Chocolate caramel cake with sea salt

This was a special cake for a special day.  Darling Husband just celebrated his birthday.   Our birthdays are both close to the mad rush of the holidays, so it sometimes seems that they get lost in the shuffle.  Best way to deal with that? Make a chocolate cake for two!

Simply Desserts is a bakery in Seattle that I think serves some of the best cake in town.  We had the red velvet for my birthday and Darling Husband loves their chocolate caramel cake.  When I saw a recipe for a chocolate caramel cake in Bon Appetit a few months ago I marked it right away.  This would be the cake I would lovingly bake for him!  Best Wife Ever!  

The cake was good.  Okay, probably better than good.  This was the first cake I ever made with mayo.  I know people get weirded out by that, but mayo is just eggs and oil, essentials in a cake.  The combination of chocolate with sea salt is so delicious.  Darling Husband loved that the frosting wasn't too sweet (this guy!), so that might be a selling point for a lot of people.  For me, I love that rush of sugar in a classic buttercream.  I think this cake deserves that buttercream.  It's the right thing to do.  

The bakery version of this cake has a really nice caramel filling. This recipe only has caramel in the frosting, and it's combined with chocolate.  I sort of missed that extra boost of caramel, but that might be a good addition to the buttercream frosting I mentioned.

Chocolate Caramel cake with Sea Salt

from Bon Appetit

Cake:

2 and 1/4 cup all purpose flour

3/4 cup unsweetened cocoa powder

1 and 3/4 teaspoon baking powder

1/4 teaspoon baking soda

1/2 teaspoon kosher salt

3 eggs

1 and 1/2 cups sugar

1 and 1/4 cup mayonnaise (not low-fat)

1 Tablespoon vanilla

1 and 1/3 cups lukewarm water

Frosting:

12 oz bittersweet chocolate, chopped

3/4 cup sugar

1 Tablespoon corn syrup

1 cup heavy cream

1 and 1/2 cups unsalted butter, softened to room temperature

sea salt

Cake instructions:

Preheat oven to 325.  Coat cake pans with cooking spray, line bottoms with parchment paper, and then spray again. Whisk together flour, cocoa powder, baking powder, baking soda, and salt in a medium bowl.  Set aside.

With your mixer on high speed, beat together eggs and sugar until pale and doubled in volume, about 4 minutes.  Add mayo and vanilla and beat until just combined. With mixer on low speed, add dry ingredients in 3 additions, alternating with water in 2 additions, beginning and ending with dry ingredients.  Divide evenly among two 9 inch cake pans. (Original recipe called for three 8 inch pans, of which I only have one)

Bake cakes, rotating halfway through, until a toothpick comes out clean, about 25-30 minutes. Let cool for about 20 minutes in pan before turning out onto a wire rack.

Frosting instructions:

Put chopped chocolate in a medium bowl.  Bring sugar, corn syrup, and 1/4 cup water to a boil in a small saucepan over medium-high heat, stirring to dissolve sugar. Boil, swirling pan occasionally, brush down sides with a wet pastry brush as needed, 10-12 minutes.  Remove from heat and slowly whisk in cream, mixture will bubble. (my caramel started to harden at this point, once returned to heat, it smoothed out)  Return to medium heat and cook, stirring until smooth, about 2 minutes.  Pour caramel over chocolate and stir until mixture is smooth; stir occasionally, allowing to cool.

Once cool, using an electric mixer, on medium-high heat, beat chocolate mixture, gradually adding butter, until frosting is smooth and thickened.  Chill until stiff enough to spread, about 30 minutes. 

Place one cake layer on plate, spread with about 1 cup frosting and sprinkle with sea salt, about 1/4 teaspoon.  Place second layer on top and frost, covering top completely and down the sides.  Just before serving, sprinkle top layer with more sea salt.

This is definitely a cake you make for a special occasion.  It's really not complicated, but it yields impressive results.  I would recommend this cake to anyone looking for a solid chocolate cake recipe.  Try the frosting as is and see what you think. Oh yeah, if you've made resolutions to eat healthy, bookmark for later.

legs in photo are true-to-life.

Heartland Turtle Bars

These bars are not necessarily a good thing to eat during bikini-season.  They are full of butter and chocolate and caramel and more butter.  I may have been eating the oatmeal crumble by the spoonful.  Yep, that good.  I made these for our caramel-themed Bakin' Friends goodies last month.  They were so amazingly simple, yet so completely satisfying.     

