Death By Chocolate Cake

No ordinary chocolate cake…this cake is the ultimate in rich, decadent, over-the-top chocolatey goodness!

In my mind, chocolate cake is sort of the little black dress of the dessert world. Everyone has to have at least one recipe (most of us have several), it goes with everything and it never goes out of style.

I’ve got chocolate cake recipes of every shape, size and variety. Two-layer, three-layer, bundt, sponge, German chocolate, devil’s food…you name it. Most of the time, I make a pretty basic chocolate cake with vanilla frosting, but for special occasions I like to break out something a little more complex. This is that recipe.

It’s rich. I mean, like crazy rich. And fudgy, and decadent. It’s the kind of cake that you think “oh, I couldn’t possibly finish that slice!”, and then you find yourself not only finishing the slice, but wondering if your stomach will revolt if you eat another one. It’s just over the top.

When I was a teenager back in the 80’s, a restaurant called Bennigan’s served a dessert called “death by chocolate” that was the same idea…if memory serves, it was this really rich, ultra chocolate cake filled with some kind of mousse and doused in a chocolate ganache.

This cake is inspired by my memories of that dessert that I would share with friends. It’s a moist, chocolate cake with chocolate chunks, filled and topped with chocolate mousse and finished with a chocolate mirror glaze.

Did I mention it’s rich?

Death by Chocolate Cake

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Prep Time 4 hours hrs

Cook Time 45 minutes mins

Course Dessert

Servings 12

Ingredients

  

Cake Ingredients

• 1 cup brown butter
• 3 eggs
• 1 1/2 cup dark brown sugar
• 1 1/4 cup coffee
• 1/4 cup bourbon
• 1/2 cup sour cream
• 1 T vanilla
• 1 1/2 cup all-purpose flour
• 1 cup dutch cocoa
• 1 t salt
• 1 1/2 t baking soda
• 1/2 t baking powder
• 4 ounces dark chocolate chopped

Mousse Ingredients

• 6 egg yolks
• 1/8 cup sugar
• 1 tablespoon vanilla extract
• 1 1/3 cups whipping cream
• 15 ounces dark chocolate chopped

Mirror Glaze Ingredients

• 2 1/2 tablespoons water
• 4 teaspoons powdered gelatin
• 2/3 cup water
• 2/3 cup whipping cream
• 1 cup unsweetened dutch cocoa powder, sifted
• 1 cup + 2 tablespoons white sugar superfine

Instructions

 

• Preheat the oven to 325 degrees. Grease and flour three 8” baking pans (alternatively line with parchment, making sure to grease the sides of the pans).
• Start by browning the butter. In a medium sauce pan, melt butter over low heat, stirring frequently. The butter will eventually begin to foam. Once the foam subsides, continue to stir until specks of brown begin to form in the butter, and the butter begins to smell slightly nutty. Remove from heat and set aside.
• In the bowl of a stand mixer, beat the eggs and the brown sugar for 3-4 minutes until thick (alternatively use a large mixing bowl and electric beaters). Add in the coffee, bourbon and sour cream and mix until thoroughly combined. Add in the browned butter and vanilla, mixing well.
• Sift in the flour, cocoa powder, salt, baking soda and baking powder. Mix until just combined. Fold in the chopped chocolate.
• Transfer batter evenly between the three pans. Bake at 325 degrees for 30-35 minutes or until cake tester comes out clean. Cool in pans on wire rack for 10 minutes, then turn out and cool completely.
• To make the mousse, combine the egg yolks, sugar and vanilla in a large saucepan. Mix in half of the whipping cream. Heat over low heat, stirring until mixture just begins to bubble around the edges. Add in chopped chocolate and mix until incorporated. Set aside.
• Whip remaining cream to soft peaks. Fold in chocolate mixture until well combined. Cover tightly with plastic wrap and set in the fridge to chill for at least two hours.
• To make the glaze, bloom the gelatin in a small bowl by sprinkling on top of the four teaspoons of water. Set aside for five minutes so gelatin can hydrate.
• In a small saucepan, whisk together the cocoa and the 2/3 cup water until it forms a thick paste. Add a bit of the cream, a tablespoon or so, if needed. Add in the remaining cream and the sugar and mix gently with a rubber spatula to combine. Bring to a boil over medium heat.
• Once the mixture boils, remove from heat and add in the gelatin, mixing gently. Strain mixture into a shallow bowl and cover with plastic wrap, making sure the wrap in placed directly onto the surface of the mixture. Set aside for approximately two hours until mixture has cooled to 90 degrees.
• To assemble, spread mousse between layers of cake. Frost top and sides of cake with mousse, smoothing out as much as possible so mirror glaze will have a flat, even surface.
• Once mirror glaze has cooled, strain into a jar or container with a spout. Set cake on wire rack over a lipped baking sheet, and pour the glaze over the top, using a continuous motion and making sure to get the edges. Once the cake has been covered, transfer back to your serving platter using a cake lifter or two off-set spatulas.

Notes

Notes – Glaze from recipetineats.com