This is my first try on a chocolate cake. I decided to make the process as easy and fast as possible. Naturally this leaves space for improvements here and there. Though I would argue that, while the process is very simplistic, the result is still pretty fancy. And of course delicious.

Note: If you are in need of a very, very sweet coffee cake you can check out this sweet coffee chocolate recipe

V4

Dough

Same as V3.

Cream

This time I try to make a pudding-butter cream:

• 1 pkg vanilla pudding powder
• 400g milk/coffee mix (20% less than stated on the pudding package in total)
• 60g sugar
• dash of salt
• 125g softened butter

Prepare the pudding, without adding sugar. Remember to reduce the liquid stated at the package by 20%. This time I used 300g oat milk and 100g fiter coffee. Next time Ill try to use 100g espresso.

Let the pudding cool down. Remove the skin in case some formed. In the meanwhile, let the butter soften. Mix the butter and the sugar, then add the cold pudding one tbsp at a time.

V3

Note: this recipe is fora half sized cake. The spring form I used is 18 cm in diagonal only. For normal sizes double the ingredients.

The cream in v2 was too intense for my taste. I wanted to get more coffee flavor for this one.

Dough

• 150g cake flour
• 100g milk
• 100 filter coffee
• 40g cocoa powder
• 50g selfmade vanilla sugar
• 50g sugar
• 60g melted butter
• 4g salt
• 5g baking powder
• 1.5g baking soda
• 1 egg

Cream

• 1/2 pkg vanilla pudding powder

• 20g sugar

• 80g espresso

• 140g milk

• 125g soft butter

• 25g powdered sugar

• 2g salt

• 80g black currant jam

Instructions Dough

Mix all ingredients together and fill it in a buttered spring form. Note that the listed recipe is for a smaller sized spring form (mine in 18cm in diameter). Bake if at 180 degrees for about 35 to 40 minutes.

Instructions Cream

Mix the softened butter and powdered sugar and place them aside. Follow the instructions on the pudding powder package (using the other ingredients) and let the pudding cool down to room temperature. Do stir it from time to time to prevent skin forming. If it does form, let it cool down and then remove it before Mixing in the pudding into the butter.

Note: the black currant jame works amazingly well with this cream.

Next time…

The cream looks amazing and the aftertaste (coffee) is superb. However, I’m missing a kick or some texture at the first bite. Maybe adding finely chop chocolate or cocoa powder on top of it would help.

V2

In this version I tried to use less cocoa powder and oil instead of sugar for the dough. The result was still good, but inferior to the old version.

For the cream I tried to make a less sweet cream. The result was an amazing tasting pudding, though it was too intense for a cake topping. For this cream a different jam (apricot) might be the better choice than black currant. Though black currant is an amazing combination with coffee, the intense cocoa pudding taste did not complement well with it.

Dough

• 150g cake flour
• 100g milk
• 100 filter coffee
• 20g cocoa powder
• 50g selfmade vanilla sugar
• 50g sugar
• 60g neutral tasting oil
• 4g salt
• 50g baking powder
• 1.5g baking soda
• 1 egg

Cream

• 200g milk

• 100g espresso

• 20g sugar

• 20g powdered sugar

• 2g salt

• dash black pepper

• dash rum

• 50g butter

• 80g black currant jam

Instructions

The dough is the same as in v1. For the cream, make a pudding with all ingredients though stir in the butter after the pudding is done.

V1

Note: this recipe is for a normal sized cake. The newer ones are for half portioned ones.

Dough

• 300g cake flour
• 200g milk
• 200 filter coffee
• 80g cocoa powder
• 100g selfmade vanilla sugar
• 100g sugar
• 120g melted butter
• 8g salt
• 10g baking powder
• 3g baking soda
• 2 eggs

Cream

• 400g powdered sugar
• 50g cocoa powder
• 3g salt
• 85g butter
• 80g milk

Jam

About 100-150g apricot or red currant jam. You can variate what fruit you want, though I would highly recommend using a sour one. The acidity really helps to balance out the overall sweetness of the cate.

Instructions Dough

Start by making the coffee, so it has time to cool down a bit. In the meanwhile preheat the oven to 180 degrees. Mix the coffee with cold milk to cool it down before adding it to the other ingredients. Other than that, just weight the ingredients and mix it. No special steps taken.

Prepare a spring form by cutting a sheet of baking paper and placing it on the bottom of the form. Butter the sides of the spring form a bit. Then add the dough and spread it evenly. Let it bake af 180 degrees for about 30 minutes.

Once it’s done, get it out of the spring form and let it fully cool down before doing the next steps.

Instructions Cream

Mix the dry ingredients first. Add the butter and let it mix in. Afterward add the milk bit by bit.

Cut the cake in half and spread the jam between the lower and upper half. Afterward you can put the cake parts back together and spread the cream on the outside of the cake.

Let the cake rest in a cool space for a few hours before serving.

Tips

• The powdered sugar in the cream is not optional. I tried to blend granulated sugar to powdered, which seemed to work great. Though the difference was very noticeable in the end result.
• After cutting the cake in half it can be tricky to get the upper part of and back on without breaking. Using a pizza peel made this process super easy

Next Time…

The cake is pretty sweet. Potentially doubling the jam, spreading half of it on top of the cake before spreading the cream would be a good addition.