Saturday 23 March 2024

Chocolate Mayonnaise Cake

Just wondering how many of you are familiar with B. Dylan Hollis, the funny chap from YouTube?  I love his videos!  And he loves to try out weird, retro, vintage recipes.  Of course I had to buy his book Baking Yesteryear when it came out last year.  And I love that he includes the really terrible recipes at the end of the book, in the Worst of the Worst section.  

The recipe in his book that really makes me shudder is the SpaghettiOs Jello Ring, which has - yes, you guessed it - tinned spaghetti, tomato soup, gelatine and cocktail franks (sausages) - (OMG!!)!  But this cake recipe is way less horrendous; in fact, it's pretty darn delicious.  I added a few little tweaks like the Kahlua and coffee powder, and sprinkles.  Every cake deserves a sprinkle!

I was watching a video recently where the (U.S.) person said they had only just been introduced to the repast of warmed baked beans from a tin, spooned onto hot buttery toast and then put under the grill with cheese, so it melts over the beans.  Oh how sad but great, that they had only just discovered this delightful midnight - or anytime - snack.  I do this with tinned spaghetti too!  But a Jello Ring is a step too far, my friends:=)


gotta love a sprinkle! (see the flamingoes?)

Makes one x 25cm./10 inch Bundt cake:

ingredients:

Cake:

345g./12 hefty ounces of mayonnaise

300g./10.5 oz white or caster sugar

1-2 tsp vanilla extract or paste  (optional)

2 tsp Kahlua or liqueur of your fancy  (optional)

420g./15 scant oz plain flour

5 Tbs cocoa powder

2 tsp coffee powder  (optional)

3/4 tsp sea salt

2 tsp baking soda

355 mL/12 oz water

150g./5.3 oz dark or milk chocolate, chopped into small chunks


Icing:

115g./4 oz mayonnaise

5 Tbs cocoa powder

1 Tbs milk

240g./8.5 oz icing sugar (powdered sugar)

2 tsp vanilla extract or paste

2-3 Tbs yoghurt  (optional)

Sprinkles or chocolate hail or your fave bling to decorate


Method:

For the cake:

Butter your Bundt very very well (Mr P. does this for me as it's his forte - hehehe)

On goes your oven to 190C/370F to heat up

Combine the mayo and sugar together in a large bowl till you have a nice smooth mixture, then stir in the vanilla extract and Kahlua

Grab another bowl, and whisk the flour, cocoa powder, coffee, salt, and baking soda together well

Now add these dry ingredients to the mayo mixture, along with the water in alternate turns, till it's well-combined

Stir in the chocolate chunks

Spoon/pour into the very well-buttered Bundt pan (I tapped a little flour over the pan as well), and bake for 40-45 minutes

Poke the middle of the cake with a cake skewer; if it's clean, the cake is done

Let it cool in the pan for 10 minutes, then turn out onto a wire rack to get completely cool

For the icing:

Combine the mayo, cocoa powder and milk together in a metal bowl, and place it over a saucepan of simmering water - or use a double boiler if you have one

Gradually stir in the icing sugar, and whisk/beat very well till smooth and glossy

Take it off the heat, cool for a minute, then stir in the vanilla and yoghurt

Place the cake onto a serving platter, and let that gorgeous dark river of chocolate wend its way over the cake

And Go mad with sprinkles!


Notes:

Dylan says this makes a 10 inch tube cake.  I have no idea what that is!  So I just used a Bundt pan, and it worked out beautifully 


get your ingredients together

mix till smooth

ready for baking at 190C for 40-45 mins.

ready to smother lavishly in bling and icing

you can never have too much icing!

deep, dark and mysteriously delicious

sprinkles and flamingoes everywhere

and I took it to Book Club!


c. Sherry M.

45 comments:

  1. the cake sounds fine. The spaghettio jello ring almost sickens me to read the title!

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  2. This is the second reference I’ve seen today for Kahlua! Both are a yes!

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    1. I have a bottle in the pantry for cooking. And also one of Frangelico. So good to add to cakes etc.

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  3. I can see how the cake would be delicious. Thank you for mentioning B Dylan Hollis. I had never heard of him before and just finished going down rabbit holes watching video after video.

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  4. My mom used to always make a cake very similar to this. I remember it being delicious. I love that you love sprinkles as much as I do.

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    1. Absolutely Lori. Lots of sprinkles are essential :)

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  5. The spaghetti jello sounds absolutely awful...LOL, but this chocolate cake looks festive and amazingly delicious. I did see the flamingoes.

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    1. Yes it sounds so awful! Gotta love a flamingo on your cakes!

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  6. I imagine this is good! I love mayo. My husband hates it, and years ago when we visited my mother, before even saying hello, she shoved this chocolate cake into his face and made him eat a slice. And then, with great glee, announced that there was mayonnaise in the cake. Yes, she’s quite rude. And, unfortunately, she still is at 95.

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    1. Yes people seem to be team Mayo - or not! If you can't be rude at 95 :=) ...

