My friend Katie is celebrating her 30-mumbles birthday and her absolute favorite cake is a black forest cake.
Personal confession: I am indifferent towards black forest cake. I am, at best, lukewarm towards black forest cake, which I suppose is better than my violently-in-opposition-of feelings towards German chocolate cake and hummingbird cake. If I am being paid to create a cake for someone, I will readily put such opinions aside and do exactly what they’ve requested. But since I was baking this cake out of the goodness of my admittedly cold, unfeeling heart, I decided that it was perfectly fine to be just a little selfish. So here is black forest cake-ish: all the basic elements of black forest cake, but done how I would like it.
A black forest cake, from my understanding, is essentially this: chocolate cake layers filled with cherries, kirsch, and whipped cream and topped with chocolate shavings and maraschino cherries. I am sure there are 10,000 variations to this, but I won’t get into them. This version uses chocolate cake, chocolate ganache, Chantilly cream, and kirsch-spiked cherries.
I tend to like more intensely dense chocolate sponges when it comes to a chocolate cake, but as this thing is filled with an airy whipped cream, that sounded structurally unsound. Instead, the sponge here is a less chocolate-forward (but lighter) sponge. Enter: chocolate ganache to dial up the chocolate-ness. Hell yeah. I love chocolate ganache and if I can put it in something, I will.
The result is a black forest cake that maybe plays up the chocolate more than most, and where the cherries are boozier than most recipes I’ve seen because if I am going to buy a specific bottle of alcohol that I would otherwise not consume, you had better bet I’m going to be heavy-handed in its intended usage.
And did I then proceed to spend multiple days creating all the elements needed to decorate this cake in the most elaborate way possible? Yes I did. Because I knew that if anyone would appreciate this, it would be my darling Katie.
For the curious, the decoration elements are: meringue mushrooms and snail, chocolate bark and tree branch, and coconut + graham cracker crumble moss. I took a ton of inspiration from this wonderful tutorial post from Little Vintage Baking, so check that out if you’re interested in making your own!
Black Forest-ish Cake
Materials
Chocolate Cake
- 1 cup Dutched cocoa (85g)
- 2 cups cake flour (240g)
- 2 cups sugar (400g)
- 1/2 cup buttermilk powder (72g)
- 2 tsp baking powder
- 1/2 tsp baking soda
- 1 tsp salt
- 2 cups warm water
- 2/3 cup vegetable oil
- 2 tsp vanilla extract
- 4 large eggs room temperature
Cherry Jam and Syrup
- 4 cups pitted frozen dark cherries (20 oz)
- 1/2 cup sugar (100g)
- 1 tsp cornstarch
- 2 tbs Kirsch
Ganache
- 20 ounces 70% chocolate, broken into small pieces (570g)
- 1 cup heavy cream
- 1 1/3 cup unsalted butter, cut into pieces (440g)
Chantilly Cream
- 1 cup heavy cream
- 1 tbs confectioner’s sugar
- 1 tbs Kirsch
Optional
- 1/2 cup Store-bought sour cherry jam or spread
Instructions
Make the Cake:
- Preheat the oven to 350°F. Grease and line two 8″ cake pans.
- In a large bowl, whisk together the dry ingredients for the cake: cocoa, flour, buttermilk powder, baking powder, baking soda, and salt.
- In a separate bowl, whisk together the wet ingredients for the cake: water, vegetable oil, and vanilla.
- Slowly pour the wet ingredients into the dry in two batches, whisking to completely combine. Add eggs in one at a time, whisking to completely blend before adding the next one.
- Divide the batter between the two pans and bake for 20-30 minutes, or until a cake tester comes out clean in the center. Cool the cakes in their pans on a rack for 15 minutes before flipping them out and letting it cool completely on the rack.
Make the Cherry Jam and Syrup:
- Combine the frozen cherries and sugar in a small saucepan and cook over medium heat for about 5 minutes, smashing the cherries with a wooden spoon to extract as much juice out of them as possible.
- Drain the cherries into a medium bowl or jar. You should end up with just about 1 cup of syrup for your efforts. Put the cherries back into the saucepan and set it aside for a moment.
- From the drained cherry juice, take a tablespoon out of it and add it to the saucepan of cherries. Add 2 tbs of Kirsch into the remaining juice, stir, and let cool before storing in the fridge until you’re ready to assemble the cake.
- Add 1 tsp cornstarch to the cherry and juice mixture. Stir. Cook over medium heat, stirring frequently, until the mixture has thickened a bit. Let cool and then store in the fridge until you’re ready to assemble the cake.
- I usually make the syrup and jam about 3 days before assembling the cake, just so there’s less for me to do later.
Make the Ganache:
- Combine all the ingredients and slowly heat over a double-boiler until it’s melted. Whisk or stir constantly until smooth.
- Separate into two or three bowls and let it cool in the fridge for a few minutes so that it sets up a bit — where it is thick and spreadable, but not completely solid. Stirring it once in a while as it cools will keep it silky.
Make the Chantilly Cream:
- Whisk all the ingredients together and then beat on high until it forms soft-to-medium peaks.
ASSEMBLY:
- Slice each cake in two to form two layers.
- Place one layer on your cake board.
- Soak the cake layer with the cherry syrup using a pastry brush. Only use enough to darken the sponge — you don’t want it to be soggy.
- Spread a thin layer of ganache over the top.
- Spread a thin layer of sour cherry jam (optional) over the top.
- Spread a third of your homemade cherry jam over the top.
- Spread a third of your Chantilly cream over the top. It helps if you pipe a thick ring of ganache around the perimeter of the cake slice before doing this to keep it contained once you begin stacking.
- Stack with the next slice of cake. Repeat steps 3-8 for the remaining layers except the last one.
- Frost the outside of the cake with the remaining ganache. Decorate as you like!
