sixteen cakes: Chocolate Irish Whiskey Cake Magic

Chocolate Irish Whiskey Cake ~ What's not to love?!!

I spotted this beauty on the cover of fine Cooking magazine's Dec/Jan 2013 edition and fell for its simple elegance and, for me, a true layer-cake novice, the challenge! Also, I needed a "wow factor" cake for a dinner party celebrating the first quarter birthdays of a special group friends and my dear hubby.

Usually settling for the ubiquitous Bundt cake (because baking a layer cake in the desert at high altitude has always meant disaster for me!) I was determined this time to succeed!

Weighing dry ingredients equals success!

Flour here is excessively dry which really alters the dry/wet ratio of a cake. I was gifted a wonderful new tool this Christmas (thank you Sean and Meg!) and was excited to put it into action! Weighing the dry ingredients sounds cumbersome and time consuming but it was NOT and the difference in my results well worth the extra step. I can highly recommend investing in a kitchen scale. Mine is an Oxo, love it!

This method resulted in a cake that was moist with a great crumb. The frosting, a perfect combination
of brown sugar, whipped cream, espresso, and Jameson's whiskey (yes! like Irish coffee!) was light, flavorful and a stunning finish to our birthday celebration.

I sliced off the cake tops slightly to stabilize the layers and the cake was well-behaved all evening ;)

Six candles, one for each of us!

White and semi-sweet chocolate curls were the perfect finish, adding just enough sweetness to this sophisticated, not-to-sweet coffee, mocha beauty....and hey, three layers? no sweat!!