CHOCOLATE CAKE better than Bruce’s mom’s! | Practical Peculiarities

You have to admit, we’ve all drooled over the chocolate cake from the film Matilda. Well this decadent, moist and fudgy chocolate cake is one that will satisfy those cravings. Follow along to recreate this easy recipe at home. As miss Trunchbull said “This cake is the most scrumptious cake in the entire world!” I really do believe that. Chocolate is quite simple yet so hypnotizing. Also, you haven’t lived until you’ve tried the “Milk Moat Method!”
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Preheat oven to 315°F (158°C)
INGREDIENTS
-CAKE-
1 ½ cups (330g) whole milk
1 ½ Tbsp distilled white vinegar
3 cups (375g) all-purpose flour
2 ½ + 2 Tbsp (525g) granulated sugar
1 cups + 2 Tbsp (83g) natural unsweetened cocoa powder (Hersheys)
3 tsp (14g) baking soda
1 ½ tsp baking powder
1 tsp kosher salt
3 large eggs (room temp)
1 ½ cups (320g) vegetable oil
2 ½ tsp pure vanilla extract
1 ½ tsp instant espresso powder
1 ½ cups boiling water

-FUDGE FROSTING-
90g dark chocolate bar 70%
3 cups (600g) granulated sugar
1 cup + 2 Tbsp (170g) cornstarch
¾ cups (65g) natural unsweetened cocoa powder (Hersheys)
¾ tsp instant espresso powder
½ tsp kosher salt
2 tsp pure vanilla extract (forgot to say this in the video)
3 cups (675g) cold water
6 Tbsp (75g) unsalted butter (cold)

Use two 9-inch cake pans for best results.

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-COOKBOOK-
Peculiar Baking: A Practical Guide to Strange Confections is available for pre-order!
https://www.nikkalcaraz.com/cookbook
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Illustrations by: Mauricio Macias

[Music] this chocolate cake is so good it’s everything that you want in chocolate cake it’s dense it is mouthwatering it’s fudgy I put my sweat and blood into developing the recipe for this cake but to be honest I wasn’t going to share it if you’re familiar with me and my work you know that my Creations are a bit more Artful some may say peculiar but after I posted this video to social media about the best way to eat a chocolate cake I soon realized how magical a simple chocolate cake could be so without further Ado I give you my version of the iconic cake that we all craved when we were kids I’m Nick and welcome to practical peculiarities First set the oven to 315° F gather and measure all the ingredients and put a pot of water to boil next mix the milk with vinegar and set it aside to curdle to a large bowl mix the flour sugar and cocoa powder it’s important to use a good quality cocoa powder for this cocoa powder is notorious for clumping so you must sift it in to avoid any little lumps add the baking soda baking powder salt and mix it [Music] up next add three unborn [Music] chickens dump it the milk and oil and mix it [Music] up oops don’t forget the vanilla a nice cup of boiling coffee really enhances the flavor by blooming the chocolate slowly pour it into the mixture while whisking the mixture is going to look liquidy but I promise that’s how it’s supposed to look next you want to work quickly because the leavers are already activated so grease two 9in cake pans and divide the batter evenly ooh a Choco River you can eyeball it like I am or you can use a scale but the beauty about this cake is that its imperfect charm makes it look so delicious give the pans a nice little tap on the counter and bake them for 70 to 75 minutes have you noticed that in the films Willy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory the witches and Matilda they all have a boy who is absolutely hypnotized by chocolate I think it’s so creative how they utilize chocolate in these stories like in Willy Wonka they have a Choco River and in the witches they have the chocolate bars that contain Formula 86 a potion to turn children into mice and of course in Matilda when a grownup forces a boy to eat the entire confection in front of the whole school chocolate is so simple but it can be transformed into something quite enchanting when I was developing the recipe for the frosting I knew that I wanted it to be shiny and fudgy and slick just like the film so first I start with the dark chocolate bar this is about 70% cocoa and I grate it on a microplane till it turns into chocolate dust this helps the chocolate melt faster when we add it to the frosting later you’ll be left over with little Nubs at the end and you can just chop those as small as you can in a medium sauce pot add the sugar and corn starch again you also want to sift in the cocoa powder this is definitely a place you don’t want any lumps some espresso powder which like I said before really enhances the flavor salts and mix it up add the water while whisking slowly [Music] once everything’s dissolved switch to a rubber spatula for better control now you want to mix it until it turns to the consistency of pudding once it starts to really thicken up remove it from the heat from there you want to throw in the chocolate and mix until it’s melted this is why grating it comes in handy now lastly to give it its Sleek signature shine stir in the [Music] butter turn it out on a dinner plate to [Music] cool you know it’s the right consistency when you spread it and it holds its shape once baked turn the cooled cakes out onto a parchment [Music] paper use a cake leveler or a serrated knife to split them down the middle place a layer of the cake on a cake stand then add a few scoops of [Music] icing repeat this for the rest of the layers the frosting is slick so you don’t want to add too much of it in between or else the layers are going to slip and [Music] slide one of my favorite tricks is placing the cake stand on top of a lazy Susan and running a small offset spatula on the side of the chocolate [Music] cake when I get to the top I do the same thing right until I reach the middle [Music] and Bam a perfect decadent chocolate cake now as you can see it’s not perfectly level and the frosting is not perfectly spread but I believe this adds to the whimsicality of it all there are only two ways to eat this cake the first is the milk method and the milk method is essentially placing the cake in a bowl and then adding a moat of milk all the way around it just tames the richness of the chocolate perfectly and the second way is of course the Bruce bog Trotter method and you will not leave this platform until you have consumed the entire confection entire confection that’s good if you liked tonight video please give it a thumbs up like And subscribe also my new cookbook peculiar baking is available for pre-order and it’ll have loads of peculiar treats that you can bake all year it’s really fun and I’m really excited for it if you’d like to see more peculiar treats follow me over on my social media and remember the more you view the more peculiarities will ensue happy baking [Music]