Cake is Delicious: Chocolate Orange

Katie is here, Katie is here!

I knew I wanted to be best friends with Katie the first time I met her. We were nine. She had a perm and white jeans and someone told me that her Dad worked for a candy company. It was a no-brainer.

When I think of Katie I think of chocolate. I think about how much we both love it. I think about the tour of Brach & Brock that her Dad, Jerry, gave us on her 13th birthday. I think about one night when we deliriously believed that there were chocolate Easter eggs hidden in her house in March. I could go on and on.

I have already shared with you my opinion that coming home is a perfect occasion for sharing food. Visiting is much the same way.

I visited Katie in Chicago two months ago. My eyes were drawn to one thing upon entering her kitchen: a giant, five pound five KG (12 pound) bar of chocolate that her Jerry had lugged home from Europe. She had waited for me to open it! We left it on the counter with a paring knife all weekend and chiseled off pieces every time we walked by. Of course I wanted to have something equally special waiting for her.

So I made this: chocolate orange upside down cake. It was just the perfect amount of batter because it made one 10 inch cake and two cupcakes. That meant one cupcake for me, hot out of the oven, and one cupcake for her, sitting in my car when she got off the plane.

We had a fantastic weekend that was over all too quickly.

In less than 48 hours we went to the Nashville farmer's market, 12th South Taproom, the downtown art crawl, Manny's House of Pizza, Marche, Hot & Cold and Taco Mamacita.

On Saturday night we threw a party at my house and in classic Hannah-Katie fashion, we ate strawberry ice cream, drank a good deal of wine and promptly fell asleep at 11:30, before the party was even over.

We laughed. A lot. I am worn out, to say the least. I cannot wait for her to come back again.

<-- Katie at Marche.




Chocolate Orange Upside Down Cake
6 T butter
1/4 cup brown sugar
2 oranges
5oz chocolate (I used 4oz dark, 1oz milk)
1 cup almond flour
1/3 cup honey
4 eggs, divided
1/2 t baking soda
pinch of kosher salt

Preheat oven to 350. Place 2T of butter in 10 inch cake pan to melt while oven warms up. Slice one orange very thin. When butter is melted, sprinkle brown sugar over it and layer orange slices so that they cover the mixture.
Beat egg yolks, almond flour, honey, baking soda and salt in one bowl. Add about 2t of zest from the second orange. Melt the chocolate with the rest of the butter and fold in with spatula.
Beat egg whites until they have at least doubled in size, but not so much that they are forming peaks. Fold egg whites into the rest of the batter. Pour on top of the oranges and bake immediately for about 35 minutes.
* Remember, you WILL have slightly too much batter. Pour accordingly.
* This cake is best served fresh with a drizzle of chocolate syrup. It DOES need to be refrigerated.