This week's cake for the Heavenly Cake Bakers to bake is the Chocolate Velvet Fudge Cake. Almost exactly a year ago to the day, I made this cake as part of a super awesome Volcano Cake for a close friend's daughter's 11th birthday. Click HERE to check it out!! So this week, I opted to do a rewind and make the Chocolate Genoise that the HCB-ers made a couple weeks ago. I used regular ganache instead of the prescribed Peanut Butter Ganache. The other change I made is substitute an equal amount by weight of corn starch for the flour and I threw in a handful of toasted almonds, which I chopped finely in the food processor. My inspiration for this change comes from Hector. A while back, he mentioned experimenting with corn starch in the Genoise to make the cake gluten-free. His reasoning for this change is that a Genoise gets its structure from the egg foam and not as much from the proteins in the flour.
I used my standby recipe for syrup which consists of sugar, water and orange juice. The cake's texture is super soft. It's melt-in-your-mouth tender. I thought it was moist enough for a Genoise (I used about 1/2 cup of syrup). The chocolate flavor was just right and the ganache was very smooth. Unfortunately, the cake formed a thin layer of dense and rubbery mass at the bottom, which I had to cut off prior to serving the cake. Other than that, the cake was fine, and I would call this a successful gluten-free experiment.
i love the way you decorated your cake. those subtle swirls are very appealing.
ReplyDeletecongrats on trying a gluten free version of a genoise! do you know about the basic GF flour mix? i bet it would perform loads better than cornstarch: 2 parts finely ground white rice flour, 2/3 part potato starch flour, 1/3 part tapioca flour. some people use finely ground brown rice flour instead of white rice. the key is finding a rice flour that truly is finely ground--should feel like cake flour or cornstarch.
I love the pattern! :D
ReplyDeleteOh, Hanaa, this is gorgeous! Your syrup sounds delicious. I'm earmarking it!
ReplyDeleteHanaa - you are amazing! I love what you did and the syrup sounds so fresh with the chocolate. I love the pattern on top - it looked Asian to me, kind of like overlapping lily pads. Lovely.
ReplyDeleteTHe pattern on top of your cake is very pretty! I love how moist this cake looks along with a deep chocolate brown, absolutely finger-licking good!
ReplyDeleteHaana your cake looks amazing. I heart chocolate and would love a piece right now. The pattern on the top is lovely!
ReplyDeleteOh man - looks totally delicious!
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