Marble Cake Buttercake Bakery by frick

[BakerAunt]

Marble Cake Buttercake Bakery
Submitted by frick on September 07, 2011 at 6:28 pm

An intensely rich, deeply chocolate butter cake, with an almost cream cheese flavor if using premium bittersweet chocolate.

Yield: 16 slices
Source: Los Angeles Times; Buttercake Bakery

2 ½ cups sugar divided (1/2 cup for syrup; 2 cups for cake)
½ cup unsweetened cocoa powder **See Note below
¼ cup light corn syrup
2 ½ tsp vanilla extract, divided (1/2 tsp for syrup; 2 tsp for cake)
2 2/3 cups all purpose flour (no high protein flour here))
2 teaspoons baking powder
½ teaspoon salt
1 cup butter (8 ounces, 2 sticks), at room temp
4 eggs; at room temp
1 cup milk; at room temp
1 cup chocolate chips ** See Note below

This recipe, with its combination of chocolates, is a sum far greater than the parts. Serendipity as it were.

My son and DH thrive on chocolate and I had bought some Premium chips I wanted to try. The combination of the Ghirardelli 60% Cacao Bittersweet chocolate chips and the other ingredients resulted in a flavor as if there were cream cheese in the recipe. This marble cake from the Buttercake Bakery, had received raves in the LA Times and I had the 12-cup bundt pan it requires so that was this morning's project.
Since the recipe has already been published in the newspaper, I feel free to leave it here to make you drool, or bake . . .I have a couple of special notes on the chocolate, as well as thoughts on the sticking problem (entirely my fault). So here goes: If you don’t have a 12 cup bundt pan, use two loaf pans, checking them to approximate 6 cups each. Most of the cake comes out dark chocolate. Don’t know where the vanilla part went. . . . . It’s VERY rich and will probably replace all the chocolate cakes in my life forever and ever.

Total Time 1 ½ hours
Servings: 12-16
Adapted from the Buttercake Bakery

1. In a small saucepan, whisk together ½ cup of the sugar, the cocoa, corn syrup and ½ cup hot water. Bring just to a simmer, stirring to prevent cocoa or syrup from sticking to bottom of pan. Remove from heat and set aside to cool. When cool, add ½ tsp. vanilla. (I put mine in the frig to hasten cooling).

2. Preheat the oven to 350 F. Butter and lightly flour a 12 cup bundt pan. The newer 10 cup pans are too small.

3. Combine the flour, baking powder and salt in a medium bowl and set aside. In a large mixer bowl, cream butter with 2 cups sugar until light and fluffy. Add the eggs one at a time and mix in well. Add vanilla.

4. Gently mix in the flour in three parts alternating with the milk in 2 parts until the batter is light and smooth. Stir in chocolate chips.

5. Divide the batter into three parts. Stir the cooled (not chilled) chocolate syrup into 1/3 of the batter. Pour 1 part vanilla batter into bundt pan, following with chocolate batter and ending with last part vanilla batter. Gently swirl through all three layers with a knife to marbleize the cake.

6. Place in oven and bake about 1 hour, until a toothpick inserted in the center comes out clean, and when the cake springs back lightly when touched. (The toothpick may encounter a melted chocolate chip, so I removed the cake when it barely began to pull away from the sides of the pan)

7. Cool the cake on a wire rack and invert onto a serving plate. Dust the top lightly with powdered sugar.

**Note # 1. I put 1 tablespoon KA’s Black Cocoa in the measuring cup before filling it with generic cocoa (I have Hershey’s mixed with a can of Kroger cocoa).

**Note # 2. I feel a lot of the amazing flavor of the cake comes from the chocolate chips I used. -- Ghirardelli Premium 60% Cacao Bittersweet Chocolate Chips. Frankly, I’m going to buy these from now own. They are amazing and don’t cost a whole lot more than regular ones. They are a little larger and flatter; really cool shape. They are available in 1 pound packages at a good price at Smart & Final if you live in CA, NV or AZ.

A Baking Note: I used my outdoor convection oven, which browns the top too much, set at 325 F. I believe the release problem came from the hot air not properly circulating on the bottom of the cake pan. I also didn’t read the directions well enough, which said to let the cake cool in the pan. I’m used to cooling a cake 10 minutes and then removing it. So I blew it here. Maybe if the cake had cooled in the pan completely, it would have come out in one piece.

Please make this cake and let me know how it comes out. BTW, I always look at the time requirement for a cake with great suspicion. I have NEVER put together a cake in 1/2 an hour except from a box. Even letting that syrup cool took more than 1/2 an hour. Gimme a break!

comments

Submitted by C.J.Giff on Wed, 2012-01-25 16:11.
Made this cake, it is all you say it is I did make a few changes. I did not have a large Bundt Pan used two spring-form Pans. (1)7" & (1) 9" filled each pan 3/4 full. Baked the 7" for about 35 min. until the sides pulled away. The 9" took some 80 min. to cook. Let each cake cool for about 20 min. in the pan then removed to a plate no problem in removing the cakes. For the Cocoa I used 1&1/2 tabs of black cocoa & 3&1/2 tabs. of double-dutch dark cocoa. For the 1 cup of chips I used some Ghiradelli 86% chocolate and some Bittersweet. For a topping I made a Chocolate Ganache Glaze. Served with 3 tabs. of cooked Tapioca Pudding on top. Man, oh man, this is the best. Has anybody had any luck in freezing this type cake?

Submitted by frick on Sat, 2012-02-04 18:58.
I am going to have to mess with that recipe to make it more reliable for getting out of the pan, but it does taste good! The next time I make it, I am going to hold back 1 or two tablespoons of water from the syrup and add 1-2 more Tbsp. of cocoa to get a thicker syrup. Then, the chocolate part of the batter won't thin out so much and will stay suspended better. That way, I hope the vanilla layer stays where it should and sticking won't be such an issue.

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