HCB: Chocolate Genoise with Whipped Peanut Butter Ganache

This is going to be a much shorter post than normal because my Thanksgiving Day list seems like it's never ending right now. I was pretty skeptical about this cake as it sounds everyone else in the group was. For one thing I had never made a genoise before so I really had no idea how it would turn out, and the flavor combination of black raspberry, chocolate, and peanut butter sounded a little odd to me. I actually didn't use the black raspberry liqueur and went with a pomegranate juice instead, but it still turned out much better than I had anticipated.

I had a busy weekend with cooking and baking classes on Saturday and then two things to bake on Sunday so I finally got started on this cake Sunday before dinner. It was pretty simple, but there were a few parts of the recipe that were a little more tedious than your simple butter cake. Clarifying the butter was one of those. I had never done that before so I wasn't completely sure if I let mine go long enough.

Having to heat up the eggs over a pot of simmering water was another one, but it wasn't too bad. Only thing I probably should have done was strain the eggs just in case any of them curdled, but I think it turned out okay. For the most part the rest of the batter was relatively easy. I really need to get a fine mesh strainer or sieve to use for sifting because it would be much easier than the hand crank one. Once it was done baking I let it cool while I ate dinner and then started the icing and simple syrup later.

The icing came together pretty easily. When I started noticing it was getting a tiny bit grainy I stopped whipping it.

The only problem I had was mine was really moist and a little warm so I couldn't do any piping on the cake like I wanted. I wanted to put it in the fridge, but my fridge was already pretty full with stuff for Thanksgiving. I stuck the rest of the icing in the fridge in hopes that I could do a little in the morning. This morning I started moving things around in the fridge because I needed to make space for the turkey anyway, and I managed to get the cake in there while I got ready for work. So, I was able to make it look pretty before I left.

I took the cake to work for the monthly birthday celebration and saved one slice for my husband. The rest of the cake disappeared. My coworkers commented on how moist it was.