Day Three Hundred Sixty Five: Longest Cake Ever

It's finally here.  The very last day.  I can hardly believe it's been a year.  Happy anniversary to me! I should definitely buy myself a gift.

For my grand finale I decided to choose a special cake recipe, a photo of which graces the cover of one of Martha's books: Martha Stewart Living's 2002 Annual Recipes. The Cover Girl Recipe in this case is Alma Etheridge Wilson's Roanoke Sixteen-Layer Chocolate Fudge Cake. (p. 134).

Yes, that really is the name of the cake.  You can't make this stuff up, people.  This cake has the distinction of being the cake with the longest name ever.*  The only thing longer than its name is the length of time it takes to put this cake together.  I started making this cake at noon on Wednesday and finally cut into it about 9 p.m.  That's a lot of work for a measly eight-inch cake.

* As determined by me, just now, for the purposes of this blog.

Martha doesn't have this recipe online, but it is very similar to her Darkest Chocolate Crepe Cake, which also looks delicious but lacks the lengthy moniker.

You may be wondering why this cake took so long to make.  You start by preparing an eight-inch cake pan by coating it with cooking spray and lining the bottom with a parchment circle (that you've cut out beforehand, natch).  Then coat the parchment with cooking spray and dust with flour, shaking out the excess.  Add a half-cup of batter to the pan and spread the batter evenly. Cook for ten minutes, turning halfway through the baking.  This results in layers that are approximately 1/4 inch thick.

Martha suggests you cook two cakes at one time, repeating the process described above a mere eight times.  Since I only had one eight-inch cake pan, I repeated the process sixteen times.

Alma Etheridge Wilson's Roanoke Sixteen-Layer Chocolate Fudge Cake, remember?

So basically every five minutes I was either turning a pan, removing a pan, removing a cake layer,  cutting a parchment circle or cleaning the stupid solitary eight-inch cake pan I own.

It was a long, long afternoon.

Truthfully I only ended with fourteen layers because I lost two layers in the baking process:  one layer could not bear to be parted from the cake pan and broke apart as I was trying to remove it;  conversely, the other layer flung itself to the floor in a rather dramatic fashion.

And that's truly how it happened.

One of the 1/4 inch thick layers below. Apparently layer number fourteen.  I began to number the layers around hour three in an effort of self-encouragement.

After several hours of baking, I'm was ready to build the cake.  You make the glaze by melting chocolate in hot evaporated milk, mixed with sugar and light corn syrup. Layer one:

 Covered with a couple tablespoons of fudge glaze:

Each layer is sandwiched with chocolate (or is it the other way around?) This is about layer four:

 Halfway through:

When the cake is finished, drizzle the remaining glaze over the top of the cake.

 Unfortunately, the top layer of the cake began to break under the stress of all that delectable chocolate....

 ....If I had a video, you'd see the top layer of the cake riding a wave of fudge glaze, making a run for it and actually sliding right off the top of the cake...and onto the counter.

Could this cake look uglier?  I think not.  I'm always optimistic, however, and still had high hopes.

It's not half bad-looking when cut, right?

In comparison with the cover photo:

Okay, so maybe it is pretty bad. 

As I said, it was late before I cut into this cake and served a piece to my official taste-tester, who is known in certain circles as my husband. When I revealed how long I'd spent baking, he nearly fell off his chair laughing.  His verdict:  had I wanted to make a mushy cake, I could have done so in a lot less time.  

I couldn't be mad because it's the truth. I was hoping to end with something knock-your-socks-off fabulous, but the truth is so much more interesting.

And so my little experiment is at an end.  It's been fun.  It's been frustrating.  I've learned that Martha and her minions are some talented people.  I learned how to make some amazing things, and I've suffered through some embarrassing experiments.  I hope you've learned something, too.  If not, I hope you at least had a chuckle or two at my expense.

I'm sure I will continue to post projects and disasters, but with much less regularity.  Maybe One Martha a Month? ...Stay tuned.

Thanks for reading.
xoxo
MRS