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  7. from Johanna @ https://gggiraffe.blogspot.com/
    I love chocolate mayonnaise cake - and it amuses me how many people start at the idea of it even though mayonnaise traditionally involves eggs, oil, vinegar and salt which are pretty common in cake baking. Also love it when icing has an avalanche and the sprinkles come with it and pool at the bottom of the cake :-) Your cake looks like a fine contribution to book club

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    1. thanks Johanna. Yes when we think about it, mayo has all those things so it's perfect!

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  8. I'm intrigued by this. Is chubby oz mayonnaise a brand, or style of mayo?
    Tandy | Lavender and Lime https://tandysinclair.com

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    1. oops! sorry! that is meant to say 12 ounces but a hefty 12 ounces :=)

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  9. My grandies would love that jello cake and recently pulled spaghetti through frankfurters as a snack - neither of which I would ever eat

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    1. not sure what that means? :=) Pulled thru frankfurters??

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  10. Why not mayo in a cake? I’ve always heard that this is a good idea, and the components of mayo are great ingredients for sweets. Maybe it’s really weirder to put slippery white stuff on sliced meat! I’ve read a couple of other reviews of that book where the reviewer chose that as the recipe to try — the rest of the ones they and you list actually sound pretty ick.

    best, mae at maefood.blogspot.com

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    1. For sure Mae. I am just a mayo-phile, and love Kewpie:) Oh there are lots of fab recipes that I want to try; he just has a few at the end that are - hilariously awful!

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  11. I've been wanting to try making a chocolate mayonnaise cake--I've heard how good they are! Thanks for the inspiration to try it! :)

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  12. I absolutely love B Dylan Hollis — I watch him most nights before bed for a quick giggle. And I love how it all started for him. He’s a stitch!

    I remember chocolate mayonnaise cakes from the 70s, I think. They were good and really moist. Yours look better than any I ever saw!

    David (C&L)

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    1. Isn't he fab David? I think he is one of those Covid surprises, like Max Miller too. Thanks!

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  13. Oh yes, as soon as I heard about this book, I had to read it. I wrote a post about it, too! So many awful foods. No, no, no, I could never make a chocolate cake with mayonnaise!
    Here's the post:
    https://readerbuzz.blogspot.com/2023/12/recipes-from-past-some-of-which-i-would.html

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  14. Oh yes, as soon as I heard about this book, I had to read it. I wrote a post about it, too! So many awful foods. No, no, no, I could never make a chocolate cake with mayonnaise!

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  15. Youtube is another world that I don't really delve into tbh! I've meant to ask, what is a "chubby oz"?

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    1. I will update that to make it clearer; I'm just meaning make it a big ounce!

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  16. Not familiar with him as I don't watch any youtube videos. I think I have a recipe using mayo :)

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  17. Hey, I know a bit of B. Dylan Hollis. His exploration of retro recipes always brings a smile to my face, even if some of them are, well, questionable (SpaghettiOs Jello Ring, anyone?). But hey, at least we have gems like this Chocolate Mayonnaise Cake to redeem the culinary adventures, right? Your tweaks with Kahlua and coffee powder sound intriguing, and you can never go wrong with sprinkles! And I'm totally with you on the joy of beans on toast, a classic comfort food. Keep the culinary adventures coming!

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  18. I'm not familiar with B. Dylan Hollis, but I am familiar with some of those awful recipes from yesteryear. On occasion, I'll flip through old church cookbooks, and some of the recipes just make my mouth drop. Did people really make these...much less eat them!? Well I can say for sure that I would make (and eat) this cake. Kudos for the addition of the sprinkles!!

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    1. Yes those old recipes are fascinating David. Sprinkles rock! :)

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  19. Did you mean warmed baked beans, I was trying to work out what warmed baked bins are, ha, ha. I love that as a repast too. This cake looks so delicious. Really, mayo, sour cream, yoghurt, probably doesn't make a lot of difference, does it? Wonderful that it cooks up in a bundt tin, my favourite. Unfortunately this chocolate cake would be too rich for my book club, they love cakes more like my orange and lemon cake. Great for mahjong though.

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    1. ooh that's funny. Yep def. beans. I think you are right about using sour cream or yoghurt etc. Just fatty additions:) I love a bundt tin!

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  20. Oh yes I'd better fix that :) Thanks for letting me know. It's not all that rich Pauline. But I get what you say about liking citrus-y cakes. Happy Easter.

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  21. No, I'm not familiar with Dylan Hollis - surely will check some videos! And those vintage recipes can really be... peculiar, to say the least! I actually knew you can use mayo in sweet baking, but I've always been quite sceptical about trying it. The cake looks and sounds tasty, I must admit. And of course Kahlua makes everything better :)

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    1. I think he has actually stopped making new videos, sadly but his old ones are still up and fabulous. Yep those vintage recipes can be very interesting.

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  22. No, I'm not familiar with Dylan Hollis - surely will check some videos! And those vintage recipes can really be... peculiar, to say the least! I actually knew you can use mayo in sweet baking, but I've always been quite sceptical about trying it. The cake looks and sounds tasty, I must admit. And of course Kahlua makes everything better :)

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