Our 10 Favorite Ina Garten Chocolate Recipe Videos | Barefoot Contessa | Food Network

From Chocolate Hazelnut Truffles to a Chocolate Banana Cream Pie, these are our favorite Ina Garten #chocolate recipe videos!
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Ina throws open the doors of her Hamptons home for delicious food, dazzling entertaining ideas and good fun on Barefoot Contessa.

Welcome to Food Network, where learning to cook is as simple as clicking play! Grab your apron and get ready to get cookin’ with some of the best chefs around the world. We’ll give you a behind-the-scenes look at our best shows, take you inside our favorite restaurant and be your resource in the kitchen to make sure every meal is a 10/10!

0:00 – Intro
0:05 – Chocolate Cake with Mocha Frosting
3:30 – French Chocolate Bark
6:21 – Chocolate Pecan Scones
9:03 – Chocolate Hazelnut Truffles
12:22 – Chocolate Peanut Butter Globs
16:06 – Chocolate Cupcakes with Peanut Butter Icing
20:15 – Chocolate Ganache Cupcakes
24:27 – Chocolate Ganache Cake
28:30 – Chocolate Banana Cream Pie
34:37 – Beatty’s Chocolate Cake

Get the recipes:
Chocolate Cake with Mocha Frosting – https://foodtv.com/32YpjtV
French Chocolate Bark – https://foodtv.com/3YzPRwc
Chocolate Pecan Scones – https://foodtv.com/2HOOOpG
Chocolate Hazelnut Truffles – https://foodtv.com/3lBf5eV
Chocolate Peanut Butter Globs – https://foodtv.com/2VZ4BGi
Chocolate Cupcakes with Peanut Butter Icing – http://foodtv.com/3rljyjz
Chocolate Ganache Cupcakes – https://foodtv.com/3YDdLGW
Chocolate Ganache Cake – https://foodtv.com/2I51Kb6
Chocolate Banana Cream Pie – https://foodtv.com/3kEGc3k
Beatty’s Chocolate Cake – https://foodtv.com/2RSrTJC

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Our 10 Favorite Ina Garten Chocolate Recipe Videos | Barefoot Contessa | Food Network

I’ve got 12 tablespoons of unsalted butter room temperature and two cups of sugar, and I’ve beaten it in a really light and fluffy. And now I’m going to add a tablespoon of good vanilla, good vanilla, and I’m going to

Turn it down to low. When I mix these in and three extra large eggs at room temperature and I just put them in one at a time until they mix in. Okay, next for the coffee and chocolate mixture. So I’m going to start with hot tap water.

Two thirds of a cup of cocoa powder. What? Really good? Cocoa powder. Next is a teaspoon of instant espresso powder. It’s very strong, but it’ll be good with a chocolate. Okay. And I’m going to whisk this together. You’ll see. It just dissolves in the water. The coffee and the chocolate.

And then I’m going to add two thirds of a cup of half and half. Just think how good that’s going to be in the cake. Okay, so that’s the chocolate mixture next to the dry mixture. What I did was I sifted together one and three quarter cups of flour, one teaspoon of

Baking soda and one teaspoon of kosher salt. And that’s all done. So I’m going to show you how I put them in on low speed. Alternately in thirds starting and ending with the flour. Just put it in slowly so it’s mixed in. Okay, that’s some flour. Next is the chocolate mixture.

Chocolate and coffee. Make sure each one’s blended in before you start the next one. Okay. A little more flour. This smells amazing. It’s not even in the oven yet. Very slowly. Just make sure it’s really, well, mixed in. And you want to make sure the bottom is, well, mixed in.

Okay. Ready to go into the pan. So I’ve got a nine by 13 inch pan. I buttered it, put parchment paper down and then buttered and floured the whole thing. So there’s no point in making a cake if you can’t get it out of the pan. Okay. And just smooth at the top.

Now I’m going to bake it and then I’m going to cool it. I’ll put the cake in a 350 degree oven for 30 minutes. Next. It’s about cooling. I’ll leave the cake in the pan until it’s completely cooled. Then I’ll flip it out onto my hand.

