Chocolate-Coffee Cake with Kahlua Sauce

Hope you and the family had a wonderful Father's day this past weekend. Since my father is miles and miles away, in India, I dint get to spend time with him on this special day but I did speak to him first thing in the morning. My darling "Appa" is a man of few words unless he is engaged in a conversation about automobiles, engines or Formula One racing. You would always spot him with a calm smile on his face. His poise and peaceful demeanor has always earned him many admirers. In fact he was one of the most popular 'dad on campus' when I was in school or college, with all my girl friends wanting to get introduced to him whenever he dropped by to pick me up. You can only guess how proud I was about that ;)

Now that I am a parent I reflect back on how he brought us up and his admirable style of parenting. I strive my best to adopt all the positive things I like in him and I hope I am doing a good job so far with my little munchkin. On this special day, I would like to take a moment to cherish my dear dad for all he has done for me and for always being there for me. He has helped shaped my character and my morals, instilling in me the subtle confidence that nothing is impossible as long as we charge on with a smile!!

Dad, if all the fathers

Had lined up one by one,

And God told me to pick,

I'd still choose to be your son.

I'm proud to have a father

Who listens and understands,

Who teaches me and sets fair rules

Without unfair demands.

Dad you are my hero,

My role model in all you do.

So Dad, if I could pick again,

You know I'd still pick you!

By Joanna F.

For this Father's day Mia and I baked this Chocolate Coffee (Mocha) cake with Kahlua Sauce for her dad! It had all his favorite things and we knew he would love it. The problem was that we would need to stop him from finishing it all up in a day  :)  The cake, as you can see, is a chocolate- base cake with freshly brewed coffee, baked moist and soft with a rich dark cocoa color. When I found this recipe and read the reviews I knew that this would be a winner. And to just to make the cake look extra special I planned to bake it in a bundt pan and drizzled some  Kahlua sauce over it, finished with some chopped Twix and chocolate sprinkles to make it look festive. Well it definitely turned out to be a rather appetizing and delicious looker. I hope you enjoy it too! 

Cake recipe adapted from here
Serves 10-12

Ingredients
1 3/4 Cups - All-purpose flour
2 cups -Sugar
3/4 Cups - Cocoa powder
2 Teaspoon - Baking soda
1 Teaspoon - Baking powder
1 Teaspoon - Salt
1 Cup - Buttermilk
1/2 Cup - Vegetable oil
2 - Eggs, at room temperature
1 Teaspoon - Vanilla extract
1 cup - Freshly brewed hot coffee
Butter or shortening for greasing the pans

Directions

• Preheat the oven to 350 degrees F. 
• Grease and flour the bundt pan.
• Sift the flour, sugar, cocoa, baking soda, baking powder, and salt 
• Whisk the buttermilk, oil, eggs, and vanilla. 
• With the mixer on low speed, slowly add the dry ingredients to the wet in 3 batches. 
• Mix in the coffee and whisk until the all the ingredients have been incorporated. The batter will be runny
• Pour the batter into the prepared pan and bake for 50 minutes, or until a cake tester comes out clean. 
• Cool in the pans for 30 minutes, then turn them out onto a cooling rack and cool completely.

Kahlua Sauce
Ingredients

1 cup - Half and half
1/2 cup - Sugar
1/2 cup - Kahlua
2 tablespoons - Cornstarch
3 Tablespoon - Peanut butter

Directions

• In a sauce pan mix the half and half, cornstarch, peanut butter and sugar.
• Heat this mixture until it thickens 
• Take off the heat and stir in Kahlua

Cake Assembly
Ingredients
1 Chocolate Bundt cake
Kahlua Sauce
Chopped Twix or Snickers
Chocolate sprinkles

Directions

• Place the cake on the cake stand or serving plate
• Pour the Kahlua sauce over the cake
• Garnish with chopped twix or snickers and chocolate sprinkles

Notes and Tips

• This cake can be baked in two 8 inch round cake pans for a 2 layered cake.
• You can substitute the half and half with whole milk. You will loose the rich creamy taste but will be able to cut down a lot of calories
• If you want to make the sauce thinner add 1 tablespoon of half and half at a time until you get the desired consistency
• You can substitute Kahlua for any liqueur of your choice like Baileys Irish Cream, Starbucks Coffee Liqueur ...anything you have at home!
• You can use your favorite chocolate -  Snickers, Mars, Twix, MilkyWay, Kit kat
• Use good quality cocoa powder and coffee

Sending this recipe to Nancy of Spicie Foodie for this month's YBR - You can check out more details about YBR here