2 cups all-purpose flour
1 cup packed dark brown sugar
½ cup unsweetened cocoa powder
2 tsp instant decaf or coffee powder
2 tsp baking soda
¼ tsp salt
¼ cup extra virgin olive oil (EVOO)
1 tsp pure vanilla extract
1 1/4 cup Dragon’s Milk (room temp) or any dark beer
½ cup semi-sweet chocolate chips
- Preheat oven to 350 degrees
- Grease and sugar an 8” springform
- Combine dry ingredients in food processor
- Add wet ingredients except beer, pulse a few times
- Add beer and mix enough to blend well
- Pour batter into greased and sugared prepared pan.
- Bake 50-55 minutes until cake springs under pressure
- Cool before removing from springform pan
- Drizzle with icing (recipe below)
ICING – While the cake is in the oven, mix the following in a blender until it’s completely smooth
- 1 can full fat coconut milk
- ½ cup cocoa powder
- ½ cup semi-sweet chocolate chips
- ¼ cup dark brown sugar
- 1 tsp pure vanilla extract
- 1 tsp instant decaf or coffee powder
- 1 tsp ground cinnamon
- Pinch of salt
p. 173 Battered: A Whipped and Sipped Mystery
Alene had gone off to college and forgotten all about Neal Dunn, until a summer day after her third year at Northwestern, when they had bumped into each other at a Wrigleyville bar. Neal bought her a beer and invited her to a Cubs game. That had been her first stout, and she thought it was so yummy she bought a six-pack and shared it with Ruthie, who went on to invent a stout cake. They changed “beer” to “bear” so as not to alarm the customers, and it worked (Cocoa Bear Cake).
Neal told her that his seats were thirty rows at the first base line, and because – like everyone that year – Alene idolized Sammy Sosa, she’d accepted his invitation. She had a great time and didn’t feel at all as if she’d used him for the tickets, but she felt obligated to go on a second date. That was on his friend’s boat out on the lake, where the soft breeze felt lovely, at first, after a sweltering day. However, there were way too many people. They were drinking and bragging about themselves and it was too loud on deck to hold a conversation. Alene started to get queasy, and it had not been a successful evening.
