glazed chocolate olive oil cake

glazed chocolate olive oil cake

• 3 Jul 2023

A few posts back I mentioned I was working on a chocolate pound cake recipe and here it is. I've made the cake twice now - the first time I made a loaf cake and topped it with dark chocolate ganache, which my Dad found a bit rich. This time I made a bundt cake and used some 'just about to expire' sour cream instead of yoghurt. 

I topped the cake with some old fashioned chocolate icing, only because I'd run out of cream with which to make the ganache, then added a handful of chopped toasted almonds for decoration. I'm not sure which version I prefer.

Making this cake takes no time at all. It takes way more time to prepare the tin and weigh out and measure the ingredients. Here's the recipe for you which makes a small bundt or a small loaf cake. For all my recipes I use a 250 ml cup, a 20 ml tablespoon, unsalted butter and 60g eggs. My oven is a conventional gas oven so if your oven is fan forced you may need to reduce the oven temperature by 20°C.

Glazed chocolate, olive oil cake

Cake
65g brown sugar
65g caster sugar
⅓ cup (50g) plain flour
⅓ cup (35g) cocoa powder
2 tsp baking powder
Pinch table salt
⅔ cup (65g) almond meal
2 tsp vanilla extract
2 eggs
⅓ cup (80g) extra-virgin olive oil
Scant ⅓ cup (75g) full fat yoghurt or sour cream

Chocolate Icing
1 tsp butter or oil
20g dark chocolate, coarsely chopped
½ cup sifted icing sugar
5g (3 tsp) cocoa powder, sifted
½ tsp vanilla extract
¼ cup (60 ml) milk

Method
Preheat the oven to 180°C, conventional. If making the bundt cake, grease a 5 cup bundt tin and dust with cocoa powder. If making the loaf cake then line a small loaf pan with baking paper, allowing some overhang for easy removal.

Place the sugars in a large bowl. Sift the flour, cocoa, baking powder and salt into a small bowl. Stir through the almond meal and set to one side. Add the vanilla and eggs to the sugar mix, then slowly drizzle in the olive oil. Whisk until the mixture thickens. Whisk in the dry ingredients in thirds alternating with the yoghurt or sour cream and mix until the batter is smooth. 

Pour the batter into the prepared pan and bake on the centre rack for 40-45 minutes or until a toothpick inserted in the centre comes out clean. Cool the cake in the pan for 15 minutes, then invert onto a wire rack. Let the cake cool completely before icing.

Chocolate Icing
Melt the butter and chocolate in a medium heatproof bowl over a saucepan of simmering water. Stir sifted icing sugar and cocoa into the chocolate. Add the vanilla extract and enough milk to make an icing of a coating consistency. Put a tray or baking sheet under the wire rack and pour the glaze over the cake, letting it run over the edges. If you like, you could decorate the top of the cake with some coarsely chopped toasted almonds and chocolate shards. The cake will keep at room temperature for 3 days.

The cake has a high cocoa content so it makes a deeply dark, moist, though not particularly sweet cake, if that's your thing. 

See you all again next week with some more baking from my kitchen.

Bye for now,

Jillian