Victuals & Drink, Volume 6 number 2, February 2004 Sourdough Chocolate Mocha Cake This recipe will produce one of the moistest cakes you will ever wrap your big fat lips around. If you are ever going to master it you must have a nurturing nature or at least know someone who does. You cannot just whip this one up during some lazy afternoon before a birthday party. It’s not instant. You’ll have to work at it, care for it, and carry it carefully in your hands. If you’ve got what it takes you will be well rewarded. If not, you’re just going to bake up some kind of weird funky thing no one could appreciate. The first thing you’ll need is some proper sourdough. Every time I get the hankering I always get out my Lowbush Moose recipe book that was written by Gordon R. Nelson back in 1978. He suggests using a packet of yeast, three cups of flour, and two and a half cups of warm water. Mix this all up in a non-metal lidded container that is at least four to five times greater in volume than the mixture. With time—sooner than you think—this mixture will start to bubble, like all good sourdough does, and expand. This is no problem if your container is of sufficient size, but if it isn’t, like mine, you’ll have to stir it down every once in a while for six to eight hours or so. After a day or two the sourdough is ready to use. Not for cake, mind you. That will come later. For several weeks to a month you should probably just stick to pancakes or bread. You need really good sourdough for cake. You need stuff that’s been around for awhile. It has to have some soul and you need to know what you’re doing. For sourdough pancakes, which kids and adults love, you need to pour your sourdough (not all of it—about three cups) out into a medium-sized bowl and add at least one tablespoon of cooking oil, a half teaspoon of salt, three tablespoons of sugar, an egg, and a half teaspoon of baking soda. Mix this all up and then fry it any way you like. My family would never turn up their noses if I also added a half teaspoon of cinnamon or substituted brown sugar or honey for refined sugar, and never underestimate the power of some chopped-up apple, a dash of molasses, or a cup of crushed pineapple. I always let my well-oiled pan get good and hot and I never flip a pancake until the bubbles near the edges of the pancake pop and then fail to close. These techniques will consistently produce pancakes that are just the right shade of ‘baby harbor seal brown’ (thanks, Mom), and they will never let your loved ones down. When you’re finished choking down all those tasty blankets of love don’t forget about your ultimate goal: sourdough chocolate mocha cake. Take that container with what’s left of your sourdough and add another two and a half cups of warm water and three cups of flour. Let it all hang out on your kitchen counter for a day or two and then stuff it back in your refrigerator until next weekend. The idea here is to allow your sourdough to mature for awhile. In the meantime you still have to take care of it, alternately consuming it and feeding it. After a couple of months it will be ready to make cake. Just for fun you could make some bread. Gordon R. Nelson suggests taking a cup of sourdough and mixing it with two more cups of warm water and two and a half cups of flour. Let this gather momentum in a nice big bread bowl for at least a day. Then add four more cups of flour, a teaspoon of salt, half a teaspoon of baking soda, three tablespoons of sugar and three tablespoons of vegetable oil. Mix, then knead this mixture for at least ten minutes, and then let it rise in a buttered and covered bowl in a warmish place until it doubles in size. Punch it down, knead a bit more, and make whatever kind of shaped loaf you’d like and let rise until it approaches twice its size again. Bake for an hour at 375 degrees Fahrenheit. This stuff makes excellent toast. Are you ready for cake? Are you man or woman enough? Have you been taking good care of your sourdough? This is where we find out. Throw a whole stick of butter into a nice large bowl and cream it with one and a quarter cups of sugar. A fork works well for this, plus it’s something the kids like to do, so let them. Did you actually think you were going to make a cake without them? Whip this up with at least three chicken eggs or, if you’re lucky enough, one of Tinker’s double-yolk goose eggs (wow). Continue mixing in three tablespoons of powdered baker’s chocolate, three tablespoons vegetable oil, one tablespoon instant coffee, one teaspoon baking powder, one teaspoon baking soda, one-half teaspoon salt, one teaspoon vanilla and two cups of that wonderful stuff—you know what I’m talking about—that’s right, sourdough. When this is all mixed up you need to look at it and decided if it’s the right consistency for cake mix. If it’s too thick you can add quarter cups of milk, one at a time, to thin it out. If it seems just right then don’t add any milk. Just forget it. If it’s too runny you’re ruined. Try again next week with sourdough that’s not so loose (try more flour). If your mixture does look okay, then go ahead and pour it into a greased and floured cake pan and bake at 375 degrees Fahrenheit for at least 35 minutes. Test to see if it’s done by stabbing it with a toothpick. If the toothpick comes out clean, it’s done. Cool for five to ten minutes, then turn it out onto a rack. That’s it, baby. It’s done. You will be the envy of all your bake-aholic friends. “Have you tried my chocolate mocha sourdough cake,” you will say sweetly, your face radiating with pride while placing your creation in plain sight in the middle of the table. “I didn’t know you could make cake with sourdough,” your friends will say, with just a hint of suspicion in their voices while staring over the top of their newspapers and cups of coffee. You deftly slice and serve all while explaining you found the recipe within this charming little ditty of a rag called The Ester Republic. They all promise to pick up a copy at their soonest convenience while picking up their forks and arranging their napkins. They taste in turn, not knowing exactly what a chocolate mocha sourdough cake should taste like. Their eyes drift off to happy places. Murmurs of pleasure escape their lips. Between bites they wave their forks through the air as if to orchestrate their taste buds, commanding them to savor every hint of chocolate, every nuance of mocha and every last juicy drop of sourdough. You’ve got them now. As if on command offers of babysitting, dishwashing, oil changing, and litter box cleaning will come out of nowhere and everywhere at once. They all want more. You give them more. You love them. That’s why you made the cake for them in the first place.
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