Carefully remove the parchment paper and place it on a serving board so the mocha frosting couldn’t be easier. I put 12oz of chopped bittersweet chocolate into a bowl, along with three tablespoons of diced, unsalted butter and two teaspoons of instant espresso powder to enhance the chocolate flavor.

Then I poured over one and a quarter cups of simmering heavy cream, stirred it occasionally until the chocolate melted. Then I added one tablespoon of coffee liqueur, a teaspoon of vanilla extract, stir the frosting until it was smooth, covered it with plastic wrap and refrigerated it for only 30 minutes.

It’s really like ganache. If you whip ganache or chilled ganache, it ends up like frosting just like this. That’s it. Okay, I’m just going to pour this right on the cake. Nice and cold and then just swirl it on. I’m just going to frost the top.

I like when you can see the cake and the frosting and I’ll show you how I cut it. That’s a dessert. Everybody will remember. The first thing I want to do is roast some cashews 350 degrees for just a few minutes.

Okay, While those are baking, I’m just going to chop up some chocolate. So I’m chopping two kinds of chocolate here. I’ve got semi-sweet chocolate and bittersweet chocolate. I just think one’s a little too sweet, one’s a little too bitter for me. But you can do whatever combination you like.

And I’m doing about 7 or 8oz of each one. A lot of recipes for chocolate that actually call for tempering it, which is a whole process that I really can’t be bothered with. So the tempering what it does is stop the chocolate from turning gray.

The next day. So I figured out the easiest thing to do is make it the same day as the party. So I’m just going to stir this over simmering water. You don’t want it too hot just until it’s melted. Okay. I’m going to go get the cashews out of the oven.

They just smell so much better when they’re roasted. Just a little bit. It really brings out the flavor. It looks like the is melted. Just take it off and let it start to cool. Okay. Cranberries, which just go in as they are and some apricots.

I’m going to chop up because there’d be too big. Good thing about this kind of a chocolate bark is you can do anything you want. You could even put trail mix in if you wanted to. Usually American bark like this has the nuts and raisins and fruit all mixed in.

But in France, what they do is they do a sheet of chocolate and have all these things on top. So you can see them looks so much prettier. Okay, so now I’m going to show you what I’m going to do.

So I’m going to take half sheet pan lined with parchment paper and I’m going to roughly measure a square, about nine inches by ten inches. And then to make sure I don’t get pencil on the chocolate, just turn it over and take the chocolate and just pour it in that square.

And don’t worry, it’s going to be a little thicker in some places than others, but that’s the nature of chocolate bark. Just spread it right into the corners. It’s going to be a rough rectangle. Look how nice and shiny the chocolate is.

And now I’m just going to put everything on top of the chocolate. So just a handful of cashews. A handful of chopped apricots. And a handful of cranberries. And I’m just going to let this rest for two hours at room temperature and we’re going to have chocolate bark.

So I’ve got the chocolate bark. I’m just going to cut it in small squares because it’s amazing. This really just hardened at room temperature. Okay. Look fantastic. One more four cups. So just scoop it and level it off. Okay. A little bit of sugar. Two tablespoons. Not too sweet. Just a little.

Two tablespoons of baking powder, which is why they’re so light and flaky. Four teaspoons of salt. Okay. So I’m just going to mix this together. And now I’ve got really cold butter. It’s three sticks of butter, three quarters of a pound.

I’m going to put it in and just let the mixture do its thing until the butter is about the size of peas. So next, I need four eggs and a cup of heavy cream. I didn’t say they were low calorie. I just said they were delicious.

And I’m just going to whisk the eggs and the cream together. So as soon as the flour is just the right consistency, where you can see the butter is just in little bits, then I’m going to add the wet ingredients. Just put them in slowly.

