Inside-Out German Chocolate Cake

Do you have a problem with procrastination??

I sure do! Or so it seems.

I made this cake back in August! Can you believe it?!?!?

I seem to make stuff, not post it, make more stuff I'm excited about, then just kind of forget about the old stuff that I made.

Recently I started moving all of my food pictures over to Flickr. My computer is running out of memory (it's a 2006 model which makes it ancient in computer years). So that means all my pictures need to go somewhere. As I've been moving them over I've found a bunch of recipes that I never posted!

Can we spell procrastination?? Oh wait...I just did.

There are two reasons I made this cake (way back then!). 1) It was the chosen cake for my Facebook baking group. 2) The Hubble's birthday was in August and German chocolate cake is his favorite.

This cake was super rich but still enjoyable. Sadly, I'm not a huge chocolate fan so I didn't eat much of it.

The way I got rid of it was having a bunch of Army guys over. I made a chocolate stout cake for the event but we ran out of that one and I pulled the rest of this one out of the fridge. Save!

Whether it was rich or not, the guys definitely devoured it. I barely was able to save a small sliver for The Hubble and I to enjoy together.

I wonder if he would have been upset if I had given away all of his birthday cake...

Let's get after it.

Ingredients: Sugar, flour, Dutch processed cocoa powder, baking powder, baking soda, salt, milk, butter, eggs, coconut, sweetened condensed milk, light corn syrup, chopped pecans, vanilla extract, almond extract and semi sweet chocolate. Phew.

Start by sifting together the flour, sugar, baking soda, baking powder, salt and cocoa into a large mixing bowl.

In a separate bowl, whisk together the milk, butter, whole egg, egg yolk and both extracts until well combined.

Pour the wet mixture in with the dry ingredients...

And beat on low speed until just combined. 

Then raise the speed to high and beat for 1 minute.

Now put the mixer back on low and slowly add in the water until combined.

Separate the batter into 3 cake pans and bake until a toothpick inserted in the center of the cake comes out clean. You will need to rotate the pans halfway through baking. When done, cool in pans for 15 minutes then remove from pans and cool completely on cooling rack.

Now for the filling. Place your coconut and pecans on separate parchment lined baking sheets. Place in upper and lower thirds of the oven and bake, stirring occasionally, until golden brown. Set aside to cool.

Pour the sweetened condensed milk into a pie pan.

Cover the pie pan with foil and place in a larger pan. Fill the larger pan with water until it reaches halfway up the pie plate. Bake for about 45 minutes, refill the water, then bake for another 45 minutes.

While the milk is baking, we will make our glaze because it needs refrigeration time. Toss your butter into a saucepan until melted. Remove from heat.

Add the semi sweet chocolate and corn syrup and whisk until melted and combined.

Pour 1 cup of the mixture into a bowl and place in the fridge about 1 hour, stirring occasionally. The rest of the glaze, just set aside.

Back to the filling! When the milk is done baking it should be thick and brown. Remove the pie plate from the water bath.

Toss the toasted pecans and coconut into the cooked milk.

Add vanilla...

And mix it all up until everything is well combined.

Now for the assembly!! Take a layer of the cake and spread press half of the filling evenly across it. It helps if you wet your spatula because the filling is stiiiiiicky!!

Then top with another cake layer and the rest of the filling.

Place the final cake layer on top of all of that.

Take the glaze out of the fridge and stir it up really good until it is spreadable. Do a rough frosting job all over the cake.

At this point, if you haven't already, place a parchment lined baking sheet under the cooling rack that your cake is on. Reheat the rest of the glaze that you set aside earlier and slowly pour it over the frosted cake. Oh, and you see the right side of my cake there?? Yeah...that's where I gorged it when I was "roughly" frosting the cake. I wasn't being literal there (even though I took it that way). You really need to gently frost the cake!

After you pour the glaze on the cake, chill it for about an hour until the glaze sets and hardens. Then transfer to a plate (or be lazy like me and leave it on a cake board). Cut a chunk out of that bad boy...

Serve it and enjoy!!!

Inside-Out German Chocolate Cake
Retrieved from Epicurious

Printer Friendly Version

Ingredients:

For cake layers

• 1 1/2 cups sugar
• 1 1/2 cups all-purpose flour
• 1/2 cup plus 1 tablespoon unsweetened Dutch-process cocoa powder
• 3/4 teaspoon baking powder
• 3/4 teaspoon baking soda
• 3/4 teaspoon salt
• 3/4 cup whole milk
• 6 tablespoons unsalted butter, melted
• 1 large egg
• 1 large egg yolk
• 3/4 teaspoon vanilla
• 1/8 teaspoon almond extract
• 3/4 cup boiling-hot water

For filling

• 7 ounces sweetened flaked coconut
• 4 ounces coarsely chopped pecans (1 cup)
• 14-ounces can sweetened condensed milk
• 1 tablespoon vanilla

For glaze

• 2 1/2 sticks unsalted butter
• 10 ounces fine-quality semisweet chocolate
• 3 tablespoons light corn syrup

Directions:

Make cake layers:

1. Preheat oven to 350°F and oil cake pans. 
2. Sift together sugar, flour, cocoa powder, baking powder, baking soda, and salt into a large bowl.
3. Whisk together whole milk, butter, whole egg, yolk, vanilla, and almond extract in another large bowl until just combined. 
4. Beat egg mixture into flour mixture with an electric mixer on low speed, then beat on high speed 1 minute. 
5. Reduce speed to low and beat in water until just combined (batter will be thin). 
6. Divide batter among cake pans (about 1 1/2 cups per pan) and bake in upper and lower thirds of oven, switching position of pans and rotating them 180 degrees halfway through baking, until a tester comes out clean, 20 to 25 minutes total.
7. Cool layers in pans on racks 15 minutes. Run a thin knife around edges of pans and invert layers onto racks and cool layers completely.

Make filling:

1. Reduce oven temperature to 325°F.
2. Spread coconut in a large shallow baking pan and pecans in another. Bake pecans in upper third of oven and coconut in lower third, stirring occasionally, until golden, 12 to 18 minutes. Remove pans from oven.
3. Increase oven temperature to 425°F.
4. Pour condensed milk into a 9-inch deep-dish pie plate and cover tightly with foil. 
5. Bake milk in a water bath in middle of oven 45 minutes. Refill baking pan with water to reach halfway up pie plate and bake milk until thick and brown, about 45 minutes more. Remove pie plate from water bath.
6. Stir in coconut, pecans, and vanilla and keep warm, covered with foil.

Make glaze while milk is baking:

1. Melt butter in a 3-quart saucepan. 
2. Remove pan from heat and add chocolate and corn syrup, whisking until chocolate is melted. 
3. Transfer 1 cup glaze to a bowl, reserving remaining glaze at room temperature in pan. 
4. Chill glaze in bowl, stirring occasionally, until thickened and spreadable, about 1 hour.

Assemble cake:

1. Put 1 cake layer on a rack set over a baking pan (to catch excess glaze). 
2. Drop half of coconut filling by spoonfuls evenly over layer and gently spread with a wet spatula. 
3. Top with another cake layer and spread with remaining filling in same manner. 
4. Top with remaining cake layer and spread chilled glaze evenly over top and side of cake. 
5. Heat reserved glaze in pan over low heat, stirring, until glossy and pourable, about 1 minute. 
6. Pour glaze evenly over top of cake, making sure it coats sides. Shake rack gently to smooth glaze.
7. Chill cake until firm, about 1 hour. 
8. Transfer cake to a plate. 
9. Serve and enjoy!!