Recipe: Chocolate Chiffon Cake

A friend of mine recently asked me to make a cake for his cousin's birthday, and I was more than happy to commission a cake for him. I'm always looking for an excuse to bake keke. After chatting a bit, my options came down to either Red Velvet or Chocolate, but you really can't go wrong with Chocolate. I thought that I'd step it up a notch and make a Chocolate Chiffon cake, a lighter, fluffier chocolate cake, so I went searching for a good recipe and I came across this one. (This site is actually one of the first places I go for baking inspiration and recipes.) Although the ingredients are all the same, I did a few things slightly differently.

Chocolate Chiffon Cake

with Cream Cheese Frosting and Strawberries

• 6 egg yolks
• 7 egg whites
• 2 cups cake flour (sifted)
• 1/4 cup unsweetened cocoa powder
• 1 1/2 cups granulated white sugar (split into 2 parts of 3/4 cups)
• 2 tsp baking powder
• 1/4 tsp baking soda
• 1/2 tsp salt
• 1/2 cup oil (canola, corn, or vegetable)
• 3/4 water
• 1 1/2 tsp vanilla extract
• 2 cups (estimated) strawberries (or other fruit of your choice)

Begin by preheating the oven to 325 degrees. 

In a large bowl, sift together flour, cocoa powder, the first 3/4 cups of sugar, baking powder, baking soda, and salt.

Well in dry ingredients

In another bowl take your egg yolks, oil, water, and vanilla and whisk them together. Then take your dry ingredients, make a well in the center, and add in the wet ingredients you just mixed. The well in the center of your dry ingredients should look like the picture on the left. Mix the wet and dry ingredients until smooth and completely combined and scrape the sides as you go to ensure that everything is mixed well. 


With either a stand mixer with a whisk attachment or a hand mixer in a separate bowl, beat the egg whites until it becomes white and foamy, then gradually begin to add the last of the sugar (3/4 cups) and continue beating until you get almost stiff peaks. You can also add 1/2 tsp cream of tartar or a couple drops of lemon juice in order to make sure you don't over beat the egg whites, but this is not necessary.

Using a large rubber spatula, gently fold in your egg white mixture into the chocolate batter in two or three parts until just combined, because you don't want to take all of the air out of the batter or it'll take away the cake's fluffiness and delicate texture. As you fold, you should be able to feel the lightness of the batter.

The original recipe calls for you to pour the batter into an ungreased tube/bundt pan, however for the purpose of making a more traditional-looking birthday cake, I decided to use two 9-in pans instead and greased them using a non-stick baking spray (different from non-stick cooking sprays, but they can work too).

Place them in the 350 degree oven and bake for 35 minutes. Keep in mind that this time could be different for your oven. You'll know that they're finished baking when you insert a wooden skewer and it comes out clean. Set the pans on a cooling rack for 15-30 minutes, then flip them to remove the cakes. The cake should have shrunk a little bit (as seen below) and should come out easily. 

Allow the cake to completely cool for at least 1-2 hours, in which time we can make the cream cheese frosting.

• 1 cup (2 sticks) butter (room temperature)
• 2 8oz packs cream cheese (room temperature)
• 2-6 cups confectioner's sugar
• 2 tsp vanilla extract

In a stand mixer with a paddle attachment, or a hand mixer in a separate bowl, beat together the room temp. butter and cream cheese until fluffy. Add vanilla and continue to mix until combined. Mix in confectioner's sugar, a cup at a time, until your desired sweetness is achieved. I only used 2 cups confectioner's sugar because I, personally, don't like super sweet frosting. Mix until powdered sugar is combined. If your frosting is still lumpy, don't worry, just keep mixing until completely smooth which could range from 5-10 minutes depending how long you had your butter and cream cheese sit out (which in my case, wasn't very long). Let your completed frosting sit out at room temperature. Room temperature cream cheese frosting will be easier to spread later on.

When the cake is completely cooled, level out the rounded cake tops. If you have extraordinary knife skills, feel free to use a knife, but if you're like me, I'd use a nifty tool called a cake leveler (great name, huh?). Set the wire to the desired height (I set the one I used to 5), place the legs on a flat surface leveled with the cake and basically cut off the top by sawing against the flat surface. It's a pretty great contraption and definitely gets the job done. 

