Om's Chocolate Cake

I believe it was my brother who gave this cake it's name. Our mom made this cake for birthdays and occasionally other special occasions when we were kids. Under all other circumstances we called our mom, "mom", but when referencing this cake, it's not "mom's chocolate cake", it's "om's chocolate cake". It's pretty much the best cake ever, though I suppose I'm rather biased on this topic.

My mom's recipe is actually a photocopy of a recipe from a old Sunset Magazine, with a few hand-written modifications.

The original recipe is titled Almond Fudge Torte, and says it serves about 10 people.

Om's Chocolate Cake

2 tsp Fresh Brewed Coffee

4 oz. Bittersweet Chocolate

3 Large Eggs

1/2 cup (1 stick) Unsalted Butter

3/4 cup Sugar

2 oz. Almond Paste

1/2 cup Flour

My mom always used Ghirardelli Extra Bittersweet Baking Chocolate, I ended up using a combination of Scharffen Berger 99% chocolate and Guittard semisweet chocolate chips. This cake is all about intense chocolateliness, I say the higher concentration of cacao, the better!

Preheat the oven to 350F. Melt the chocolate in a double boiler, and make some coffee. When the chocolate is melted, mix 2 Tbsp of coffee into the chocolate.

While chocolate is melting and coffee is brewing, cream together the butter and sugar. Make sure the butter is at room temperature first, it'll make your life a lot easier. If your butter is cold, you can cut it up into many pieces so it will warm up quickly.

Add almond paste to the creamed butter and sugar...

Separate the eggs - whites in a new mixing bowl, yolks in with the butter-sugar-almond paste.

Add the coffee-chocolate to the butter-sugar-almond paste-egg yolk. Also add the flour and thoroughly mix.

Beat the egg whites to stiff peaks.

Shout out to my trusty vintage Hobart-Kitchen Aid mixer and egg beater that I inherited from my mom when she moved back east to be near the grand kids, et al.

Fold the egg whites into all the other stuff in three parts, being careful not to over mix.

 Butter an 8-inch cake pan and dust it with cocoa powder.

Pour the batter into the pan...

Bake at 350F for 30min. Do not overbake! This cake is better underdone than overdone!

Let cool on a rack for about 10 minutes.

Tap out of the pan onto the rack once it's cool enough to touch and let it continue to cool completely before making the chocolate glaze.

Chocolate Glaze

2 Tbsp Unsalted Butter

4 oz. Bittersweet Chocolate

Once the cake is cool, melt the chocolate with the butter on a double boiler. Mix the butter and chocolate together thoroughly. Once fully melted, remove the buttery chocolate from the heat and allow it to cool, stirring occasionally. Let it cool until it's thick and almost solid. Position a chinoise, cheesecloth, or any other fine mesh over the cake and pour the chocolate glaze through it. Keep the cake on the cooling rack for this and put something under it to catch drips. It helps to have a second person help you with this.

Use a spatula to evenly spread the glaze over the cake and down the sides. Then get busy eating all the chocolate off the spatula, strainer, bowls, and anywhere else it might have splattered! I have many fond childhood memories of "helping" my mom clean up from making this cake. 

Allow the glaze to fully harden before serving. This can take several hours at room temperature, or roughly 30 minutes in the fridge. Once the glaze is solid, it's ready to be served, or adorned with additional decorations. 

I made this cake after getting some totally unexpected, incredibly bad news. I was craving a serious cooking project and some serious comfort food. Also I felt the need to express my frustration with several horrible things that have happened to my close friends this year. Also lots of pink edible sparkles. Because everything is better with sparkles. Let's all love each other and live awesome lives no matter what. And if we eat enough cake, we just might poop sparkles.