less crumbly texture.    The cake is flavored with a little bit of rum and vanilla, and I found that made a great platform for a variety of embellishments - whipped cream, berries, strawberry jam, and lemon curd are all ones we tried at home. But it was also tasty without anything added to it, and most importantly for me, it made a great grab and go breakfast the next morning! One note about the recipe, it says to pour the batter into your tart pan, but my batter was thick - more like cookie dough than cake batter, so I had scoop it in and then smooth with a rubber spatula. I was worried I had made a mistake, but if I did, it didn't seem to affect the taste or texture. Each month The Cake Slic
Read more

Raspberry Clafoutis #CakeSliceBakers

Image
This month I decided to make the Raspberry Clafoutis in part because the raspberries available locally have been amazing this month. This is a dessert more traditionally made with cherries, but the author opts for raspberries, and I agree that they did add a lovely counterpoint to the sweet cake. The family all loved this cake. My chocolate-loving and preferring daughter declared it her new favorite and said this was what she wants for her birthday cake from now on. I did manage to save a small piece to eat for breakfast the next morning. While it was better warm from the oven, it was still quite tasty as a cold breakfast. Blackberries are now in season at our local PYO farm, so I foresee a blackberry clafoutis on this weekend's menu.  Each month The Cake Slice Bakers are offered a selection of cakes from the current book we are baking through. This year it is  Gâteau: The Surprising Simplicity of French Cakes  by Aleksandra Crapanzano. We each choose one cake to bake, and t
Read more