It’s going to be really wet, but that’s what makes really good scones. Okay, next up, the chocolate and pecans. So I’ve got one and a half cups of medium diced, bittersweet chocolate and one cup of chopped pecans. I’m just going to toss them together and to make sure they get well distributed, I’m

Going to put in three tablespoons of flour. Just coat them a little bit and it makes sure they get distributed in the dough. Okay, here it goes. So I’m going to turn this on low and then just slowly. Add it in. Okay, now comes the fun part.

I’ll dump out the dough onto a very well floured board and needed a few times to be sure that chocolate and pecans are well distributed. Adding a little flour so the dough doesn’t stick to the board. Then I’ll roll out the dough one inch thick with a floured rolling pin.

Dip a three inch cutter in flour, cut out the scones and place them on to parchment lined sheet pans. Okay, I’m just going to egg wash the scones now. So I’ve mixed one egg with two tablespoons of water. So that’s the egg wash.

And then just a little bit of sugar on the top. Just give it a little sweet crunch. As though they’re not sweet enough. I’ll bake your scones at 400 degrees for ten minutes. Then switch the pants around so they cook evenly and bake them for another ten minutes.

When the tops are lightly browned and the insides are fully baked, I’ll take them out and put them on a platter. Ta da! Gorgeous scones. These look amazing. I’m gonna take a half a cup of heavy cream and just heat it up.

What you don’t want to do is boil this because there’s nothing worse than the taste of boiled cream. Okay? Can’t make chocolate truffles without lots of chocolate. I’m using bittersweet and semi-sweet. I think bittersweet is a little too bitter and semi-sweet is a little too sweet.

So I like to combine the two and get sort of halfway in between. So that’s 3.5oz of semi-sweet chocolate. Chop it up fairly fine because what I’m going to do is pour the hot cream over it and it’ll melt the chocolate and I’m going to chop up 3.5oz of bittersweet, you know, true

Chocolate aficionado’s only like bittersweet chocolate. But I have to say, it’s a little bitter for me. So the key to this is to add flavorings that really complement the chocolate. I find vanilla and coffee really make chocolate taste more chocolatey. And then I like to add one other flavor.

So there’s sort of a back note to it. Very often I use Grand Marnier, but this time I think I’m going to do it with hazelnuts. So I’m going to do chopped hazelnuts on the outside and frangelico, which is hazelnut liqueur on the inside.

So the next thing I’m going to do is pour this warm cream. It’s actually hot. It’s just under the simmering point. Through a strainer onto the chocolate and the cream is going to melt the chocolate and just stir this. The good thing about this system is you can’t overheat the chocolate.

The cream just gets under the simmering point and it’ll just melt the chocolate. So I’m going to let that melt. And at the other flavorings, one and a half tablespoons of Frangelico liqueur, which is a hazelnut liqueur. One tablespoon of coffee, prepared coffee, which I have from this morning.

And if it’s hot, it’s even better. Helps melt the chocolate and half a teaspoon of good vanilla extract. And if I played my cards right, the chocolate should be melted by now. So just stir it around. And I bet it’s pretty good too, huh?

I have chocolate all over me. Oh, it’s so good. I love the balance of bittersweet and semi-sweet, so I’m going to chill this for about 45 minutes and then make little balls and roll them in hazelnuts. So it’s time to scoop the truffles.

So what I’ve got is a chilled mixture of semi-sweet chocolate, bittersweet chocolate and all kinds of. Delicious flavorings like hazelnut liqueur, frangelico, vanilla, coffee and cream. They’ve been chilling in the refrigerator. You can scoop this with spoons the old fashioned way with a small ice cream scoop. Makes it really lovely.

It’s easy, and you get every single ball exactly the same. And I’m going to roll each one and chopped hazelnuts that I’ve toasted in an oven for about. Ten minutes at 325. Remember, you don’t want perfect little circles. You want them to look like wild truffles. That’s great for the holidays.

Just pack them up in a bag and it’s a great hostess gift. So I’m starting with two extra large eggs. The original ones actually didn’t have peanut butter chips in them, but I thought, nothing’s ever made worse with peanut butter, right?

