I hadn’t baked anything in quite a while. I was craving a cake and Sam was craving chocolate. This was the result! A mash up of all things delicious – Chocolate Caramel Honeycomb Cake!
Chocolate Caramel Honeycomb Cake
Ingredients:
For the cake:
¾ cups of Guinness
¼ cup of strong black coffee
250 grams of unsalted butter
¾ cup of unsweetened cocoa powder
2 cups of all purpose flour
2 cups of sugar
½ tablespoon of baking soda
¾ teaspoons salt
2 large eggs
2 teaspoons of vanilla extract
⅔ cup of sour cream
For the Caramel Buttercream:
300 grams of butter, softened
400 grams of soft caramel (homemade or store bought)
pinch of sea salt
For the chocolate ganache:
1 cup of whipping cream
230 grams of dark chocolate, chopped
For an additional topping:
50 grams crushed chocolate honeycomb candy (I used a Crunchie bar and ran it through the food processor)
sea salt
Instructions:
Preheat the oven to 350F/180C and grease two cake pans.
In a large saucepan heat your Guinness, coffee and butter together until the mixture comes to a gentle simmer. Then add your cocoa powder while whisking continuously. Set aside to cool to room temperature.
Blend flour, sugar, baking soda, and salt in a different bowl.
Mix eggs, vanilla and sour cream in another bowl until throughly combined.
Now check on your chocolate mixture and make sure it’s cool. If it isn’t and you continue on, then you’re going to melt your cream and that would be a disaster.
Add the chocolate mixture to the egg/cream mixture and blend them together. Then add the flour mixture a little bit at a time and beat on low speed until combined. Divide batter equally among the pans.
Bake cakes in the preheated oven for about 35 minutes.
Remove the cakes from the oven and set aside to cool.
Make salted caramel buttercream by whipping the butter until it’s light and fluffy and then fold in the caramel. Finish it off by stirring in a pinch of sea salt.
Frost the entire cake with your caramel buttercream. It doesn’t matter if you are a bit sloppy because this is just going to be your crumb coat. Then put the whole cake in the refrigerator for at least 30 minutes to chill.
While your cake is chilling, make your chocolate ganache. Add your chopped chocolate to a medium sized bowl. Pour your cream into a small saucepan and bring it to a boil. As soon as it is boiling, remove it from the heat and pour it over your chocolate. Let it set for 5 minutes. Then stir it all together until the chocolate is completely melted. Let the whole thing cool for about 30 minutes and then whip in your ganache until it is paler in colour and fluffy.
When the chocolate ganache is completely cooled (it’s important that it’s not even a little bit warm or else it will melt your caramel buttercream) frost your cake with it. Finish it off with your crushed honeycomb pieces and a sprinkle of sea salt.
Definitely worth the effort!