Once you've got your two even layers, lay the first one on a cardboard cake round. I placed the cardboard round on a Lazy Susan and then on a cake stand to make icing the cake easier. Then is when I start washing and cutting the strawberries into thin slices. Place them onto a paper towel to soak up any extra moisture. You don't want water getting into the frosting. You may or may not use all of the strawberries.

When your strawberries are cut, spread out a thin layer of frosting on your first layer. It doesn't have to be super neat. Place your strawberries onto the frosting then gently lay your second layer of cake on top and align them.

Apply a thicker layer of frosting on top and sides and frost entire cake. I used an offset spatula for this. Keep in mind, I have never completely frosted a cake before this, so clearly I am no professional, but I guess for a first time, my results were decent.

I was pleased with the top of my cake because it turned out pretty smooth. I can't really say the same about the sides, but the strawberry garnish made it much better. Place the strawberries how you want on your cake and you're finished!

And I have received word that my cake was a hit! Thanks to my very first "clients" and happy birthday!

Sweets Raku

This weekend I finally got to go to Sweets Raku, a Japanese dessert restaurant in Las Vegas China Town, and I've got to say, it was well worth the wait.

Most people are seated at the counter and are able to watch their dessert being made right in front of them, and I've got to say that it's pretty entertaining to watch, especially with such a nice, modern-looking kitchen setting (The dish in the picture turned out to be ours). The actual location is a bit small but makes sense since it's a side location of the main restaurant Raku located about 100 feet away in the strip mall, but either way, this place still constitutes in my book as "fancy shmancy". 

When you are seated, you are given two menus - a drink menu, and their ever so popular edible menu which is made of rice paper and served with a sauce of your choice. We chose raspberry sauce and it was delicious! 

While Sweets Raku has quite an assortment of high-end selections, what they're known for is their 3-course dessert option, Prix Fixe. 

The first course, Amuse, is a seasonal sorbet served with white wine jelly. Right now they're serving peach sorbet, and it was perfect. It tasted so refreshing and not overbearingly sweet. And as for the white wine jelly, you could still detect a subtle taste of white wine which complimented the peach sorbet very well.

The second course is the course that you choose from the five choices available that day. Like Amuse, some choices are seasonal. We decided to choose the Marriage, a delicious sponge cake wrapped around banana custard with fresh bananas, and strawberry mousse. The dish also featured some fresh strawberries, raspberries and blueberries, and also white chocolate and gold garnish, which I thought was a nice touch. It's so hard to pick a favorite part of this dessert. The sponge cake itself had so much flavor, but again didn't overpower the rest of the dish's main components. The strawberry mousse was presented beautifully (like everything else served in this place) and was very light and airy. The banana custard was exceptionally creamy and the fresh slices of banana made it even better.

The final course, Petit Four, which is also seasonal, is a cream puff filled with either regular or chocolate cream and a fruit sauce of your choice, served with passion fruit and strawberry marshmallows, and garnished with caramel and orange zest. My first thought was "what could be so special about a cream puff?" but with the first bite, this cream puff told me other wise. The pastry itself is very crisp on the outside and perfectly soft and flaky on the inside, and honestly, I was hesitant on ordering the chocolate cream thinking it would be really overpowering, but it proved to be just as light and delicious as everything else and went well with the strawberry sauce inside. The marshmallows, although small, were packed with so much fruity flavor, which tasted true to their fresh fruit counterparts.

All in all, my experience at Sweets Raku was an enjoyable one. I'm a sucker for food with beautiful presentation and they definitely delivered. Now, with a price of $19 per person who orders the Prix Fixe ($24 for 2 people sharing) and not-so-large servings, I wouldn't say this is an everyday place to enjoy desserts, but if you're in the mood to treat yourself or someone special to something new and refreshing, I say go for it, because you won't regret it. I'm hoping to find other occasions to treat myself just to try all the different options they have!

Even the presentation of their glasses and coasters were nice!