Legal German Chocolate Cake
Cakes, Desserts, Paleo
Chocolate cake was part of my childhood. It was present at every birthday celebration, every family event, it joined us for many happy Sunday afternoons, it came into school classrooms…
My 30th birthday request from Jared was a cake. Birthday cakes are big in my family but I haven’t had one since my friend Lauren made me raw cupcakes when I lived with her, so this year I really wanted to indulge in some good, clean and decadent birthday cake goodness. Living in a small town there’s nowhere to buy a clean cake (which is why I built a business doing it!) but this year we get the treat of my cousin Georgie living here too and I knew she’d bake up an extravaganza so we asked her if she’d do it and she created the most incredible cake!
She based it on a recipe of mine from the blog, and freestyled the filling and frosting/icing. I asked her for the recipes for those two and she gave me the ingredients and then said you just have to follow her lead and freestyle, so, I dare you.
CAKE INGREDIENTS
For one layer (we had 3 layers)
3/4 cups coconut oil
1 cups honey
4 medium/large eggs at room temp
3/4 cup cocoa
1 tsp vanilla
1 1/2 cups almond meal/flour
1 tbsp baking powder
1 tablespoon instant coffee (THIS is an organic fair-trade version)
Pinch pink salt
DIRECTIONS
Preheat your oven to 350F, and line your pans with parchment paper.
Place the oil and honey in a bowl and beat together. Add one of eggs and vanilla and beat them in until the mixture is smooth again, then add the remaining eggs and beat them in.
Mix all the dry ingredients together in a second bowl and fold them into the wet mix until combined. If you’ve multiplied the batter, split it between your lined pans and place in the preheated oven for 30 mins. Check them at 25 minutes, depending on your oven they might be done, you don’t want them overcooked. You’re looking for them to feel springy to the touch and to have a skewer come out clean (or almost clean). When they are cooked, remove them from the pans and cool on wire racks.
When the cake has fully cooled you are ready to frost it!
MOCHA CREAM FILLING
enough for two thick cream layers between cake layers
2 cans of coconut cream (refrigerated overnight)
Some more instant coffee powder
Cocoa powder
Honey/maple to taste.
DIRECTIONS
Remove the coconut cream cans from the fridge and carefully open them. Scoop out the solid white part and save the water for a smoothie. Using a stand mixer or electric whisk beat the cream until it’s about doubled in size and forms a good peak. Whisk in a little cocoa, a tiny bit of coffee powder ‘dissolved in a dash of water’ (Georgie’s words!), and just enough honey/maple to make it sweet to taste – coconut cream has natural sweetness so you won’t need much. Then cover and refrigerate the whipped cream overnight or at least 6 hours so it firms up before you spread it into the cake.
GANACHE
Cocoa
Honey
Coconut oil
Coconut cream
DIRECTIONS
This one you’re going to have to use creative genius for, but you just need a thin layer to coat the cake, there’s so much creamy goodness inside you don’t need a ton on the outside. I’d start with the thick part of a can of coconut cream as you did for the mocha cream. Scoop it out and set aside. Then mix together a raw chocolate in a pan over a very low heat of 3T warm softened coconut oil, and 2-3 tablespoons honey and 6T cocoa. Into that warm raw chocolate, stir the thick coconut cream until it’s smooth and well combined. The warmth of the chocolate should melt the coconut cream. Then place it back int the fridge until it’s firm enough to spread over the cake!
NB: This ganache section is my guess for you at how it would go with the ingredients Georgie used and eyeballed, but I’ll say, you can’t go wrong, if it’s too thin just pour it over, and if it gets too thick add honey/soft coconut oil to thin it down! Or you could just make my favourite raw chocolate, (or any other melted chocolate) and pour it over the whole thing and top it with nuts and berries!
