Speakeasy - Sweet Melissa Sunday's

It seems like forever since I've baked with Sweet Melissa Sunday's. We took December off and I skipped our first recipe of January. I really enjoy the SMS gals and have missed baking with them.

I did some searching to try and figure out why this is called a Speakeasy Cake. I didn't find anything, so I guess it's because the cake has brandy it in. I made a half recipe and baked it in large muffin tins. I'd hoped to be able to use half of the cakes for our Sacher Torte, a version of this recipe, on February 6th. Notice I said I'd hoped to be able use half of them. I think where I went wrong was probably somewhere around the mixing or folding of the egg whites. My cakes didn't rise very much and then sunk in the middle. Melissa's instructions say if you open the oven too soon, the cake will fall. The baking time for the full size recipe is 70 minutes. Unsure of just how long to bake them in this size pan, I checked them at 35 minutes and they were overdone! So much for cutting them in half and using them for the Sacher Torte. Not sure they were tall enough anyway to cut in half but for sure they were too crunchy. :)


Deciding to make the best of it, I made the ganache and frosted the cakes. Seriously chocolate ganache makes even the most overdone cakes taste great!!

You can find this week's recipe and Jeannette's beautiful cake at The Whimsical Cupcake. If you want to check out some of the other SMS baker's cakes, you can find the links here.