Friday 13 March 2009

Verdict: Coffee and Walnut Cake

In a word: Terrible.

This was, in my opinion, an abject failure. The cake was dense (unsurprising given how much nut and how little flour/raising agents were in the mixture), but most of all tasted of pretty much nothing. The coffee was just not noticeable in any way. The sandwich layer had far too much butter in and the cake tasted greasy. I thought it was absolutely dire, personally. Other people present at the party thought it was better, some even claiming to like it, but I'm sure they were just being polite. I sure as hell won't be baking that cake again!

1 comment:

  1. I think your analysis sounds accurate (having not tried the cake but having flicked through your ingredients). The amount of coffee was tiny compared to the amount of other ingredients. The density isn't always a bad thing, as thick heavy cakes have a charm of their own, especially with the icing topping.

    I'd suggest if you were to make it again, stick in a ton more coffee, maybe swap the plain flour for self-raising and add a tiny pinch of salt.

    Having said that it might be better to just find a better recipe to base it on before you tweak ingredients... maybe start with the awesome Hugh F-W chocolate chestnut cake (or the Elizabeth David chocolate almond cake it's based on) and add coffee to the mixture.

    Must admit, the cake looked absolutely beautiful though :)

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