The first time I made chocolate ganache was for my mother in law's birthday a few years ago, in the pre-Bennett years. I made a really moist chocolate bundt cake, covered in a chocolate ganache and it was a HIT. It really really was so good.... I'm not tooting my own horn, I'm serious! It was amazing, I put that recipe in my recipe book, I loved it.
And because of how much I loved that cake, I tried to think how I was going to combine hearts and ganache, and this is what I came up with. These little cakes did end up falling apart on me a bit, because the cake recipe I followed, which was from Pioneer Woman, called for a large jelly roll pan, and I only had two medium sized pans, so I had to split my cake batter in two parts. The larger of the two cakes was thicker and it cracked a bit more than the thinner, slightly smaller cake. It really helps holding the cookie cutter in place, and packing the little crumbs in there, to help hold the shape.
I made it work, though. The chocolate sheet cake recipe from Ree Drummond is so moist and tasty! It made it a bit easier to pack the small torn pieces back together when the hearts were falling apart.
I will say, this was my first attempt at anything like this, so a few of my hearts were messy, but my husband LOVED them... that's all that matters, right? :)
Well, here it is, my delicious heart shaped, marshmallow fluff filled, chocolate ganache covered cakes. I hope yall enjoy!
----Chocolate Marshmallow Heart Cakes----
(cake recipe from Pioneer Woman)
Chocolate cake:
2 cups Flour
2 cups Sugar
1/4 teaspoon Salt
4 Tablespoons (heaping) Cocoa powder
2 sticks Butter
1 cup Water (boiling)
1/2 cup Buttermilk (see below for a substitute)
2 whole Beaten Eggs
1 teaspoon Baking Soda
1 teaspoon Vanilla
Filling:
Marshmallow Fluff
Chocolate Ganache:
1 cup chocolate chips
1tbsp butter
1/4 cup heavy whipping cream
Sift together flour, sugar, and salt in a large bowl. Set aside.
In a small saucepan, bring water to boil. In another small saucepan, melt butter, and add cocoa, and stir until the cocoa is dissolved. Then, add the boiling water and let the mixture boil for 30 seconds, then, add it to your dry ingredients. Be careful not to burn yourself. Stir the mixture until well combined.
In a small bowl, mix buttermilk, baking soda, vanilla and beaten eggs.
**IF YOU DO NOT HAVE BUTTERMILK** put about a tablespoon of lemon juice into whatever size measuring cup you need for buttermilk, and fill it the rest of the way with regular milk. Stir it around, and let it sit for 5 minutes before adding it to your ingredients.
Add milk mixture to your cake mixture. Stir to combine.
Grease your pan, and pour in your cake batter. Bake at 350 for 20 minutes. (Unless, you are using two pans, like myself.... my smaller pan took 12 minutes, and my larger one took 17)
Allow your cakes to cool before overturning them onto parchment paper.
Meanwhile, melt your chocolate in the microwave, at 30 second intervals. Then, add the very warm cream, and the butter, and stir. If you are not going to be working quickly, which I wasn't, You can start a double boiler, and put your chocolate in there, to keep it smooth enough to continue working with.
Cut your heart shapes out using a cookie cutter, and lay them on a cooling rack, with an empty pan underneath, to catch the chocolate drippings. Lay each heart out flat, and add a thin layer of marshmallow fluff, trying not to go too close to the edges, to prevent overflow.
Put the second heart on top of the marshmallow layer, and coat with chocolate ganache. Once you have your hearts covered how you'd like them, allow them to set a bit, before serving.
* This ganache recipe does not bring the chocolate to a hardened state, so this is more of a fork and plate kinda cake. If you'd like the chocolate to set up, leave the cream out.*
And voila! These babies are soooo good! I hope yall enjoy these as much as we have :)
