As I was trying to come up with a new recipe for the next installment of the Expedition Chocolate blog, I decided I wanted to try something more directly tied to one of our bars. With its bitter-sweet components and spice blend that lends itself equally well to baking, reimagining Zhuzhou as a cake immediately came to mind.
This dense spice cake is not overtly sweet. It gets spiked with orange flavor from Seville Orange Marmalade. Seville Oranges are a more bitter fruit compared to a typical Navel Orange. There is also less overall sugar added (the frosting has no powdered sugar in it), so the chocolate notes still shine through. If you prefer dark chocolate because you find milk chocolate too saccharine then this is right up your alley. In keeping with original bar, pieces of candied orange peel and sesame seeds round out this recipe.
Ingredients
1 tsp butter
100g dark chocolate , broken into pieces (65-80% dark)
240 grams of Seville Orange Marmalade
3 eggs
180g granulated sugar
240ml vegetable or canola oil (use something with neutral flavor)
25g cocoa powder
250g all-purpose flour
1½ tsp baking powder
1 tsp cinnamon
¾ tsp cloves
¼ tsp ground black pepper
For The Chocolate Ganache & Garnish
200g 70% dark chocolate
225ml heavy cream
Chopped candied orange peel
Toasted Sesame Seeds
What You’ll Need
9-inch round cake pan
Parchment paper
Two wire cooling racks
Scale
The usual baking utensils
Steps To Making This Amazing Chocolate Cake
Preheat oven to 350F or 325F if using a convection oven with fan turned on. Butter the bottom and sides of a 9-inch round cake pan, then line bottom with parchment and butter the bottom of it.
Melt 100g chocolate in a double boiler or melt in microwave at 50% power stirring every 15-20 seconds until just melted. See my truffle recipe for how to melt chocolate on the stove.
In small bowl measure out orange marmalade then thin with 1 tablespoon of hot water (from the tap is fine). Add water and str.
In a large bowl, lightly beat the eggs with a whisk. Stir in sugar and oil until well combined. Then add the cooled chocolate and orange marmalade.
Using a sift if you have one, sift in flour, cocoa powder, baking powder and spices. Mix well and pour into cake pan.
Bake in over about 50 minutes or until toothpick inserted in the middle of the cake comes out clean. Check when there is about 10 minutes left in the bake and if it is getting too dark on top, cover with foil.
When ready, remove from oven and place on wire rack to cool about 10 minutes. After cooling, invert on another wire rack, remove the parchment paper from the bottom of the cake and then invert it back on to the first rack. Because this is a single layer cake, you want to preserve the nicely rounded crown on the top of the cake – we aren’t going for a flat surface.
Let cool completely. This ganache topping has a low melting point so if the cake is still warm when you frost it, you will be disappointed with the results.
While cake is cooling, finely chop the 200g of dark chocolate and place in a heat proof bowl. In a small saucepan heat cream up just to the boil (stir so a skin doesn’t form).
Pour cream over chocolate and let sit for 2-3 minutes. Stir to combine and continue to stir until you get a glossy consistency. If some chocolate hasn’t melted, pop in microwave for 15 second bursts.
Let ganache cool until you get spreadable consistency like whipped cream cheese. If it is taking a while to set up, place in fridge for 5-10 minutes. If it gets to firm, just allow it to warm back up.
Once cake is cooled and ganache is where you want, frost the cake. You will be covering it with the garnish so it doesn’t need to be perfect.
Sprinkle on the chopped orange peel and sesame seeds.
Enjoy!
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