After weeks of pound cakes, I had had enough of vanilla-flavored desserts. I was in the mood for chocolate! And I wanted to make a chocolate cake, which I had never done before. I wanted something rich and intensely chocolatey. I had 6 ounces of unsweetened chocolate, 4 ounces of sweet and sour chocolate and cocoa. (Fun fact: So far, about 10% of the words in this blog post are “chocolate.”) My dairy options were also limited.
Chocolate Mousse Pie is exactly what I was in the mood, but it didn’t fit my ingredient limitations. (I’m stubborn on extra trips to the grocery store.) I had to settle for Chocolate Cream Pie.
Chocolate cream cake is just pudding in a cake crust. I was starting to get disappointed that I wasn’t going to end up with a dessert as rich as I had originally intended.
I shouldn’t have worried. This chocolate cake was very rich, chocolate and delicious. See how well I’ve spread the filling on the cake peel here? Okay, now look at the edges, and you can see where I took a spoon around the edge of the cake to pick up some filling. Just to try, you know? I had to make sure it was edible. I needed several tablespoons to really make sure.
Oh, it was edible all right. Topped with whipped cream and sprinkled with cocoa, this definitely satisfied my chocolate craving.
Chocolate cream cake (adapted from epicurious.com and Cooks Illustrated
)
8 to 10 servings
Epicurious note: The cake (without topping) can be cooled up to 1 day. Bridget’s note
: I made the cake on Friday and finished it on Tuesday, and I didn’t notice any loss of quality over time. I covered each piece with whipped cream while serving instead of spreading it over the cake. Also, I used 4 ounces of semisweet chocolate and 3 ounces of unsweetened chocolate, plus 2 teaspoons of extra sugar.
Chocolate
cookie crumb crust 16 Oreo cookies (with filling), broken into rough pieces, about 21
/2 cups 2 tablespoons unsalted butter, melted and cooled Chocolate cream filling 2/3 cup sugar 1/4
cup cornstarch 1/2 teaspoon salt 4 large egg yolks 3 cups whole milk 5 oz fine-quality sweet and sour chocolate (not unsweetened), melted 2 oz unsweetened chocolate, melted 2 tablespoons unsalted butter, smoothed
1 teaspoon vanilla
Whipped cream Coating 1 cup heavy cream (cold) 1 tablespoon granulated sugar 1/2 teaspoon vanilla extract 1
. For crust: Set the oven rack to the middle position and heat the oven to 350 degrees. In a food processor bowl equipped with a steel blade, process the cookies with 15 one-second pulses, then let the machine run until the crumbs are evenly fine, about 15 seconds. (Alternatively, place the cookies in a large zippered plastic bag and crush with a rolling pin.) Transfer the crumbs to the medium bowl, drizzle with butter, and use your fingers to combine until the butter is evenly distributed.
2. Pour the crumbs into a 9-inch Pyrex cake dish. Following the illustration below, press the crumbs evenly on the bottom, rising sides of the cake plate. Refrigerate the lined cake dish 20 minutes for firm crumbs, then bake until the crumbs are fragrant and curdled, about 10 minutes. Cool on a rack while preparing the filling.
3. For the filling: Whisk the sugar, cornstarch, salt and yolks in a heavy 3-quart saucepan until well combined, then add the milk in a jet, whisking. Bring to a boil over moderate heat, beat, then reduce heat and simmer, beat, 1 minute (the filling will be thick).
4. Force filling through a fine mesh sieve in a bowl, then whisk the chocolates, butter and vanilla. Cover the filling surface with plastic wrap and cool completely, about 2 hours.
5. Fill the spoon on the crust and cool the cake, lightly covered, at least 6 hours.
6. For topping: Just before serving, whisk the cream, sugar and vanilla in a bowl of stand-up mixer on low speed until small bubbles form, about 30 seconds. Increase speed to medium; Continue beating until the beaters leave a trail, about 30 seconds longer. Increase speed to high; Continue beating until the cream is soft, thick and nearly doubled in volume and forms soft peaks, about 20 seconds. Spread or pipe whipped cream on the cold cake filling. Cut the cake into segments and serve.
