Beware the Chupacabra....cake.

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It seems only fitting that we start off this blog with a little blood...I mean fun...no, I mean blood.

My favorite cake of all time is Devil's Food cake.  It really is the cake of the devil, as it possesses me and I eat every piece in my apartment and then start prowling around my apartment building, knocking on doors and stealing other people's cake like some cake-crazed demon!  It's quite the scene, I assure you.

I've experimented a few times with the idea of a Latin inspired chocolate cake.  A few weeks ago I made chocolate chiffon cupcakes with chili powder in them that turned out mediocre at best.  The texture didn't fit the flavors.  They were too light and airy to match the slightly spicy flavor of the chili.    Wednesday I was in my cake formula class, trying to get my creative juices flowing and it popped into my head: a spicy spin on my favorite cake!  I'm a cupcake girl by nature, but lord knows, I need the practice with cake assembly so I decided I'd put on my big girl panties and tackle a cake.  But it needed a name, something Latin and dangerous....and maybe something that spills a little blood?

Chupacabra Cake!
(Note: The base of this recipe is from Wayne Gisslen's Professional Baking, Fifth Edition)

Cake Flour  2 3/4 cp
Cocoa Powder  2 3/4 Tbsp
Baking Powder  2 7/8 tsp 
Baking Soda  1 5/8 tsp
Butter (room temp.)   2 Sticks (8 oz)
Ancho Chili Powder*  1 1/2 Tbsp
Chai Seasoning*  1 1/2 tbsp
Sugar  2 cp
Milk (2%)  1 1/3 cp
Vanilla Extract  1Tsp
Eggs   5

Preheat your oven to 375 degrees and prep two 9" round cake pans by lining the bottoms with parchment  paper and generously spraying each pan with cooking spray on the sides and bottom.

1) Sift together your dry ingredients (flour, cocoa powder, baking powder and soda, the chili powder and chai seasoning).  I would suggest sifting it more than once.
2) Place the butter and all of your dry ingredients into your mixing bowl with the paddle attachment and paddle together on low speed for two minutes, then scrape down the sides and repeat (total mixing time: 4 minutes).  My KitchenAid always manages to collect some rogue flour or egg or sugar at the bottom, so make sure you thoroughly scrape the bottoms as well as the sides.
3) Pour in your sugar and 3/4 cp of your milk, paddling on low the entire time.  Scrape down the sides as it's necessary (which will be often, and don't forget the stuff hiding at the bottom!).  The mixture will gain some uniformity after about 3 minutes, but you can go for up to 5 minutes.
4) Combine the rest of your milk and your eggs and lightly beat them together.  Add this combination to your running mixture in three to four additions, mixing each addition until it's completely combined before you add the next addition.
5) Pour half of the batter into each prepped cake pan and then put them in the oven to bake for 20-25 minutes.  When they cakes are done they will be firm, but springy to the touch and when you pierce them with a tooth pick or skewer, they will come out clean.

Cake Batter

6) Let your cake cool very thoroughly.  In fact, I've found that cutting a cold cake is infinitely easier than cutting a room temperature cake or, lord forbid, a warm cake.  After your cake is at room temperature, remove it from your pant by running the dull side of a paring knife around the edge and flip it over to release the cake (this is where the parchment paper comes in handy).  Wrap each half in plastic wrap and put them in your refrigerator for an hour or so. 
7) When your cakes are thoroughly cooled, trim the dome off of each with a serrated knife and then trim each of them in half, horizontally.  This is a lot easier with a cake stand, which is a great investment.  Some tips, keep your body completely still, move just your hand to rotate the cake and the other to move the knife.  Pay special attention to keep your knife completely parallel with the table, and try making one shallow mark all the way around.  Go slow!  Also, don't forget to take the parchment off the bottom of each cake.  My chef in class warned me about this, and I giggled that someone would forget a thing like that....and then I forgot the parchment paper on mine.

Yay!  Let's move onto the filling...

Dark Chocolate Ganache

Heavy Cream     1cp
Semi-Sweet/Dark Chocolate (I used 58%)  8oz
Red Food Coloring  15 drops

1) Put your cream in a sauce pan and bring to a scald over med-high heat
2) At the same time, make sure your chocolate is either already in small pieces or chop it into small pieces and place in a small to medium mixing bowl and place on a dry towel on your counter
3) When your cream is scalded, pour it over your chocolate and let it sit for one to two minutes
4) With a spatula, start stirring the mixture in slow, circular motions starting with small circles in the middle and progressively moving outwards as the mixture starts melting and gaining some consistent color (if it won't completely melt the chocolate, place the mixture over a hot water bath to get the process going again)
5) Stir in food coloring and then let sit, covered to cool to room temperature

Cinnamon Vanilla Butter Cream
(Also based on Gisslen, pg 426)

Butter, room temperature  3 sticks
Powdered Sugar  4 3/4 cp
Egg whites   1 white from a jumbo egg
Vanilla extract  1 1/2t
Cinnamon, ground  1 1/2t
Milk  1/8 cp

1) Place your butter in your mixing bowl and then sift in your powdered sugar.  Using the paddle attachment, blend together on low speed until completely combined and consistently textured
2) Add the remaining ingredients on your medium speed to combine and then turn up to high until the frosting is very light in texture).  You don't have to add the water, but I find that the buttercream is easier to spread with a little moisture.

Let's put this demon beast together now, shall we?! 

1) Spread 1/3 of your ganache on your bottom cake layer.  It's okay if a little of it spills over the side, but try your best to keep it to a minimum.  I didn't.  It got messy later on.  Place the next cake layer on top of your ganache layer and then repeat two more times (four cake layers, three ganache layers). 

My cake is bleeding!

2) I think it's easier if you pipe your buttercream on top of your cake to make sure that the top layer of frosting is even, but you can use your judgement.  I pipe a tight spiral of buttercream on top of the cake, starting at the center and working my way out.  Use an offset spatula to spread the frosting on top as evenly as possible.  I think this technique also avoids the problem of not having enough frosting on top and being able to see cake through your frosting!
3) To frost the sides, again, I prefer to pipe lines of frosting vertically up the sides at 1" intervals and then using your offset spatula, evenly spread your buttercream around the sides.  Be generous.  You don't want to be able to see your layers through your white frosting.

4) At this point, it's just a matter of evening things out, so use the tools available to you.  I love my medium sized offset spatula.  It really is a godsend and is so easy to handle, but you can also use a bowl scraper.  Or, if you're not worried about complete evenness, you can use a butter knife! *shudder*
5) For a finishing touch, take a tooth pick, mack a fang sized circle in your cake, with another to match for fan marks (don't go so deep that you hit the cake).  Then lightly lay your toothpick on the cake leading up to the fang mark.  Put on drop of red food coloring at the start of each trough so that it trickles into the fang mark. 

Kind of creepy, right?

When you sink your fangs into this cake, you won't notice any heat from the chili. Ancho chili's have little to no heat, but you will notice the pleasant chili flavor.  You'll also notice the cardamom and clove from the chai seasoning. 

I hope you enjoy it as much as I have.  This is going to be a go-to recipe for me for many a birthday cake, or even gift of cupcakes!

Enjoy and try not to draw any blood when you're protecting your cake from would-be cake thieves.


*I purchased my ancho chili powder and my chai seasoning here in Chicago at The Spice House.

Gisslen, Wayne. "Cake Mixing and Baking." Professional Baking. 5 ed. New York, NY: Wiley, 2008. Print.