Cake #2: Chocolate Cake with Blackberry Filling

So, not too long ago I attended a wedding, which included the baking of a seriously good looking cake. (I swear there's also cake under there.) I watched them making it Friday night/Saturday morning. And I thought: I should start making cakes. Regularly.

And thus, I have started. Since one of the Thirsty Thursday crew was having a BBQ/Dinner Party, I decided to foist upon them moist, delicious cake.


(Picture courtesy of leahseraph.)

Slightly less ambitious, but tasty. The recipe was pretty much straight from the book. The substance was the Devil's Food Cake from King Arthur's Baking Companion (thanks to misshepeshu for getting this into my hands.) The recipe is a bit denser than I think I'd like in cake (though not as dense as any of the brownies that are my regular staple). I think I'd like to try for a chocolate cake that's lighter at some point; I may have to find one.

The filling is a blackberry topping. The blackberries were hand-picked at a quite lovely spot near where I live. I used the strawberry topping for cheesecake recipe in Cook's Illustrated Best Recipes and modified it for blackberries. (Well, I didn't have any jam, either.) Or, really, I just made the raspberry glaze I used to make for my brownies, back before the cheesecake brownie days. Either way, it was a blackberry jam. Very easy to make (possibly a bit too sweet, as I added sugar as per CIBR. Not sure it was needed.) Very runny, though. I'd've preferred a thicker sort of filling so I could make the blackberry layer thicker. Not sure how I would accomplish this, though. I may need to find a recipe that isn't designed for a glaze. (It was a bit thicker than a glaze might be. And on a side note, I used leftover blackberry filling with the lemon poppyseed muffins I commonly make, which had a very tasty result.)

The chocolate glaze is straight out of King Arthur. It's also a bit runny, though very tasty. I think next time I'm going to try for more of an frosting rather than a glaze. Kind Arthur has a Thick Fudge Frosting recipe that looks like it would be good. I think that might go with a lighter chocolate cake as well. (Or maybe a not-chocolate cake.)

Decorating it are more of the hand-picked blackberries. Mmm, tasty.