Theme: Tangy
Cookbook Used: Faking It
Author: Valli Little
So for tangy week, I thought I'd try something that I thought sounded gross the first time I read it; chocolate mayonnaise cake. The picture in the cookbook is a chocolate cake with white icing and decorated with nuts. My first thoughts were, "Oh my gawd, this is a chocolate cake with mayonnaise icing!!".... but this was not the case. The mayonnaise is used inside the cake instead of using eggs.
My mother, aunty and I sat down to have a taste test. Because we all knew there was mayonnaise inside the cake, we could taste it. I fed a slice to my dad without telling him anything. After he finished it I asked him how the cake was. He said it was alright, and seemed pleased with what he had just eaten. I then followed up with the question: "Could you taste the mayonnaise?"..... surprised he said "MAYONNAISE?!?!.....*pause*.... nup..."
I don't think I'd make this one again unless I REALLY wanted chocolate cake and didn't have any eggs. Once you get over the mayonnaise taste within the first bite, it's really just like a chocolate cake. But let me tell you, the only substitute for eggs.... is eggs.
*NB. I did use whole egg mayonnaise, not cheap or tangy mayo you'd put in your salad roll.
*NB. I did use whole egg mayonnaise, not cheap or tangy mayo you'd put in your salad roll.
Chocolate Mayonnaise Cake
Valli Little
Get your hands on:
1 2/3 cups (250g) self-raising flour
60g cocoa powder
1/4 teaspoon baking powder
200g caster sugar
3/4 cup (225g) whole-egg mayonnaise
3 teaspoons vanilla extract
100g unsalted butter, softened
100g cream cheese
1 2/3 cups (250g) pure icing sugar, sifted
1 shot (30ml) Kahlua (or other coffee liqueur)
Hazelnuts half-dipped in melted chocolate, to decorate
1. Preheat the oven to 180°C. Grease and line the base of a 23cm springform cake pan.
2. Place the flour, cocoa, baking powder, caster sugar, mayonnaise and 2 teaspoon of the vanilla in the bowl of an electric mixer with 200ml warm water and beat for 2-3 minutes until smooth. Spread into the prepared pan and bake for40 minutes or until a skewer inserted in the centre comes out clean. Cool completely.
3. Meanwhile, make the icing. Process the butter, cream cheese, icing sugar, remaining 1 teaspoon of vanilla and Kahlua in a food processor until smooth. Spread over the cooled cake and decorate with nuts.
Serves 6-8.
You'd really have to use a real egg mayonnaise to get away with it and not one of those tangy, vinegar-infused imitation ones - the taste would be too strange!