So I’ve got two extra large eggs and a tablespoon of instant espresso powder and that really brings out the chocolate. Plus two teaspoons of vanilla. That also brings out the chocolate flavor. These cookies are actually amazing. They’re like these big mounds and they’re stuffed with chocolate chips and peanut

Butter chips and pecans and walnuts. They’re so good. So I’m just going to mix this all up. Then I need three quarters of a cup of sugar. So Jeffrey and I have divided up the tasks for dinner. He’s at the vineyard, he’s choosing wines, and I’m in charge of baking and cooking.

Wait a minute. That doesn’t sound fair, does it? So this is going to mix on high speed for about two minutes. Then we’re going to add lots of really good stuff. I’ll show you what happens. This is why it’s important for the eggs to be at room temperature because you want it to

Sort of fall back on itself on a ribbon, which is exactly where it is. So now it’s time to add the chocolate. And what I’ve done is I’ve melted the chocolate ahead. It’s really easy to do.

All I did was put six tablespoons of unsalted butter into a bowl set over a pan of simmering water with six ounces of semi-sweet chocolate chips, two ounces of unsweetened chocolate, and just melted everything together until it was just melted. Then I just took the mixture off to cool.

Okay, so with the mixer on low. I’m just going to add the chocolate. This is very chocolatey. You want to be sure this is really cool because the last thing you want is to add hot chocolate to eggs. You’ll have chocolate scrambled eggs. Nobody’s idea of a good dessert. Okay, that’s in.

Okay, so now the dry mixture. The first thing is the third of a cup of flour. One reason why these are so intensely chocolatey and fudgy is it’s got very little flour in it. One teaspoon of baking powder. And a quarter of a teaspoon of salt. And just mix that together.

And then with the mixer on low, just put it in really slowly so it gets mixed in. And then I’m going to add all kinds of nuts. Chips. Great. So I need one cup of whole pecan halves. It’s really important that they be whole. The cotton halves as opposed to chopped pecans.

I need a cup of whole walnut halves. And again, it’s really important for these to be whole because then it’s going to be really chunky in the cookie. Two thirds of a cup of peanut butter chips. Yum. I have to stop myself from eating them while I’m making it.

And six ounces of chocolate chips. Semi-sweet chocolate chips. Come right in. And then the key to this is one tablespoon of flour. And what that does is keep them from sinking to the bottom of the mixture. So I’m just going to mix them up like this.

I mean, it looks like trail mix to start with. Okay. Now I’m going to add the chocolate mixture. Jeffrey loves these. So I thought, why not? It just smells incredibly chocolatey. Fabulous. I’m just going to fold these together and then I’m going to make these globs, chocolate globs.

I think Jeffrey’s going to like this, and I’m just going to make a round ball with this. Just scoop it out right onto the sheet pan. How bad does that look? Okay. Into the oven, 325 for 15 minutes and we’re going to have chocolate peanut butter

Globs. So the first thing I’m going to make is chocolate cupcakes with peanut butter frosting. So I need one and a half sticks. It’s 12 tablespoons of unsalted butter at room temperature. And then I use two kinds of sugar, brown sugar, because it has a little bit of a molasses flavor.

I need two thirds of a cup. Just like that. That’s one third. And I also use granulated sugar. Because it makes it lighter. If I used all brown sugar, it would be too dense. Two thirds of a cup of granulated sugar. I’m going to cream those together. Okay. Two eggs, extra large eggs.

And you want them at room temperature. That way they mix in best. Just until they get completely incorporated. Two teaspoons of vanilla. So far it smells like chocolate chip cookies. Okay, now for some wet ingredients. I need a cup of buttermilk. Half a cup of sour cream.

It actually makes the batter really thick and it keeps the cake very moist. And two tablespoons of coffee. Just stir that together. Just going to combine this. Until it’s smooth. Okay. Now for the dry ingredients. One and three quarters. Cups of flour. I use unbleached all purpose flour. One cup of cocoa powder.

This is what gives it all the chocolate flavor. And now you see why I sift everything? Because the cocoa powder has lumps in it. One and a half teaspoons of baking soda. And half a teaspoon of salt, actually. Salt is really surprisingly important when you’re baking.

