It’s the beginning of December and Christmas and the associated parties will be upon us soon. If you need to feed and WOW a crowd, Khalua Fudge Pound Cake is the way to do it. I’ve been making this cake for about 20 years now and it has gotten rave reviews for all those years. Don’t let the length of the recipe put you off. While it’s not a 20 minute dessert, it’s not difficult and the results are more than worth the extra time you will put into it.
Begin ahead of time by making sure that your butter and eggs are at room temperature. I use only unsalted REAL butter. This is a dessert, right? So make it FABU! Trust me, six eggs and real butter will put you on the FABU Highway.
When you are ready to begin baking the cake, preheat your oven to 300o F. Grease and flour a 10” tube pan. I’ll tell you now that this recipe makes too much batter for a standard Bundt pan so I suggest you use a deeper tube pan, like an angel food cake pan. I have an antique square angel food pan that my grandmother used to use and so my Khalua Fudge Pound Cake is always square.
To make the fudge, put the cocoa, ¼ of sugar, light corn syrup, Khalua and water into a small saucepan. Heat this mixture to boiling over medium heat while stirring. Once it’s boiled, set it aside to cool.
In a small glass measure, mix the milk and vanilla.
In a large bowl place the butter and sugar and mix them at high speed or until fluffy. I scrape the sides down a couple of times to be sure it’s good and mixed. Next you will add the eggs one at a time making sure the egg is blended before adding the next. Once the eggs are incorporated, begin adding the flour, a cup at a time, with the milk.
Be sure to scrape down the sides so that all of the batter is incorporated before taking approximately 2 ½ cups of the batter and putting it into a medium bowl. Stir the baking soda into the cooled fudge and mix completely into the batter in the medium bowl.
Place half of the remaining plain batter into the bottom of your tube pan, top with the fudge batter, and then the remaining plain batter.
Bake for 1 hour and 40 minutes. After cooling for 15 minutes in the pan, turn the cake out onto a rack to finish cooling.
To make the glaze, you can either chop 4 oz of semi-sweet chocolate in a food processor or do what I do and use semi-sweet chocolate chips. Then you will heat the butter, heavy cream and Khalua in a small sauce pan until it boils. Pour the mixture over the chocolate, cover with plastic wrap and let set for 5 minutes. Then stir until smooth. Cool completely and drizzle over the cake.
I think you and your guests will agree that this cake is Mmmmm FABU!
Khalua Fudge
1/2 cup cocoa
1/4 cup sugar
1/4 cup light corn syrup
1/4 cup Khalua
1/4 cup water
Cake:
3/4 cup milk
1 tbsp vanilla
1 lb unsalted butter
2 1/2 cups sugar
6 large eggs, room temperature
4 cups flour
1/4 tsp baking soda
Khalua Glaze:
4 oz semi-sweet chocolate
4 tbsp unsalted butter
2 tbsp heavy cream
2 tbsp Khalua
Make fudge; in saucepan, over low heat. Mix ingredients. Heat to
boiling over medium heat; stirring. Cool.
Preheat oven to 300 F. Grease and flour 10 in tube pan.
Make cake: In small glass measure, mix milk and vanilla. In large mixing bowl at high speed, beat butter and sugar 3 min or until fluffy. Beat in eggs one at a time. Add flour (in 1/4’s) alternately with milk mixture (in 1/3’s), beginning and ending with the flour. Spoon 1/3 of batter (about 2-1/2 cups) into medium bowl. Stir soda into fudge; stir into batter in medium bowl. Pour half of remaining plain batter into tube pan. Top with fudge batter; add remaining plain batter.
Bake 1hour and 40 minutes or until tests done. Cool cake in pan on wire rack 15 min. Invert onto rack.
Make glaze: In food processor chop chocolate. In saucepan, heat butter, cream & Khalua to boiling. With motor running, pour into chocolate; process until chocolate melts and mixture is smooth. Cool completely. Drizzle over cake.
Lauri Rottmayer authors The FABU Highway.
