Coconut Chocolate Spiral Bundt Cake
The moment I saw the beautiful red velvet bundt cake baked by Regina (another insta-baker in Singapore), I knew I had to bake my own eventually. So here's my first try! Disclaimer: This is a very long entry, so scroll all the way down if you just want the recipe.
Baking for me has always been serendipitous. Whenever I see fascinating cake flavours, I'd promise myself to try them one day (believe me, I have a whole folder of recipes I haven't tried), but I never actually make plans to do it until the whim of the moment compels me to.
The moment from which this super cool spiral bundt cake arose was when I walked into ToTT (that's short for Tools of The Trade) in Suntec City one day after church because they were having a sale. This place sells ALL sorts of kitchenware and cooking/baking tools, and I've ALWAYS wanted to step in when I walked pass but never had the time to.
What luck that it was having a sale the moment I had the time to browse, and I got the spiral Heritage Bundt pan at SGD 63 (already on discount, the original price is SGD 90)! I had no idea Nordic Ware's Bundt Cake pans cost that much!
What is the difference between Chiffon and Bundt Cake Pans?
This is a Chiffon Cake Pan. Usually made of aluminium, they have a funnel in the centre to ensure even baking at the centre of the cake. Sometimes they have little feet (you see 3 here) to allow for the cake to be cooled upside down. All chiffon cakes are cooled upside down completely in ungreased pans to allow for the cake to stretch to that glorious fluffy height while clinging on to the sides of the cake pan.
This is a Bundt Cake Pan from Nordic Ware. Usually made of cast aluminium with a platinum non-stick finish, there is also a funnel to ensure even baking. Bundt cake pans look like fancier chiffon cake pans. Unlike chiffon cake pans, bundt cakes should not stick to the pan while cooling, otherwise you'll have a headache dislodging the cake loose from all those ridges! We want to remove cakes from bundt pans easily, so bundt cake pans are always greased and floured before use, unlike chiffon cake pans.
History of the Bundt Cake Pan
Interestingly, the word 'Bundt' was coined by David Dalquist, the owner of Minnesota's Nordic Ware company, after the German word 'bund' which means bond or alliance, since he first invented the pan for the Hadassah Society (a group for Jewish women), which wanted to recreate traditional kugelhopf—a dense, ring-shaped cake.
Some speculate that he added the 't' to distinguish his brand from the German-American Bund, a pro-Nazi group. Others guess it was was for trademarking purposes. Demand for his unique pans didn't take off until 1966 when a gooey chocolate cake baked with a Bundt pan came second in the 17th annual Pillsbury Bake-Off.
Source: Sterling, Food & Wine 2015
What you see below is inspired from Liv for Cake's two-toned Bundt tutorial.
Baking Process of the Coconut Chocolate Spiral Cake
Recipe adapted from Liv for Cake
Ingredients:
2.5 cups plain flour
1.5 tsp baking powder
0.5 tsp salt
227g / 2 sticks butter
1.5 cups sugar
4 eggs
2 tsp vanilla
1 cup coconut milk
Additional ingredients for different-flavoured batters:
COCONUT - 1 tsp coconut essence, 0.5 cup desiccated coconut
CHOCOLATE - 2 tbsp cocoa powder
Method:
2. Whisk flour and baking powder in bowl. Set aside.
3. With a paddle attachment on the stand mixer, cream butter and sugar on medium high until pale and fluffy, about 5 min. Add eggs 1 at a time, incorporating well after each.
4. Add vanilla.
5. Reduce speed to low. Add flour in 3 portions, alternating with 2 portions of milk. Mix until just combined.
6. Separate batter into 2 bowls. In one, add coconut essence and desiccated coconut. In the other, add cocoa powder. Incorporate well using a spatula/whisk.
7. Fill 2 piping bags with each batter. Clear plastic bags can be used too - just snip off a small corner after filling the bags and pipe through the opening. Pipe them in alternate ridges like this:
Then fill in the rest of the spirals accordingly. Use a spatula to keep them in their own spiral and not spillover. If they do spill over, just scoop out the stray batter with your clean fingers or spatula. Please allow me to rant for a while here. The hot Singapore weather (about 32 deg C) made my buttery batter pretty fluid and it became super frustrating to keep the coloured batter in their own spiral. So if you can afford to, do this in a cooled room. This was incredibly time-consuming for me just because of damage-control! :(
8. Fill the rest of the cake pan with the rest of the batter. You can use a knife to marble the colours together. I didn't bother - was worn out by this stage.
9. Tap the pan against the table to release air bubbles trapped in the batter. I didn't do enough of this and my cake ended up holey at different places! Bake for 55 - 60 min or until cake tester comes out clean.
10. This is how the cake looks like right out of the oven. Cool for 10-15 minutes maximum, then unpan the cake! If you let it sit for too long, the cake might get stuck in the pan. Put a cooling rack over the top, then with mittened hands grip the sides of the pan with the rack and flip. The cake should fall out nicely if your pan was properly greased and floured.
TADAAAA! I'm going to be shameless and say I admired the cake for a long time before glazing it. Hahahah!
11. For glazing, I used 1.5 cups of icing sugar and 3 to 4 tbsp of whole milk. The unanimous feedback was that this is too sweet, so I suggest using only 1 cup. Also, since it's Coconut Chocolate cake, I should have used coconut milk for the glaze!
Use a spoon to scoop the glaze and let it fall from the top of each curved ridge. The glaze should be viscous and so should flow nicely down. You may want to lay spare paper below your cooling rack before doing the glazing, because it's all going to drip down on your table.
The cake turned out too dry and crumbly, so next time I'll cut down on the flour / add one more egg / use more butter? Not sure if there's some technique I'm not doing right.
Enjoy the bake! :)
