This month’s recipe started out as
a recipe that my mother and grandmother made for me as a child.
It is a chocolate mayonnaise cake. This is the cake I got on all
of my birthdays and or special events. What you are going to get
from this is how to begin with a basic recipe and re-work it to
make the recipe fit your needs.
The basic recipe is:
2 cups flour
1 cup sugar
1 cup mayonnaise
1 cup boiling water
½ cup cocoa powder
2 tsp baking soda
This is the recipe I grew up with. Now,
one of my responsibilities at Clabber Girl as Chef is to develop
new recipes with our Baking Mix. So, looking at the ingredients
in the original recipe, I thought I could substitute our Baking
Mix for the flour and the baking soda keeping everything else
the same. Well, after making it I thought that it had the same
flavor and was lighter in texture but was too crumbly and would
not cut correctly. Back to the drawing board - what did it need?
After discussing it with our Food Scientist Nita Livvix, we determined
that it needed more fat to hold it together, so we increased the
mayonnaise by a half a cup. Now we have a chocolate mayonnaise
cake made with the Clabber Girl Baking Mix.
After making this with the Baking Mix, Nita asked
if it could be made with cream cheese in place of mayonnaise.
Again we are back to the test kitchen. We substituted 8oz. of
cream cheese for the 1 ½ cups of mayonnaise. The cake was
lacking the same chocolate flavor that I had grown up with. I
didn’t want to add more cocoa powder because then it would
start to taste chalky and might be too dry. Knowing that coffee
can bring out the flavor in chocolate I took away half of the
water and added ½ a cup of espresso in its place.
The result was cake that had its own flavor with a great texture
and was moist.
Here is the final recipe for what we are calling Chocolate Irish
Coffee Cake. The process for all of the recipes is the same but
what I hope you get from this is the confidence to make a recipe
your and to not be afraid to try out something new. Good Luck
and have fun in the Kitchen.
Chocolate
Irish Coffee Cake Printable Recipe
Makes 1 – 9inch cake
2 cups Clabber Girl Baking Mix
1 cup Sugar
½ cup Cocoa Powder
½ cup Boiling Water
½ cup Espresso or Strong Coffee
8 ounces Cream Cheese
In a microwave soften the cream cheese for 30-45
seconds
In a mixing bowl combine the Baking Mix, sugar and the Cocoa Powder.
Add the boiling water and mix thoroughly Add the espresso and
the melted cream cheese and mix well
Pour batter into a greased 9 inch cake pan and bake at 350 for
approximately 20 minutes or until a tooth pick comes out clean
when inserted.
Irish
Cream Cheese Frosting
8 ounces Cream Cheese (room temperature)
6 tbsp Butter (room temperature)
2 ½ cups Powdered Sugar
1 tsp Vanilla Extract
3 tbsp Irish Cream
Cream together cream cheese and butter in a mixer
on high with the whip attachment
Add vanilla. Turn down mixer to low and slowly add the powdered
sugar and mix until incorporated. Turn back up to medium and slowly
add the Irish cream.
Chill about 1 hour, until mixture firms up slightly.
Frost cake.
Entertaining with Chef Eddie 
