I found a jar of Morello cherries from Trader Joe's in the pantry, right after I had seen a post on social media about the Black Forest Cake from Sally's Baking Addiction. It's three layers of chocolate cake, brushed with sweet cherry syrup, layered with whipped cream and cherries, and topped with chocolate ganache. The recipe is written to be made with canned cherries in syrup, so it seemed like the perfect project for my jar of cherries.
The chocolate cake is an oil cake that also includes sour cream and buttermilk. To make the batter, you simply combine all of the dry ingredients (flour, natural cocoa powder, sugar, baking soda, baking powder, salt, and espresso powder) in one bowl; combine all of the wet ingredients (canola oil, eggs, sour cream, buttermilk, and vanilla) in another; pour the dry into the wet; add hot coffee; and blend to combine. I divided the batter between three pans to bake. Even though I had generously buttered the pans and also lined them with parchment, I wish I had floured the pans as well. I had to run a knife around the edges of the cakes to release them after they were cool, and even then, I didn't get a completely clean release.
The recipe calls for two 15-ounce cans of cherries in heavy syrup, and the jars they sell at Trader Joe's are 24.7 ounces; I figured it was close enough. You drain the cherries and cook down some of the reserved syrup with kirsch until it's substantially reduced. (My bottle of kirsch was almost empty so I used a 50-50 mix of kirsch and Chambord.) My reduced cherry syrup was thick and sticky, but didn't taste of alcohol at all.
I leveled the cooled cakes and brushed the surface of each layer with the cherry syrup. I quickly used up all of the syrup and I wished that I had made more; there was definitely more liquid in the jar of cherries that I could have used. Then I filled the cake with lightly sweetened whipped cream (heavy cream, powdered sugar, and vanilla), and the drained cherries. I didn't have any syrup left over to sprinkle over the whipped cream and cherries. After I stacked all of the layers, I spread a thin layer of whipped cream over the entire cake and then added a chocolate ganache drip (bittersweet chocolate, heavy cream, and corn syrup).
This cake was freakin' delicious. The chocolate cake itself was had an intense chocolate flavor and a springy crumb, and my absolute favorite part was the top portion of each layer that was soaked with the reduced cherry syrup. In the future, I would definitely save all of the syrup from the jar of cherries and reduce it. The syrup was sweet and delivered fantastic concentrated cherry goodness that was simply spectacular combined with the chocolate cake. The whipped cream was so light and lovely, and cake delivered an incredible amount of flavor without being heavy. I can't recommend this cake highly enough.
Recipe: "Black Forest Cake" from Sally's Baking Addiction.
The chocolate cake is an oil cake that also includes sour cream and buttermilk. To make the batter, you simply combine all of the dry ingredients (flour, natural cocoa powder, sugar, baking soda, baking powder, salt, and espresso powder) in one bowl; combine all of the wet ingredients (canola oil, eggs, sour cream, buttermilk, and vanilla) in another; pour the dry into the wet; add hot coffee; and blend to combine. I divided the batter between three pans to bake. Even though I had generously buttered the pans and also lined them with parchment, I wish I had floured the pans as well. I had to run a knife around the edges of the cakes to release them after they were cool, and even then, I didn't get a completely clean release.
I leveled the cooled cakes and brushed the surface of each layer with the cherry syrup. I quickly used up all of the syrup and I wished that I had made more; there was definitely more liquid in the jar of cherries that I could have used. Then I filled the cake with lightly sweetened whipped cream (heavy cream, powdered sugar, and vanilla), and the drained cherries. I didn't have any syrup left over to sprinkle over the whipped cream and cherries. After I stacked all of the layers, I spread a thin layer of whipped cream over the entire cake and then added a chocolate ganache drip (bittersweet chocolate, heavy cream, and corn syrup).
This cake was freakin' delicious. The chocolate cake itself was had an intense chocolate flavor and a springy crumb, and my absolute favorite part was the top portion of each layer that was soaked with the reduced cherry syrup. In the future, I would definitely save all of the syrup from the jar of cherries and reduce it. The syrup was sweet and delivered fantastic concentrated cherry goodness that was simply spectacular combined with the chocolate cake. The whipped cream was so light and lovely, and cake delivered an incredible amount of flavor without being heavy. I can't recommend this cake highly enough.
Recipe: "Black Forest Cake" from Sally's Baking Addiction.
Comments