In the interest of full disclosure, I did not plan on writing an article about this cake at all. However, sometimes, a girl can no longer justify sitting in her bedroom listening to the Gilmore Guys podcast while doing nothing else. Sometimes, a girl gets a sudden urge to bake something fun, festive and tasty, and sometimes, said baked good ends up looking so pretty, it would be a crime for her not to share it with the world. Enter the maple pecan chocolate cake. Read on and enjoy, friends…
I’m not a cook, in any sense of the word. I definitely enjoy being in the kitchen, experimenting with various ingredients and flavours, seeing what happens when I add a bit of this or when I sautée my broccoli instead of roasting it, etc., however, I’m not a cook. Barring a cooking class I took when I was a young warthog about 9 as part of the Girl Guides, I’ve not had any formal training in the kitchen (and, let’s be honest…that was maybe 2 hours of a professional chef trying to wrangle some very energetic children, and… I only did it for the badge). I’m not a baker, nor am I a candle-stick maker, but all of that being said, I think some of my happiest moments have been, are and will be spent in a kitchen.
Something about having the freedom to make, well, whatever you want to make, whether it be a quick bag of popcorn or a three-course meal, not having (many) limits and having the space and ability to let your creative juices flow really appeals to me. Thus, a few days ago, I stepped into the kitchen to conquer a strange yearning I had to make and subsequently eat some chocolate cake (fun facts about me: one, I’m not a big chocolate fan and two, as shameful as this may seem, before Sunday, I’d never made chocolate cake from scratch before). I didn’t know if the cake would rise or sink (HA! No pun intended!), but dangnabit, I was going to have fun in the process. Spoiler alert, it didn’t fail at all; in fact, I’ll be damned if it’s not one of my greatest achievements in the kitchen…