It really brings out the coffee and the chocolate and the peanut butter flavor. Okay, Just sift those all together. Okay. So how’s this doing? And low speed. I’m going to add the dry ingredients. Now for some wet ingredients. This smells amazing.

Really chocolatey and then just finish it up with a spatula and make sure it’s really, well, mixed. Okay. Into the muffin cups. Okay. Into the oven. 350 degrees for 20 to 25 minutes. And then I’m going to work on the icing.

This recipe is actually originally from my friend Kathleen King, who owns Tate’s incredible bakery in South Hampton. And she makes this peanut butter frosting. So I need one cup of confectioners sugar, one cup of peanut butter, smooth or creamy? Okay. Five tablespoons of unsalted butter at room temperature.

It’s really important. So it blends in really well. I’m just going to start mixing that on low speed so you don’t have confectioners sugar everywhere. Three quarters of a teaspoon of good vanilla extract. And the last thing is a third of a cup of cream to make it nice and creamy.

You just want to mix it. I don’t want to whip it because I don’t want it to light and fluffy. I want it to have great flavor. Okay, that’s it. That’s the frosting. And the last one. And now I’m going to sprinkle it with chopped peanuts. Make it even better.

This is actually wonderful because it gives a texture, but you also know that it’s peanuts from the peanuts on top. I don’t know. With a dessert like this, the rest of the meal better be pretty good to stand up to it. Chocolate ganache cake is such a Barefoot Contessa classic.

We made it into wedding cakes for 600 people. We’ve made it into individual ganache cakes. But what everybody remembers most is the chocolate ganache cupcakes with a little candied violin on top. So I thought it’d be really fun to do for the Barefoot reunion.

So to make it, I start with a quarter of a pound of butter at room temperature. Very important and a cup of sugar. It’s got a secret ingredient. I’ll show you. I’m going to beat those together until they’re light and fluffy. For extra large eggs.

And low speed. Add the eggs one at a time. Until they’re, well, mixed in. Now comes the secret ingredient, chocolate syrup. I know it sounds odd in a cake, but it’s really good. 16 ounce can. This recipe originally comes from my friend Devon Fredricks, who owned Loaves and Fishes

When she was like 25 years old. She’s an amazing cook. One tablespoon of good vanilla extract. And the last thing is a cup of flour. Just sprinkle it in slowly so it doesn’t get lumpy. And this is the point. You want to mix in the flour just enough, but don’t over beat

It. Otherwise it’ll make a tough cake. That looks really good. It smells so chocolatey. So this is enough for one. 8 or 9 inch cake. But I’m going to make 12 cupcakes out of it. So I’m gonna use it. A muffin pan. Very inexpensive muffin pan for the.

From the hardware store and an ice cream scoop, which gives you perfect cupcakes every time. It’s much easier to measure. You want them almost filled. They don’t rise too much. And then later, after they cool, I’m going to do shiny chocolate glaze. It’s double chocolate, double trouble.

So I’m going to bake these at 325 for about 25 to 30 minutes. Everybody likes a nice chocolate cake, but it’s the icing that everybody loves. For my chocolate cake, I going to do a chocolate ganache icing, which is a shiny chocolate glaze. It’s really easy to make.

So in a double boiler, which is basically just a heatproof bowl over simmering water, I’m going to put one half a cup of heavy cream, half a pound of semi-sweet chocolate chips. And because I always like coffee and chocolate, it gives it a real depth of

Flavor. Add a tablespoon of instant coffee granules. So I’m just going to let that sit over simmering water until it just melts. Don’t want to burn it. Just stir it around. So the ganache is still a little bit warm, so it’s easy to pour. Isn’t it amazing how shiny it is? Just gorgeous.

And you can really taste that little bit of coffee in it. It really brings out the chocolate flavor. I can imagine the big vats of ganache we used to make for chocolate wedding cakes was such an unusual wedding cake and I would cover it in fresh violets and white roses.

