Mocha Bundt Cake

Guys, I had a WEEKEND. I’m sitting in Duxbury now, but it has been a journey to get this far.

On Friday night, Molly and I drove up to Vermont for our annual college mini-reunion trip, which this year turned into a girls’ trip with me, Molly, and Marj. We arrived at the AirBnB, after driving through some pretty harrowing wind/snow conditions, at around midnight. We then proceeded to unload the car and go into the house.

Five minutes later, Molly saw some motion out of the corner of her eye, and there was a crash. She then beckoned me over to the window, saying a tree just fell on my car. I thought she was kidding.

You see, this trip has had weirdly similar experiences in the past. A couple of years ago, we parked our rental car outside of the garage in Utah, went inside, and heard a crash. That was the sound of ice sliding off the roof and caving in the windshield.

So on Friday night, I thought Molly was messing with me. She was not.

It was a very large tree, and it had very much fallen onto my car. So our weekend of hiking and doing literally anything which we wanted to drive to was pretty much out.

Now, the management company says they are going to handle this. But come Sunday, a tree was still pinning my car to the driveway. Fortunately, I have a wonderful saint of a mother, who drove up to rescue us. I’ll keep you all updated on whether Boo (my car) will also be rescued in the coming week.

Despite Boo’s headache, we did find time to bake this weekend, of course. I asked Marj to pick a recipe with the direction “some kind of cake that’s not already on my blog.” She delivered. She found the Chocolate Sour Cream Cake with Chocolate Chips from Magnolia Bakery, and brought some of the ingredients we’d need for that, and then in the moment we made some adjustments (which I never do) based on what we had on hand. The result? Perfect dessert, but also really good breakfast cake.

First, in a medium bowl, whisk together the flour and baking powder. Set aside.

In a small bowl, combine the Raaka chocolate and cocoa powder/espresso mix. Pour the hot coffee over the mixture, and stir until chocolate melts and is smooth.

In a large bowl, beat the butter, brown sugar and granulated sugar until light and fluffy.

Add the eggs and vanilla and beat to combine.

Add the flour in a couple of additions, beating after each one to incorporate.

Then, add the sour cream and beat until smooth and creamy.

Add the melted chocolate mixture in a couple of additions, again scraping down the sides as needed to fully incorporate.

Stir in the chopped chocolate pastilles by hand.

Grease a bundt pan with butter and flour. We only used butter (as demonstrated by Marj), and that became a mistake when it came time to flip the cake. Fill the greased pan with the batter.

Bake at 325°F for 70 to 80 minutes, until a toothpick comes out mostly clean.

Allow to cool briefly before flipping out of pan to cool completely. Hopefully you have more success than this:

I did, however, get some pictures where the Frankenstein effect was a little less pronounced:

But then Marj, saving the day, whipped up some frosting for the top, and my cake became presentable:

Store covered at room temperature. Eat with milk, coffee, or whatever beverage you think deserves a bundt cake.

Enjoy!

Mocha Bundt Cake

Ingredients:

• 3 cups + 2 tablespoons flour
• 3/4 teaspoon baking powder
• 3 ounces 68% Raaka chocolate
• 1 1/2 tablespoons 1:1 cocoa/espresso powder mix
• 1 cup hot coffee
• 3/4 cup salted butter, softened
• 1 box light brown sugar
• 1/4 cup granulated sugar
• 2 eggs
• 1 1/2 teaspoons vanilla extract
• 3/4 cup sour cream
• 1 cup broken chocolate pastilles

Directions:

1. In a medium bowl, whisk together flour and baking powder. Set aside.
2. In a small bowl, mix together Raaka chocolate and cocoa/espresso powder mix. Pour hot coffee over mixture and stir until melted. If it’s not melting, microwave for 20 seconds at a time at 50% power until smooth. Set aside.
3. In a large bowl, beat the butter, brown sugar, and granulated sugar on medium speed until light and fluffy.
4. Add the eggs and vanilla extract and beat to combine.
5. Add the dry ingredients in a couple additions, beating after each addition.
6. Add the sour cream and beat until smooth.
7. Add the melted chocolate in a couple of additions and beat until smooth.
8. Stir in the broken chocolate pieces.
9. Spoon dough into a greased Bundt pan. Bake at 325°F for 70 to 80 minutes, until a toothpick comes out mostly clean. Remove from oven and allow to cool in pan before flipping onto a wire rack to cool completely.
10. Frost if you want!