My love for the bar cookie is strong.  Sometimes when you make cookies, you may be too impatient to roll out the dough, taking the time to bake sheet after sheet.  With a bar cookie, you toss it into a pan and wait by the oven.  I also appreciate how easy it is to just slice off "one more bite" from the pan.  Somehow I feel better about eating 20 little slices, compared with 20 little cookies. 

I love the way the chocolate and oatmeal crumble go together.  The caramel flavor is slight, but it is a nice complement.  All the ingredients are simple, you probably have them waiting for you in the cupboard.  I was so tempted to make another batch, just so I had one to keep and one to mail.  This is one of those recipes I know I will make time and time again, if only just to enjoy that crumbly oat topping!

Heartland Turtle Bars

from the Baked Explorations cookbook

Topping and Base:

1 and 1/2 cups all purpose flour

1/4 teaspoon salt

3/4 teaspoon baking soda

1 cup firmly packed brown sugar

1 and 3/4 cups rolled oats

1 cup unsalted butter, melted

1 cup chopped pecans

1 and 1/2 cups milk chocolate chips

Caramel Filling:

1/2 cup firmly packed brown sugar

10 Tablespoons unsalted butter, cut into cubes

2 Tablespoons heavy cream

Preheat oven to 350.  Prepare 9x13 baking pan with parchment paper, letting it hang over the sides. I always give my parchment paper a coat of cooking spray.  

Topping and Base:

In a medium bowl whisk together flour, salt, and baking soda.  Use your hands to rub in the brown sugar till combined.  Add the oats and stir.  Make a well in the center of the dry ingredients and add the melted butter, stirring until all ingredients are wet.  Spread about 2/3 of the mixture across the bottom of the pan, enough to cover the entire base, and bake for 10 minutes. Leave oven on, but remove pan to let oat mixture cool.  Once cool sprinkle with chocolate chips and pecans.

Caramel Filling:

In a medium saucepan, over medium-high heat, melt brown sugar and butter together.

Bring the mixture to a boil, stirring constantly for one minute

Remove pan from heat and stir in the cream.  Pour onto the chocolate and pecan layer.  Use a spatula to evenly spread the caramel.

Sprinkle the remaining oatmeal mixture on top and bake for 10 to 12 minutes, or until top is golden brown.  Let bars cool completely before serving.

Anyone who gets a taste of these bars will be grateful.  Make these for summer parties, toss into kids lunchboxes, eat the entire pan yourself, there's really no wrong way to enjoy them!

Salted Caramel and chocolate chip cookies

We have some new neighbors who just moved in across the street.  I decided to be super neighborly and bake them up some treats.  I always like trying out a new twist on a classic recipe.  I've been reading a lot about people adding a little cornstarch to their chocolate chip cookies.  The corn starch is supposed to create that nice chewy texture and produce a nice puffy cookie.  I tried this recipe two different ways.  With one, I chilled the dough, the other, straight to the baking sheet.

I honestly didn't notice any difference in either of the methods.  I did really like the texture though: nice chewy outside, soft middle.  Maybe I'll have to keep making them to perfect the recipe.  All in the name of research right? For fun I added in some caramel chips.  Oh, and a little sprinkle of sea salt on top.  Both add-ins are optional, but I think totally worth it.

 Salted Caramel and chocolate chip cookies

3/4 cup unsalted butter, softened

1 cup brown sugar

1/4 cup granulated sugar

1 egg

1 Tablespoon vanilla

2 cups all purpose flour

2 teaspoons cornstarch

1 teaspoon baking soda

1/2 teaspoon salt

1 cup milk chocolate chips

1 cup caramel chips

sea salt for sprinkling

Preheat oven to 350.  Line a baking sheet with parchment paper or a silpat.  Stir together flour, cornstarch, baking soda, and salt.  Set aside.

With a mixer cream butter and sugars together until light and fluffy, about 3 minutes.  Add egg and vanilla and mix completely, scraping the bowl as necessary.  Add pre-mixed dry ingredients and mix until just combined.  Stir in chocolate and caramel chips.

Using a medium cookie scoop, or a tablespoon, drop rounded balls of dough on prepared cookie sheet.  Sprinkle dough with sea salt.

Bake for 8-10 minutes.  Tops will still appear light and slightly undone.  Do not bake longer than 10 minutes.  9 minutes was perfect in my oven.  Allow to cool on baking sheet for about 5 minutes and then transfer to rack to cool completely.  Yum!

It's fun to put little twists on cookie recipes. Luckily, this didn't turn out to be a negative experiment. I would definitely make this recipe again.  Would be fun to try this with other fun candies or mix-ins.  Like I said, I'm willing to keep trying...it's the least I can do for you.