So beautiful big shiny chocolate wedding cake. I have wonderful candied violets that we used to use that we put on each one. Edible violets. These are sometimes a little hard to find, but if you find a bakery supply store or a specialty food store or a cake decorating store or something like that.

They are. Cakes. Remember these? Hey. Hey. Violet. How come you get those with Violet? The little Violet’s beautiful. If I have one, go to chocolate cake. This is it. It’s chocolate ganache cake. And it starts with one quarter of a pound of unsalted butter, and it has to be at room

Temperature. One cup of sugar. This cake is amazing because you can make it in almost any size, and it’s completely foolproof. I’m just going to cream these together until the butter is light and fluffy and the sugar is mixed in.

So first what I’ve done is I’ve buttered an eight inch round pan and it’s got a nice high two inch side. And then the question is, how do you get a square piece of parchment paper into a round

Pan? So take the piece of paper and do it in half and then fold it in half again. Fold it in half again, just as many times as you can. Just like that. And then you put the tip right where the middle of the pan is and cut off inside the

Pan like that. And if it’s too big, you can just refold it and recut it. And now what I want to do is butter the paper in the pan and flour the whole thing. So I just use the paper the butter came out of. Easy as it can be.

A little bit of flour and just flour, the whole pan, the sides and everything. Just make sure you get the whole thing. The butter and sugar is perfectly mixed. It’s kind of light and fluffy and the butter is pale yellow. So now the next thing I want to add is four eggs.

Just I’m going to do it on low speed and I add one egg at a time just until it’s incorporated. The next ingredient in this cake is the secret ingredient, chocolate syrup. It’s a whole 16 ounce can. I’m just going to pour it right in. Next is a tablespoon of vanilla.

It’s a lot of vanilla for an eight inch cake, but it really makes it taste great. Okay. And the last ingredient is flour. I’m going to turn it on low. One cup of all purpose flour.

And at this point, I don’t want to over mix it, so I’m just going to put it in slowly. If you dump it in, you’ll end up with lumps. But if you put it in slowly with a mixer on low speed, you’ll end up with a delicious

Cake every time, just until it’s mixed in. I love the smell of this. Okay. I think it’s perfectly mixed. Okay. I want to make sure there are no lumps, no flour. Perfect. I’m just going to pour it right into the pan.

This cake isn’t going to rise very much, so don’t worry about it filling the pan. It doesn’t have any leavening in it. I’m going to bake this cake. 325 degrees for about 40 to 45 minutes just until a cake tester comes out clean.

And in the meantime, I’ve actually made not one, but two cakes. I’ll bet you’re wondering why. I’m going to tell you in a second. And I’ve made chocolate ganache to pour all over the cakes. Look how gorgeous it is. It’s so rich and wonderful. Let me tell you how I made it.

I poured a cup of heavy cream into a bowl set over a pan of simmering water. I added a pound of semi-sweet chocolate chips, two teaspoons of instant coffee granules to bring out the flavor of the chocolate and stirred it occasionally while it melted together.

In fact, the more you stir it, the shinier it gets. Now you’re going to find out the reason why I made two cakes. Ladyhawke, who does social media with me. We did a video recently for Instagram of how to do a Chevron pattern on a chocolate cake. You made it look very easy.

So nervous. It was so much fun. So I’m turning the tables on Lottie and I’m going to teach her how to do the Chevron pattern. So I combined one and three quarters cups of Confectioner’s sugar and about three tablespoons of water.

You want to adjust it a little bit just so you get a really thick pouring consistency. Okay, so now you take a little knife and you use the back of the knife. Not the not the cutting edge, the back. And you slide it right across kind of lightly. One more. Yeah, Yeah.

I’m going to make chocolate banana cream pie. It’s classic comfort food. It’s got a graham cracker crust, chocolate pudding, bananas and whipped cream on top. I mean, a duh. Who wouldn’t love that? So it starts with a really rich chocolate pudding.

So I need three quarters of a cup of sugar, five extra large egg yolks. This is one time they don’t have to be room temperature. A third of a cup of cornstarch. We want a really rich, thick chocolate pudding. And a teaspoon of salt.

