The 2nd Best Thing I've Ever Put In My Mouth*

One night several years ago, my sister happened to call around dinner time and this is how the conversation went:

Her: Whatcha doin'?

Me: Making dinner. Can I call you back later though, because I'm right in the middle of things.

Her: Sure, but what are you making?

Me: Tacos!

Her: Really? Tacos? {pause} For... ONE?

Me (feigning insult): YES, "TACOS FOR ONE"! What are you saying? Single people aren't allowed to make themselves tacos? GOOD DAY, SIR! {click}

In her defense, I think my answer caught her off guard, not that I was cooking something for myself. She'll be the first to admit that I love cooking--whether or not Jeremy is here to cook for-- and that I'm even pretty good at it. Her momentary shock at the idea of "tacos for one" and my immediate cobra-like strike back response was classic.

Whether it's "tacos for one" or something more elaborate and challenging, I never need an excuse to cook for myself or my loved ones. When I find something I want to make, I do it as soon as possible, which is why it's out of character that for 2 years I've been looking for a reason to make a certain recipe. This straight forward, moderately simple-sounding recipe intrigued me so much that after I did online research and came up with my own adaptation using different versions of it, I kept even the idea of making it to myself.

This was something that demanded the perfect opportunity to bake. Luckily--and without her realizing it-- my sister came up with a dinner party theme (is it just our family that does this?) that fit the bill. She decided to have a "Goodbye Beijing, Hello London 2012" dinner party on the night of the Olympics closing ceremonies, featuring traditional London eats.

My contribution (in a nod to all the pubs I enjoyed in London), and the reason for this post, was to be the famed Chocolate Guinness Cake, otherwise known as The 2nd best thing I've ever put in my mouth*.


The view, if I were an Olympic high diver on my way towards the most delicious pool in the world.

This recipe is not difficult, so don't be intimidated by the number of steps I've broken it down into. As the name suggests, you can make this cake with Guinness or any stout of your choosing. As mentioned above, I did a lot of research because there are so many iterations of this recipe online. The chocolate stout cake recipe listed on Epicurious has 300 reviews alone, many with helpful tweaks and nearly all with strongly-worded advice to cut the recipe down by half unless you plan to serve it to an army; advice that I took to heart and we still had a bigger cake than anticipated. There are a handful of ways you can frost this cake, or you can dust it with powdered sugar and call it a day. I went with my go-to ganache, which is super easy.


The reason why you're licking your screen.


For some ingredients, I specified which brand I used, in case you're anything like my friend--and great cook--Scooter (of "Half-n-Falf" fame) who wants to make sure if she follows someone else's recipe exactly and it doesn't turn out, she can blame them. Just kidding, she doesn't really do that, but that woman likes me to get specific, so I'm doing the same thing for you to use as a recipe guide, not recipe law.

One final thing in this all-too-long preamble (I edited it down 3 times, I swear!): I realize that Scharffen Berger unsweetened cocoa powder is ridiculously expensive compared to what you'd usually have on hand. My grocery store had it marked down from $10 to less than $3, so because it's supposedly the best and because I'm not an idiot, I snapped it up immediately**. But that's just me.


Now calm down & get ahold of yourself (oh, please click that hotlink, you won't be sorry!) so you can get to baking!

The 2nd Best Thing I've Ever Put In My Mouth* Cake
If you're sharing this recipe with your mother, I suggest calling it "Chocolate Guinness Cake". It requires less awkward explanation, and you can trust me on that.

For the Cake:

• Three 9" pans or 1 bundt pan
  
• 1 cup stout (Young's Double Chocolate Stout); You'll need to pour closer to 2 cups FOAM INCLUDED from the bottle to the measuring cup to equal the 1 cup needed for this recipe.
  
• 1 cup (2 sticks) unsalted butter
  
• 3/4 cup unsweetened cocoa powder (Scharffen Berger natural unsweetened)
  
• 1/2 tsp cinnamon
• 2 cups CAKE flour (Swan's Down)
  
• 2 cups superfine sugar (Domino's)
  
• 1/2 Tablespoon baking soda
  
• 3/4 tsp salt
  
• 2 large eggs
  
• 3/4 cup sour cream (I used light sour cream, as kind of a joke, because have you read this recipe?)

For the Ganache:

• 2 cups heavy cream
  
• 1 tsp vanilla
• 18 oz. Semi-sweet chocolate chips (Guittard) Don't cheap out now! Use anything less than Nestle & you'll be sorry.

Note: If you bake this cake in a bundt pan, you can cut the ganache recipe down by one-third or in half since you won't have the layers to fill.

--

Cake instructions:

1. Preheat oven to 350°F. 
2. Butter three 8-inch round cake pans with 2-inch-high sides. Line with parchment paper. Butter paper. You may be tempted to forego the parchment paper and buttering, but DO IT ANYWAY. Alternately, you could probably use a non-stick spray on the pans and parchment, but you're in this far already.
3. Sprinkle about 1 Tablespoon of cocoa powder (totally separate from what recipe calls for) in each pan, and shake around to coat buttered pan & parchment with a thin layer of cocoa. Tap out any extra. Set pans aside. The butter will help ensure this notoriously sticky batter doesn't stick, and the addition of cocoa powder dusting to the buttered coating helps the cakes release from the pans without breaking. I recommend doing this cocoa-powdering step over the sink or you'll have a big mess to deal with after you put the cakes in the oven, when you could instead be relaxing with your feet up while drinking the remaining chocolate stout out of a frosty mug.
4. Bring stout & butter to simmer in heavy saucepan over medium heat. Add cocoa powder and cinnamon; whisk until mixture is smooth. Remove from heat and cool slightly.
5. Whisk flour, sugar, baking soda, and salt in separate large bowl to blend.
   
6. Using electric mixer, beat eggs and sour cream in another large bowl to blend. Add stout-chocolate mixture to egg mixture and beat just to combine. Add flour mixture and beat briefly on slow speed. 
7. Using rubber spatula, fold batter until completely combined. 
8. Divide batter equally among 3 prepared pans, filling halfway or less. Do not fill more than that because this recipe will rise more than you think. 
9. Bake until tester inserted into center of cakes comes out clean, about 35 minutes. 
10. Transfer cake pans to rack; cool at least 30 minutes. 
11. Turn cakes out onto rack, remove parchment and cool completely.

Ganache instructions:

1. Put chocolate chips in pyrex bowl, set aside. Bring cream and vanilla up to a slow boil in saucepan, then remove from heat. 
2. Immediately pour over chocolate chips and let sit for 5 minutes. 
3. Whisk until smooth. 
4. Refrigerate for up to an hour (or however long you can stand it), then whip for 2-5 minutes with hand mixer.
5. Place 1 cake layer on plate. Spread 1/4 of ganache over. Repeat with 2nd cake layer. Top with third cake layer, spreading remaining 1/2 of ganache over top & sides of entire cake. 
6. Optional: In addition to the ganache, add raspberries, strawberries, blackberries or maybe even snozzberries in between each layer and on the top.

--

After that, you should:

1. Serve immediately or refrigerate until serving
   
2. Unleash the motherf**king moonwalk!

--


*I know what you thought after reading that title, but you should give me a little more credit than that and get your mind out of the gutter. The first best thing I ever put in my mouth was THIS, though I realize you know me well enough to not be surprised at all if I said that I wish it was THIS. Drool.

**Come this winter, I'll use it in a 3:1 ratio with sugar to make Spammon's recipe for crazy-good hot cocoa, which along with one song in particular are nearly the only things that got me through the endless snowstorms of last winter.