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Remember the other day when I said I was going to try to make the Tunnel of Fudge cake again, except this time I would not forget the brown sugar? I did try again. The second attempt was for Duncan’s birthday party with friends. A photo: 
This isn’t an attempt, dear reader, to extort validation from you, because I already believe this photo to be gorgeous, and you won’t change my mind if you say otherwise. BUT when isn’t a picture worth a 1000 words? How about when you want to tell a sad tale about how incredibly ugly something turned out and the picture makes it seem otherwise?
I made the cake again, determined to do everything perfectly. I started with a completely clean kitchen so that there wouldn’t be any chance of leaving something out. I used a melted butter and cocoa mixture to carefully oil every nook and cranny in my fancy bundt pan. I mise-en-placed, I measured, I scraped. I read the recipe, I checked it twice, and thrice. I combined the mixtures so gently, and I did not overstir. I baked up my cake. I was amazed at the difference from before. Although my last cake had turned out, this one was a revelation. It baked up at least 1/3 higher than before and it came out of the pan perfectly, with every decorative detail intact. Then I made the glaze. This time I used the cream the recipe called for (rather than the 1% I had used last time) and I was amazed at the difference. The glaze looked absolutely decadent. I was thrilled.
Kate decided at this moment that she needed to use the toilet (another story for another post). I thought this was perfect timing because I was supposed to let the glaze sit for 25 minutes anyway. Kate wanted to sit for a long time, so finally I had to ask Pdad to take over and I returned to my glaze. It was hard–not even spreadable–and certainly not pourable. I did not panic. I heated a little extra cream and stirred it into the solid chocolate mass and loosened it up. “I’m getting to be such an accomplished baker!,” I sang in my head. “Look! I can fix problems!” I started to pour the glaze on to the cake. It was still a little too thick. At first it looked pretty good, but I wanted it perfect, so I kept poking and prodding, spreading and stretching. It began to look worse and worse. From here, friends, you can guess how this sad story ends. The more I did, the worse it became. The worse it became, the more I did. I tried to mix just a little water on top of the dried glaze to make it smoother (this works nicely on buttercreams), but my shiny ganache turned to muddled mud. My smile turned upside down. Worst of all, I was out of time. The guests were at the door. I had to leave well enough alone–too late. Everlastingly too late.
The children at the party didn’t comment. The cake was delicious–the brown sugar is key. Do I try again?
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7 Responses to “Sad Sight Revisited”
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Yes, try again! You were so close this time! fyi – water mixed with chocolate = disaster.
next time, you might want to heat it up just a bit and stir well if you run into the same glaze problem. You can do it!!
…but it TASTED great, right?
Okay, my go-to solution for icing nightmares is to throw some texture on like “I meant to do that.” I’ve planned and not planned to use toasted coconut, chopped nuts, grated chocolate and/or curls. Just makes it yummier. Now, in a fancy Bundt it would camoflage the shape of the cake. But then again, it would also camoflage the shape of the glaze.
Please try again… when I am in town.
Fixing seized chocolate (if indeed that is what happened, but I don’t think it was): http://candy.about.com/od/workingwithchocolate/a/chocmistakes.htm
I think your ganache just got hard as it cooled, which is natural. Had you had more time, I am reasonably sure that your approach would have worked, perhaps even without adding more milk. I would suggest rewarming it in a double-boiler adding milk only if needed to loosen it up once it is thoroughly warm.
Just had to add another note — I just read somewhere online about using a hairdryer to give cakes a glossy finish — can you believe it?! Apparently, some wedding cakes sport a slight sheen these days, and I guess a hairdryer is involved. If you need to touch up, you just smooth it out and re-blast. Who knew?
If you temper the ganache correctly, it should have that sheen naturally, but that is difficult to do, especially for home cooks. I think the hairdryer idea might work. It would be worth a try (I think).
Sharon–I like both of your ideas. Adding texture didn’t even occur to me. Duncan would have been thrilled by red sprinkles! Of course, the cake would then definitely have lacked the elegance I was aiming for, but I had already brought that problem upon myself. I also like the hairdryer idea, I bet that would have worked.
Jim F., The chocolate didn’t seize (unfortunately I can say this with confidence because I have experience with chocolate seizing so I am familiar with that phenomenon). My ganache turned out perfect and shiny. I think you are right–it just got too cold when I was with Kate, and then I didn’t get it warm enough before I poured it over the cake. It was still very beautiful when I first poured it on, it was the messing with it, trying to move it around, that dulled and ruined its looks.
Strangely enough, the hairdryer sheen was in referance to buttercream! So I don’t know if it would bring back the shine to a ganache. But it would warm it up and maybe let you jiggle it around. : )