I know it sounds odd to put salt in something sweet, but it really brings out the chocolate flavor. Okay, I’m just going to mix these together. Low speed, just until they’re combined. The next thing I need is four cups of scalded milk, which means it’s just below the

Simmering point. You’ll see little bubbles right around the edge. And that’s when it’s perfect. And since it’s really hard to pour milk from a pot into a mixer and it’s hot milk, I’m going to pour it into a measuring cup that has a spout. It’s much easier.

So I’m just going to take this and pour it very slowly into the eggs. What I don’t want to do is scramble the eggs. So you want them to warm up really slowly. It’s really like making a custard. A really rich, deep chocolate custard.

Okay. Now what I’m going to do is I’m going to take this and pour it back into the pan and cook it for a few minutes, just until it’s really thick. And then I’m going to add lots of chocolate. So pour it back into the pan.

Same pan. You don’t have to clean the pan out. Okay, I’m just going to cook this at a medium low heat for about five minutes, just until it’s really thick. I’ll see you on the other side. This looks like it’s perfect. You can see it’s sort of the consistency of warm pudding.

Now I’m going to turn off the heat and I’m going to add lots of chocolate. Seven ounces of bittersweet chocolate. Just pour it in. It’s just going to melt right into it. Next is two tablespoons of unsalted butter. I’ve just diced it up so it melts in.

Just give it a little extra richness. And now, because I love coffee and chocolate together, I’m going to add two things that have coffee flavor. The first one is a tablespoon of coffee liqueur. Just gives it real depth of flavor. And we want lots of flavor.

And the second one is instant coffee or espresso, whichever one you like. Whatever you have in the pantry, it doesn’t really matter. It smells so good. All the chocolate and the coffee together. It’s just fantastic. Next thing is to pour it into the crust. And this is my foolproof graham cracker crust.

Let me tell you how I made it. I put 10 to 12 graham crackers in the food processor and ground them up, transferred the crumbs to a bowl, added a quarter of a cup of sugar, and three quarters of a stick of

Melted butter, stirred the mixture together, poured it into an 11 inch false bottom fluted pie tin, pressed it gently with a measuring cup into the corners and across the base, making sure the sides and bottom are an even thickness.

Then bake the crust at 350 degrees for ten minutes, then set it aside to cool completely. It’s really important to let the crust cool completely so the warm pudding doesn’t soak into the crust. So here comes the moment. I’m just going to pour it in and hopefully it’s just the right amount.

Oh, how good does this look and how good does it smell? And you want it right up to the top. Just smooth it out. So I’m just going to add bananas and whipped cream to this. Now, this is my kind of fruit dessert.

And what I’m going to do now is I’m going to put a little plastic wrap. I want to chill this, but I don’t want it to form a skin. So I’m going to take a piece of plastic wrap and just put it directly on the pudding and that’ll keep it nice and creamy.

So just smooth this out and I’m going to chill it for six hours and then I’m going to put bananas and whipped cream on top. But I happen to have one already chilled in the fridge. This is the chilled pie. And I made some whipped cream.

Look how dark and delicious and chocolatey this looks. Wow. I love it. And I’ve made whipped cream its three ingredients really easy. I poured a cup of cold, heavy cream into an electric mixer. It has to be cold because you can’t whip warm cream.

Then added one tablespoon of sugar, a teaspoon of vanilla. Turn the mixer to medium high and whisk it until it just made firm peaks. I’ve sliced some bananas. 2 or 3, depending on how big they are, and I’m going to put them in concentric circles right on top of the tart.

Now that looks pretty good already, but I’m going to make it even better. So I’m going to put a layer of whipped cream on top. This is a really earthy dessert. It’s very comfort food. This isn’t the time to pipe whipped cream. This is the time to just slather it on.

And what I want to do is just push it right to the edge. But I still want you to see the bananas and the chocolate. I think it looks so much better that way. I think we need a little more whipped cream, though.

