Melt some chocolate, melt some butter, and you have a delicious icing for your cakes. Done right, this coating is good enough on its own. It's my personal practice that anytime a recipe has a flavouring option, I'll default to the one that uses rum, bourbon, cognac, or any other spirit.
Here is Julia Child's recipe from "Mastering the Art of French Cooking: Volume 1". In this case, I'm doubling the recipe given that I found that the original one does not make enough to coat a two layer cake. If you're doing one layer, you'll be good with half of this recipe.
INGREDIENTS
- 2 ounces semi-sweet baking chocolate
- 2 tablespoons rum (of coffee)
- 6 tablespoons unsalted butter
EQUIPMENT
- Wooden spoon
- Bowl over saucepan with barely simmering water
- Bowl of cold water
Simple ingredients to make an extraordinary icing.
In the bowl over the saucepan, melt the chocolate and the rum (or coffee) until you have a smooth mixture.
The mixture will be shiny and smooth.
Remove chocolate from the pan and start beating the butter in, one tablespoon at a time.
This will take some beating, you can use a whisk or an electric beater set to low-medium to get an even mix.
Once the butter has been incorporated into the chocolate, place the bowl over the cold water and continue mixing until it reaches the consistency of a thick mayonnaise, and is ready for spreading.
The mixture has to thicken to the point where it will be easy to spread on the cake.
You can keep the icing on the cold water while you work, or refrigerate it until you are ready to use it.
Enjoy!
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