The World’s Best Chocolate Cake

Chocolate Cake

Chocolate cake can be hard to get right. It’s either not chocolaty enough, or not moist enough, or has a strange texture, but not with this recipe. I’ve tried a lot of different chocolate cake recipes and this one has been developed to work every time. There’s a secret ingredient too, which is Guinness – the Irish stout/ale. By adding in some of this drink, it makes the texture a lot richer and stops the cake from drying out when being baked.

This is the perfect celebration cake and is a real show stopper and is guaranteed to have people asking, “how have you got this cake so rich and moist?”. So what do you need for this amazing cake? I bet you’re excited to see the ingredients:

275g plain flour
400g caster sugar
150ml sour cream
250ml Guinness stout
250g unsalted butter
100g cocoa powder
2 eggs
1 tsp bicarbonate of soda
1 tsp vanilla extract

There’s a very simple method too:

  1. Firstly preheat the oven to 180 degrees in advance and line a 22cm cake tin with a little vegetable oil to stop it sticking when turning it out.
  2. Warm the Guinness up in a large saucepan but don’t let it boil. Add in the butter until it completely melts and becomes a buttery alcoholic mixture.
  3. Add in the sugar and use a whisk to ensure there are no lumps and all the sugar dissolves into the liquid to make an almost syrup like batter.
  4. Add the cocoa powder and whisk so there are no lumps. The mix should now be very dark and look like a dark liquid chocolate.
  5. Add the soured cream and again whisk. Take the mix off the heat too which will allow the sour cream to lower the temperature in preparation for the eggs.
  6. Beat in the eggs ensuring the mix isn’t too hot, or the eggs will poach.
  7. Add all the flour and whisk in. This mix will get a little tough now as it becomes thicker, but ensure with it until all the visible lumps are gone.
  8. Pour the mix into the tin and bake for around 40 minutes, or until a knife comes out clean with tested. It will take a couple of hours from here to cool, where you can then take it out of the tin and decorate however you like.

Cream cheese or butter frosting goes really well with this recipe, but you have freedom to do whatever you want. You can even leave it undecorated and serve with a spoon of clotted cream in aid of turning this cake in a pudding. Enjoy!

Attached Images:
  •  License: Image author owned 

Aideen is a serious devotee to all things chocolate and although a daytime employee within the takeaway food industry in Ireland with Just Eat, still finds time to explore recipes and write about her experiences.

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