Just kind of pile it up Now, was this the ultimate comfort food or what? Maybe a little extra decoration, like shaved chocolate on the top. I’ve used bittersweet chocolate in the tart, but if I use milk chocolate, if you have a little bit, it’s actually easier to shave and make curls.

Otherwise it tends to just end up kind of ground on top. Look how good that looks. Okay, let’s see if I’m going to put it on a cake stand. So I’ve got a nice cake stand, and let’s see if I can get it out of the tart shell.

So this is a false bottom tart shell. So what you do is just take it off and slide it right onto the cake stand. Now, I don’t know that this is everybody’s idea of a make-ahead fruit dessert, but you can make a lot of it ahead. And it’s got fruit in it, right?

Works for me. So it’s one and three quarters of a cup of flour. I’m going to sift all the dry ingredients together. Two cups of sugar. I’m going to sift them right into the bowl. Mixing bowl. And since the chocolate cake with chocolate buttercream, it’s got three quarters of a cup

Of cocoa powder. Dark chocolate, cocoa powder. It smells so good. It’s so chocolatey. Okay. One teaspoon of baking powder, two teaspoons of baking soda helps it rise. One teaspoon of salt. I’m just going to sift all these together.

So the method of this cake is to sift all the dry ingredients together in a cloud of chocolate. And then I’m going to slowly mix the wet ingredients into it. Okay, That’s the dry ingredients. I’m just going to mix them on the mixer until they’re combined. Okay, now for the wet ingredients.

The first thing is a cup of buttermilk. I always shake it because it does settle. Make sure it’s, well, mixed. So I’m going to do it in a measuring cup. That’ll be easier to pour into the cake batter. So I need one cup of buttermilk. Half a cup of vegetable oil.

Two eggs just beat the eggs a little bit right into the wet ingredients. I use extra large eggs. One teaspoon of good vanilla. Really important when you’re doing chocolate. Okay. I’m just going to combine these. And then with a mixer on low, I’m just going to put it into the dry mixture.

And then I have a secret ingredient, or I should say Michael’s grandmother had a secret ingredient. This recipe calls for a cup of hot brewed coffee. And I always think coffee is really important for chocolate and makes it taste really chocolatey. And that’s exactly what this does. Right into the mixture.

I’ve got two eight inch cake pans. I lined them with parchment paper. Butter and flour. Pressure’s on. It has to be good because Michael knows exactly what it is. He actually served this cake to me once at dinner, and I just begged him for the recipe. I didn’t have to beg very hard.

I’ll make sure they’re pretty equal size. Okay. Into the oven, 350 degrees for 35 to 40 minutes. And then we’re going to cover it with the easiest, most delicious butter cream you’ve ever seen. So we’ll chop up six ounces of really good semi-sweet chocolate.

I’m just going to melt the chocolate in a bowl that I’ve set over simmering water. In the meantime, we’re going to start the rest of the buttercream. So I need two sticks of butter, half a pound at room temperature. I’m just going to beat that on medium speed.

Okay. The next thing I need is one extra large egg yolk and a teaspoon of good vanilla extract. Okay. I think the chocolate’s going to be ready by now. Let’s see. Take this off the heat and just let the chocolate cool while I turn the cakes

Out. Just add it to the butter and vanilla. So I’ve got two teaspoons of hot water. I’m just going to put in a tablespoon of instant coffee powder, which is a very intense coffee. Just melt this together and pour it into the buttercream. I’m just going to whip it for a minute.

Make sure it’s really well blended. I’m gonna turn it on low and add all this gorgeous chocolate. The chocolate is actually cooled now a little bit. You don’t want to pour hot chocolate into butter, otherwise the whole thing will melt. You really smell the chocolate and the coffee together.

A little hint of vanilla. And that’s Michael’s grandmother’s chocolate buttercream. Icing a cake. Just go over it very gently. Start from the top and work your way down the sides. Okay, so now I’ve got buttercream on all sides of the cake. I’m just going to go up and down the sides.

And good news about an old fashioned cake is it’s supposed to be a little messy, and then I’m just going to smooth the top. Just sort of big swirls. I can’t wait for dessert.