Chocolate Cake with Peanut Butter Mousse

I got my bake on today.... and I am quite pleased that I only messed up once, and it wasn't a tragedy : ) Nor did I forget the sugar (although I did have to run up to the store again b/c I apparently only had 1 cup of sugar left in the house.. why I dunno... but that problem has been averted) 

I made a chocolate mousse cake with peanut butter mousse and chocolate curls to top it off.. all from scratch people.... wohoo me! I haven't baked a cake in awhile, think the last was the cupcakes for dinner at the Calderwoods... that was awhile ago...

The cake is fun and easy, and strangely it has a whole cup of coffee in it.

I got the cake recipe and ideas off of Sweet Tooths blog site... which does look a little more mousse-y, and she did a hazelnut mousse version.

Chocolate Cake

1-3/4 cups all purpose flour

2 cups sugar

3/4 cups good cocoa powder

2 tsp baking soda

1 tsp baking powder

1 tsp kosher salt

1 cup buttermilk

1/2 cup vegetable oil

2 large eggs

1 tsp pure vanilla extract

1 cup freshly brewed hot coffee

- Preheat the oven to 350 degrees. Prepare you 8" cake rounds by greasing and flouring them

- Sift the flour, sugar, cocoa, baking soda, baking powder, and salt together into a bowl and mix until well combined

- In another bowl, combine the buttermilk, oil, eggs, and vanilla. With the mixer on low speed, slowly add the wet ingredients to the dry

- With the mixer still on low, add the coffee and stir just to combine

- Split the batter into the prepared pans

- Bake for 35-40 minutes, or until cake tester comes out clean

- Cool in pans for 30 minutes, then turn onto a cooling rack to cool completely

- Once cooled, use a large serrated knife to evenly split each layer into 2 and level off any domes from baking ( I just cooked 4 separate cakes to avoid having to split them into 2)

- Layer cakes and mousse, sprinkling toasted hazelnuts between each layer for a nice crunch. (Its ideally for a hazelnut mousse cake)

(Here is where the mistake happened)
I have not ever made Mousse before, and was talking to one of my lovely friends on the phone while making it. After getting off the phone I realized I was suppose to whip the whipping cream (go figure) separate, til stiff, and then fold it in...

well I had just added the whipping cream straight to the mixture and beat it in with the mixer... whoops!. It turned out fine, I mean I suppose its more icing like, rather than mousse-y... but its still delicious and edible.

The mousse recipe I used is here on grouprecipes.com.

Peanut butter Mousse

• 1 18 oz jar creamy peanut butter
• 2 8 oz pkgs cream cheese, room tempshopping list
• 2 cups powdered sugar
• 2 Tbsp vanilla extract
• 2 cups chilled whipping cream

1.  Bring cream cheese to room temp.
2.  Using electric mixer, beat peanut butter and cream cheese in large bowl to blend.
3.  Add powdered sugar and vanilla extract and beat until well blended.
4.  Using clean, dry, COLD beaters, beat 2 cups whipping cream in a COLD medium bowl until stiff peaks form. (This is the part I didn't read or follow :X )
5. FOLD (do not stir) into peanut bitter mixture in 4 additions.
6. Enjoy!

And the chocolate curls are discussed (and pretty super easy) on the pioneer womans blog. ( I also plan on getting sufficiently lost on her site finding lots of other fun things to make).

When I make these again, Im probably going to half the amounts she used, I had a small pan, and it got thick b/c I ran out of room to spread it out thin like she says too... and it made way more curls then I needed, (but it was also nice to have extra practice and mess up times)  I ended up just putting the extra in a Tupperware container and stuck it in the freezer.

And now the cake is chillin' in the fridge, because frankly, I feel like it might melt and slip-slide off itself. I def recommend if you are making this for an event, to assemble on location, It gets a little wiggly with all the mousse between the layers. (Or again this could be because of my human error in making the mousse)

Anyhow now I am off to make dinner... which is another new adventure. I will share later I am sure, if it is at yummy as I think it will be.