Description
This chocolate honey cake reeks of chocolate and honey and all in a fabulous way!
Ingredients
1 1/2 cups all-purpose flour
1 t baking soda*
1 T cocoa
1 c boiling water
Optional: 1 t espresso powder and 1 t vanilla extract
Sticky Honey Glaze:
1/4 c water
1/2 c honey
6 oz semisweet chocolate, chopped
1/2 c plus 2 T powdered sugar
Instructions
Preheat the oven to 350 degrees F.
Butter and line a 9-inch springform pan.
Melt chocolate in microwave or over low heat on stove. Set aside to cool.
In a stand mixer, beat together sugar and soft, room temperature butter until creamy, and then add the honey.
Add 1 of the eggs, beating it in with one tablespoon of flour, and then add the other egg with another tablespoon of flour. Fold in the melted chocolate, and then the rest of the flour and baking soda. Add the cocoa, pushed through a fine wire mesh strainer to ensure no lumps, and then beat in the boiling water. Mix everything well to make a smooth batter and pour into the prepared spring-form pan.
Bake up to 1 1/2 hours, but check the cake after 45 minutes and if it is getting too dark, cover the top lightly with aluminium foil and check every 15 minutes so the cake does not scorch.
Let the cake cool completely in the pan on a rack.
Make Glaze:
Bring the water and honey to a boil in a saucepan, then turn off the heat and add the finely chopped chocolate, swirling it around to melt in the hot liquid. Leave a few minutes, then whisk together. Add the powdered sugar through a fine mesh strainer and whisk again until smooth.
Pour glaze over the cold chocolate honey cake; it might dribble a bit down the edges, but I just spread it around. The glaze remains tacky, so make a head and let it sit a bit. It does not totally dry out like a buttercream does. This is more like a sticky ganache.
Notes
* I used a scant 3/4 t of baking soda at Denver's altitude
This is Nigella's honeybee cake. You do not see marzipan honeybees, because I don't have the patience for that!



