The Jane Austen Baking Club: Sense & Sensibility

While I’m in the kitchen whipping up a batch of {cookies, cupcakes, pies, brownies, etc} I usually bring in my laptop and watch a movie. Last week I got to work creating a birthday cake for the boyf, which was great because I can’t find enough excuses to make full-sized cakes these days. Technically, the cake was only for the two of us, so it’s still a miniature cake, but it’s not a cupcake anyway. While mixing up the batter and whipping the icing, what could be better than sipping on a beer/glass of wine (or three) and popping in a girly movie to get emotional to? Thus, the creation of the Jane Austen Baking Club. Current members: me.

What you’ll need to make a miniature chocolate cake with caramel-milk chocolate icing:

Sense & Sensibility – the Kate Winslet/Emma Thompson/Hugh Grant/Alan Rickman theatrical version
2-3 glasses of wine/bottles of beer/shirley temples (virgin if you like)
Baking Ingredients for Caramel-Milk Chocolate Frosting and Caramel Sauce Recipe, Chocolate Cake recipe below
1 – 6″ round cake pan & 1 – 4″ round cake pan

First, you’ll need to make the icing since it’s got to chill out in the fridge for a couple of hours. While that chills you’re free to move on to the actual cake making. For this icing you need to also have everything chopped & measured & ready to go the moment you need it, because once it gets going there’s no stopping to prepare. Basically, the icing is just a ganache (truffle chocolate) with caramelized sugar, chilled then whipped to make a lighter frosting.

1. Chop 3oz. of bittersweet chocolate. In this case I bought 2 – 11.5oz bags of Ghiradelli milk chocolate chips and a 4oz bar of bittersweet chocolate to chop.  2. Combine in the same bowl and keep handy. 3. Measure out the 2.25 cups of Heavy Cream and keep handy next to the stove. Pour sugar & water into deep saucepan and get started!

4. Stir sugar & water over medium heat till sugar dissolves. 5. Bring to rolling boil. 6. Continue to boil as sugar mixture thickens and turns an amber color. 7. When amber, pour in heavy cream (whisk while pouring in cream – cream will vigorously bubble up). 8. Stir/whisk until caramelized sugar and cream are dissolved together.

9. Pour caramel syrup over chocolate and stir. 10. Keep stirring – it’s not smooth yet! 11. Smooth and lovely – put that baby in the fridge for 2 hours while you make the rest of the cake.

At this point in your movie watching & baking you should be about 30 minutes into the movie (the Dashwood girls have been turned out of their home and make for the cottage that will serve as their new home, with the hopes of seeing Edward again soon.) About one drink has been drunk. Moving on to the cake recipe, adapted from the Cupcake Kit by Elinor Klivans:

1 cup unbleached all-purpose flour
1/4 cup unsweetened Dutch process cocoa powder
1/2 teaspoon baking soda
1/4 teaspoon salt
1/4 cup (1/2 stick) unsalted butter at room temp.
1 cup granulated sugar
2 large eggs
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
1 teaspoon instant coffee granules dissolved in 2 teaspoons water
2/3 cup buttermilk (regular or reduced fat)

1. Butter & cocoa powder the 4″ & 6″ pans (flour will make the cake dusted white, which isn’t a biggie, but cocoa is just better, k?) Preheat oven to 325 degrees. 2. Stir together flour, cocoa powder, baking soda & salt. 3. Cream butter and sugar till light & fluffy. 4. Add eggs one at a time until combined and a little creamy looking. 5. Add coffee and vanilla. 6. Mix till combined – toffee color. 7. Add half the flour mixture and mix till just combined. 8. Add buttermilk and mix till combined. 9. Add remaining flour mixture and mix batter till completely combined. 10. Fill both pans about half full. This  cake rises quite a bit; there should only be enough batter to fill these two pans evenly.

At this point we’ve watched the Dashwood ladies get settled into their “humble” cottage (that I think any of us would kill for these days), and Marianne get swept off of her feet by the romantic and charming Willoughby. He’s left her on the fence as to his affections when the girls go to London and she seeks him out. Elinor secretly suffers as she learns that her secret love Mr. Ferris is already engaged, but keeps it together (somehow). It’s time to put the cakes in the oven, sit back and watch hearts get shattered like only Jane Austen can. The smaller cake will take 30-35 minutes to cook and the larger should take 35-40. Make sure to pause the movie about halfway through to turn the cakes around.

DING! Cakes should be done (as well as the second drink if you’re me)! In an attempt to truncate an already extensive post, here’s the final steps: 1. take caramel-chocolate frosting out of the fridge if you haven’t already and bring to room temp. while cakes cool. 2. transfer caramel ganache to mixer bowl. 3. Whip several minutes till icing becomes a much lighter color and has more of an icing consistency. 4. Look for soft peaks and spreadable texture. 5. If you’ve got it, use a very large round tip and pastry bag, fill with icing. 6. Cut dome tops off of both cakes and cut each cake in half. 7. Pipe icing filling between cake layers. 8. Crumb coat 6″ layer cake and put in fridge/freezer while repeating steps 7 & 8 with 4″ layer cake. 9. Stack cakes.

And then of course, decorate the cake:

I’ve got to admit – I’ve always smiled at the thought of certain ex-boyfriends sitting brokenhearted in Willoughby’s place overlooking Marianne’s happy ending. I relate so much to her character that I’m convinced Austen wrote the part based on me. The screenplay for this film was actually written by Emma Thompson herself (so talented!), and holds such a special place in my heart, not just for the story line but because she and Kate Winslet are definitely two of my favorite actresses. As a final note to the cake, I made a caramel syrup (link given at the top of the blog) to drizzle over the cake, and it came out super tasty. Of course, it’s very sweet – but it was a totally awesome birthday cake.

Want to be part of the Jane Austen Baking Club? Tell me which Austen movie, tv series, tv movie, or Austen-esque film you’d recommend for my next baking expedition!