My dad turned 75 this year, and he specifically requested a German chocolate cake to celebrate. I kinda ho-hummed at the thought, but of course I was game to make my dad a special organic treat from scratch, even though I didn’t care for it myself… or so I thought.
Turns out I only hate crappy fake-ass German chocolate cake. The thing that really grossed me out as a kid was the frosting, but I think I had only ever tried the hydrogenated-tastic Betty Crocker type before. REAL German chocolate cake is essentially frosted with a mixture of homemade caramel, toasted pecans and toasted coconut — and it is AMAZING.
I found this recipe online which was clearly written by a German woman, as evidenced by some of her adorable grammar quirks. But another quirk was that she didn’t lay out all the steps ahead of time like most American recipes do — things like greasing the pans, preheating the ovens, and roasting the pecans were all interspersed with the other information. So it took a good couple reads to get organized.
Plus, as always, I added some of my own twists. Amongst other alterations, I used chocolate ganache to stick between the three layers, since I needed some anyway for the decoration. And I think it helped glue it all together better, plus it added an extra kick. And I toasted the coconut and pecans more exactly than the recipe called for, just to bring out their flavor.
And it was EXCELLENT. Man, am I excited to have a new cake recipe to enjoy! It’s not a *pretty* cake, by any means, but what it lacks in glamor, it makes up for in flavor.
Hello,
Just so you know, German chocolate cakes are not traditionally made in Germany. It is named like so because German chocolate is used in its making.