It's Mix Monday! Oh I love exploding myths and making convenience foods from scratch. Why is it? Why do I love it? Well...perhaps it's the sweet stream of email flowing to my heart thanking me for saving family budgets around the world. Literally. It's so highly motivating to get a thank you note. It warms the coggles of my heart.
How many recipes call for a box of cake mix? Well in America anyway I've seen whole books written on the subject. They're books that doctor a cake mix into a lot of other stuff. However...what if the person making the cake or doctored mix had some crazy stipulations? I do. I want the mix being made with all natural ingredients, from scratch and things most people have access to. I want it made to taste wonderful without adding a lot of chemicals to my diet. Yikes...did I just say "diet" in blog entry about chocolate cake? Oh the irony of my existence is sometimes scary.
You will need some very high quality vanilla. It will still make a very impressive cake. If this recipe looks familiar, It is in fact an adaptation of the Chocolate Toffee Buttermilk Cake Mix. A simple form of that cake with some subtle changes.
The texture is still perfect.
Chef Tess' Chocolate Cake Mix
yield 18 cups mix (4 1/2 mixes total)
1 cup (8 oz) butter
6 cups (1 lb 11 oz) all purpose flour
3 cups (11.5 oz) baking cocoa
1 cup ( 4.5 oz) non-fat milk powder or soy milk powder
5 cups(2 lb) granulated sugar
4 tsp salt
1/3 cup baking powder (2 oz)
1T double strength vanilla ( or vanilla bean paste)
1 tsp ground cardamom
1 tsp cayenne pepper
6 cups (1 lb 11 oz) all purpose flour
3 cups (11.5 oz) baking cocoa
1 cup ( 4.5 oz) non-fat milk powder or soy milk powder
5 cups(2 lb) granulated sugar
4 tsp salt
1/3 cup baking powder (2 oz)
1T double strength vanilla ( or vanilla bean paste)
1 tsp ground cardamom
1 tsp cayenne pepper
To prepare mix: In a large 3 gallon or larger bowl, combine the flour, cocoa, dry milk
sugar, baking powder and salt very well. You may use an electric mixer if you have one with a large enough bowl. Cut the butter into chunks and along with the flavor extracts incorporate into the dry ingredients until the mixture resembles sand. Take the mix and a couple of cup fulls at a time, run through a flour sifter. I use a hand flour sifter that works very well to help the mix become smooth and homogeneous. ( Need a picture tutorial on the mix making process? See: My Yellow Homemade Cake Mix) Divide into quart size bags. 2o oz of mix equals one cake mix. This is almost exactly 4 cups of measured mix.
To bake:
Combine with 3 eggs
1/3 cup oil
1 cup water
200 strokes by hand or 3 minutes medium speed.
Bake time 350 degrees:
Pan size: 2 8 inch 33-35 minutes
2 9 inch 28-31 minutes
13 by 9 inch 32-35 minutes
bunt 38-43 minutes
24 cupcakes 18-21 minutes
High altitude: stir 1/4 cup all purpose flour into mix. Mix as directed.
Ganache Glaze:
1 cup cream
1 lb chopped high quality chocolate (we used Guitard)
1/4 tsp hazelnut oil
1/4 tsp fresh ground cinnamon
Boil one cup of cream in a sauce pan and pour over the chocolate. I added 1/4 tsp hazelnut oil, 1/4 tsp cinnamon, 1/8th tsp ancho chile powder...and blended until smooth. When chocolate is melted completely and the glaze is smooth, drizzle over one inch squares of baked cake.
These where double layers of cake with peanut butter filling...
There you go. Chocolate Cake mix. All natural. 
11 comments:
that looks yummy i'm gonna have to make some for my husband who could eat Chocolate cake EVERY DAY of his LIFE...i swear i think he thinks it's THE MAIN FOOD GROUP to LIVE on ...
how long are these good for since they have butter in them? Where should they be stored? We would probably take a year to eat six cake mixes...
I love the idea of making your own cake mixes! Is there a way of long-term storage of the finished mix? Freezer?
Great site - I'll be back for sure!!
If you use the butter, yes, do store them in the freezer or fridge. They are good frozen up to a year if sealed properly. Omit the butter for longer shelf storage. I have made the mix without butter and kept it on the shelf and just added 1/2 cup oil instead of 1/3 cup oil when preparing the batter.
Yummy! It LOOKS like my homemade cake that has vinegar in it... that is my all time favorite recipe...
Yahoo! Yahoo! You did it! Way to go! I'll have to try it soon.
P.S.) I just bought a small 8oz. bag of Chia seeds. Mixed it with some juice and YUM! Can't wait to keep it going every day. That seed is seriously amazing!
Lisa
gourmified@gmail.com
you evil, evil woman! The word "ganache" makes my mouth water every time...is there anything more decadent? I think not. How many mixes does this batch make?
Ganache is Evil. This makes 4 1/2 mixes...so plan on a lot of ganache.
I realize this recipe was posted a year and a half ago... but was wondering how this would work using powdered butter? And possibly the vanilla powdered flavoring? Would make for a nice "jar method" mix if we included powdered egg and shortening, too? I wish I were as good as you at converting recipes to the jar method.
I have been working on some jar method mixes. They will be a little different, since I don't use baking powder for long term storage.
I just made your yellow cake mix (which is VERY good by the way... Although it it falls a little when pulled out of the oven). The yellow cake mix recipe calls for 1 cup of butter between 2 'mixes'. This recipe calls for 1 cup between 4 1/2 'mixes'. How come there is such a drastic different between the recipes. I guess my logical mind wants to think that they should have a similar amount of butter for each 'mix'.
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