The recipe for the cake can be found on epicurious. One of my favorite things to do is scroll through the comments to see what other people added, modified, etc. One lady mentioned cupcakes and I personally thought that was GENIUS! It's the perfect amount of chocolate, especially after the steakhouse meal we had just eaten. Also, I know you're not supposed to mess with proportions when baking and not alter recipes, but when one of the comments said it made 36 cupcakes I decided that was too much for a 6 person dinner party and use only 1/3 of the ingredients and they still turned out lovely.
So for the chocolate cake and ganache, I used my favorite local chocolate brand, Taza. The factory is located in Somervile, MA and they specialize in stone ground Mexican chocolate. I followed the recipe for the chocolate cake and baked in the oven for 35 minutes since I was only making 12 cupcakes.
Instead of making the ganache that is included with the cake recipe, I opted for more of a traditional ganache recipe with a twist. My secret ingredient....
You can see the ganache batter in the background. The ganache recipe is as follows.
8 oz of Semisweet chocolate ( I used the Taza chocolate)
1/2 cup of heavy cream
1/2 teaspoon instant coffee
2 splashes of Grand Marnier
1. Chop up the chocolate into fine pieces and put in a double broiler. A double broiler is easily made at home with a pot of boiling water and a glass bowl on top. Add cream and coffee. Stir until all the chocolate has melted and you have a creamy smooth chocolate mixture.
2. Add Grand Marnier and keep stirring until mixed well.
After the cupcakes had cooled a little and the while the ganache was still warm, I dipped the top of the cupcake in the ganache and then put on a rack to cool.
Here they are...
Next time, I'm trying to make these cupcakes with bacon :)
